Mon-Jas Charan
Message Board Member
"Poena Vigoratus. Pullus cavo vix. Palma , est eternus"
Posts: 2,630
|
Post by Mon-Jas Charan on Feb 19, 2008 18:33:46 GMT -5
US may shoot down satellite Wednesday
By ROBERT BURNS, AP Military Writer
An attempt to blast a crippled U.S. spy satellite out of the sky using a Navy heat-seeking missile — possibly on Wednesday night — would be the first real-world use of this piece of the Pentagon's missile defense network. But that is not the mission for which it was intended.
The attempted shootdown, already approved by President Bush, is seen by some as blurring the lines between defending against a weapon like a long-range missile and targeting satellites in orbit.
The three-stage Navy missile, designated the SM-3, has chalked up a high rate of success in a series of tests since 2002 — in each case targeting a short- or medium-range ballistic missile, never a satellite. A hurry-up program to adapt the missile for this anti-satellite mission was completed in a matter of weeks; Navy officials say the changes will be reversed once this satellite is down.
The government issued notices to aviators and mariners to remain clear of a section of the Pacific beginning at 10:30 p.m. EST Wednesday, indicating the first window of opportunity to launch an SM-3 missile from a Navy cruiser, the USS Lake Erie, in an effort to hit the wayward satellite.
Having lost power shortly after it reached orbit in late 2006, the satellite is well below the altitude of a normal satellite. The Pentagon wants to hit it with an SM-3 missile just before it re-enters Earth's atmosphere, in that way minimizing the amount of debris that would remain in space.
Adding to the difficulty of the mission, the missile will have to do better than just hit the bus-sized satellite, a Navy official said Tuesday. It needs to strike the relatively small fuel tank aboard the spacecraft in order to accomplish the main goal, which is to eliminate the toxic fuel that could injure or even kill people if it reached Earth. The Navy official described technical aspects of the missile's capabilities on condition that he not be identified.
Also complicating the effort will be the fact that the satellite has no heat-generating propulsion system on board. That makes it more difficult for the Navy missile's heat-seeking system to work, although the official said software changes had been made to compensate for the lack of heat.
The Pentagon press secretary, Geoff Morrell, said Defense Secretary Robert Gates was briefed on the shootdown plan Tuesday by the two officers who will advise him on exactly when to launch the missile — Gen. Kevin Chilton, the head of Strategic Command, and Gen. James Cartwright, the vice chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, who held Chilton's post until last summer.
"We all have an agreed-upon series of steps that need to be taken for this launch to be given the go-ahead," Morrell said, adding that no final decision has been made on when to make the attempt.
"The secretary is the one who will decide if and when to pull the trigger," the spokesman said, adding that Gates was departing Wednesday morning on an around-the-world trip that will include a stop in Honolulu, Hawaii, where a military command center will be monitoring the satellite operation.
Left alone, the satellite would be expected to hit Earth during the first week of March. About half of the 5,000-pound spacecraft would be expected to survive its blazing descent through the atmosphere and would scatter debris over several hundred miles.
Known by its military designation US 193, the satellite was launched in December 2006. It lost power and its central computer failed almost immediately afterward, leaving it uncontrollable. It carried a sophisticated and secret imaging sensor.
Morrell said the cost of adapting the Navy anti-missile system for the shootdown mission was $30 million to $40 million.
China and Russia have expressed concern at the planned shootdown, saying it could harm security in outer space. At the State Department on Tuesday, spokesman Sean McCormack told reporters that the U.S. action is meant to protect people from the hazardous fuel and is not a weapons test.
China was criticized last year when it used a missile to destroy a defunct weather satellite.
The Navy ship-based system, which includes a command-and-control and radar system known as Aegis, as well as the SM-3 missiles, is just one segment of a larger, far-flung missile defense system that has been in development by the American military for more than three decades.
Managed by the Pentagon's Missile Defense Agency, the program includes interceptor missiles sitting in underground silos at Fort Greely, Alaska, and at Vandenberg Air Force Base, Calif., as well as radars around the world that are used to track an enemy missile and help the interceptor hit it.
As currently configured the missile defense system is designed mainly to counter a threat from North Korea. The Bush administration, fearing an emerging missile threat from Iran, is in talks with Poland and the Czech Republic to place interceptor missiles in Poland and a tracking radar in the Czech Republic. Russia has objected strenuously, saying such bases would be a threat to Russia.
___
Defense Department: www.defenselink.mil
|
|
Mon-Jas Charan
Message Board Member
"Poena Vigoratus. Pullus cavo vix. Palma , est eternus"
Posts: 2,630
|
Post by Mon-Jas Charan on Feb 21, 2008 10:34:23 GMT -5
Who's Orbiting the Moon? 02.20.2008
February 20, 2008: The space around Earth is a busy place, as teeming with traffic as a roundabout. More than 500 active satellites are bustling about up there right now. Some are transmitting radio, television, and telephone signals; others are gathering information about Earth's atmosphere and weather; still others are helping people navigate down here; and the rest are conducting space research.
Soon the space around the moon will be busy too. China, Japan, India, Russia, and the US either have sent or plan to send satellites there for a bird's-eye view of lunar features and resources.
Why is the moon such a draw?
For one thing, it's there – close by. We can see it better than we can see anything else in space. And it's reachable, even by countries whose space programs are in their infancy. It represents a grand first step for them.
Right: The crescent moon over Beijing, China, contributed by a reader of Science@NASA. [Larger image]
Indeed, two of those nations are already there: Japan and China are orbiting the moon right now.
Japan's Kaguya spacecraft, formerly known as SELENE, reached the moon in October 2007. Its mission: to make detailed maps of the moon's surface, to search for water (a key resource for future human landings) frozen in deep craters, and to study the moon's gravitational field.
Barbara Cohen, a lunar scientist and self-described "lunatic" at NASA's Marshall Space Flight Center, says "Kaguya is the Cadillac of missions right now. It is huge, consisting of three separate satellites, and has excellent instruments. It will do a lot of particles and fields work that no other currently planned orbiter will do. Plus it will be able to train all its instruments toward the same spot on the moon simultaneously."
Kaguya's main satellite carries 13 science instruments, including an HDTV (high-definition TV) camera, which is sending back incredible images of lunar landscapes stretching into the distance like an open road and Earth rising over the lunar horizon:
Barely a month after Japan reached the moon, China followed suit: China's Chang'e-1 spacecraft entered lunar orbit on November 5, 2007. During its 1-year mission, it will map the moon by taking three-dimensional images of the entire lunar surface. This satellite will send back the first detailed pictures of some areas near the poles where water ice is most likely to be found.
Chang'e-1 is the first in a series of three Chinese spacecraft: Chang'e-2 will be a lander with a rover, and Chang'e-3 will return moon samples to Earth. The Chinese hope someday to send humans to build a lunar outpost, but for now they're focusing on gathering knowledge and experience step-by-step.
Later this year India plans to send its own Chandrayaan-1 probe to orbit the moon. In Sanskrit, "Chandrayaan" means "Moon Craft." A NASA-sponsored instrument, the Moon Mineralogy Mapper, will ride along and use an infrared spectrometer to survey the lunar terrain and give us a highly detailed picture of mineral locations. Chandrayaan-2, planned for 2010 or 2011, will place a robotic rover on the moon. The rover will wheel around on the lunar surface, pick up samples of soil or rocks, do chemical analysis, and send the data to the spacecraft orbiting above.
NASA is very much a part of this "Great Moon Rush." Later this year, the agency plans to launch the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter (LRO), a spacecraft bristling with instruments to map the moon and locate key resources ranging from water to building materials.
"The LRO mission will provide the best resolution images – at about 50 cm per pixel – out of all the instruments currently headed to the moon," says Cohen. "This means we will be able to see rocks that are about two feet in diameter. This lets us look at potential landing sites to assess the terrain and hazards for a human return. LRO will also have an instrument that flies 'tissue-equivalent plastic' to assess radiation damage to human skin." (Readers, stay tuned for a series of upcoming Science@NASA stories about LRO and its capabilities.)
In 2011 NASA's Gravity Recovery and Interior Laboratory, or GRAIL, will peer deep inside the moon to reveal its anatomy and history. This mission, part of NASA's Discovery Program, will fly twin spacecraft around the moon for several months to measure its gravity field in great detail and answer questions about how Earth and other planets in our solar system formed.
Both LRO and GRAIL will provide valuable information to help plan for a human US return to the moon in the next decade.
The US has already been there, you say? True, but we didn't stay long enough to do much more than scratch the moon's surface, literally. The pull to return is strong. Dr. Wesley Huntress, lunar advocate and Director Emeritus of the Carnegie Institution's Geophysical Laboratory, says it best:
"... many nations with emerging space programs have the moon in their sights. There will be a renaissance in lunar scientific exploration in the next several decades that the US will not want to miss. The pull of the moon to emerging space programs around the world can be a catalyst for a new era of space exploration; one of international cooperation1 ...."
No return would be complete without an original lunar pioneer: Russia. After racing to the moon in the 1970s, the USSR virtually abandoned lunar exploration. Russian scientists nevertheless continued to look longingly toward that silver orb in the night sky, recognizing its great worth for research. Now, the Russian space program, with an eye toward an outpost in the distant future, may launch its Luna-Glob project within the next several years. Plans include an orbiter that will deploy 13 probes, including penetrators and a lander, to answer questions about the moon's origin and search for water ice.
"There is a fair bit of overlap among missions, but this is okay in science," adds Cohen. "We will get more coverage and better resolution by being able to add together data from similar instruments. This is partly by design. NASA doesn't want an over-reliance on other countries to collect the data necessary for a human return to the moon. What if another country canceled its commitment to fly or their spacecraft failed? We rather fly our own missions with our own instruments to make sure we get our basic data, and then we definitely collaborate with other countries and missions to share, refine and improve the data."
How long will it take for the moon to be encircled with satellite traffic like Earth? Not very long, with the current moon rush. By the end of 2011, nine satellites could be buzzing around up there. That's a pretty good start.
|
|
|
Post by Leda EmBorr on Feb 21, 2008 15:50:42 GMT -5
Gosh, we have such a problem already with orbital space debris... I would think that blasting sattellites would just make it worse! There seriously needs to be a way to retrieve them without blowing them apart!
That is awesome news about the revival of Lunar exploration!! Very hopeful!
Speaking of the moon--- I got to see the Lunar Eclipse last night... I was flying home from Colorado, and the pilot actually got permission to turn the plane to let everyone see! The moon was very high, so the plane must have been almost sideways to get the moon in in view for us!!!!!!
|
|
|
Post by Jedimom/Cor-Al Gelkar on Feb 21, 2008 16:52:45 GMT -5
I saw a little bit. It was too cold to be standing out there for the whole thing! Brrrr!!!!
Oh! ANd I have been hearing a lot of analogies about how the blown up spy satellite looked "like the Death Star being blown up" LOL
|
|
|
Post by Leda EmBorr on Feb 22, 2008 2:26:38 GMT -5
www.news.com.au/story/0,23599,23258003-2,00.html Not sure if it looked like the death star... actually, it's kinda worrisome. They say the debris will fall back to earth and burn up in the atmosphere because of the low altitude of the satellite. That's probably true, but who really knows what they are up to?
|
|
|
Post by Leda EmBorr on Feb 22, 2008 2:31:42 GMT -5
And here is Andrew's take on it... hope he doesn't mind me posting his cartoon. Yes this is the only way I keep up with my son. www.andrewborno.com/
|
|
Mon-Jas Charan
Message Board Member
"Poena Vigoratus. Pullus cavo vix. Palma , est eternus"
Posts: 2,630
|
Post by Mon-Jas Charan on Feb 29, 2008 19:27:58 GMT -5
Ulysses Says Goodbye Posted by Kelly Beatty, February 29, 2008
Just last month I wrote about how Ulysses, a European spacecraft launched in 1990, was completing its third and likely final pass over the Sun's polar regions. At the time it looked as if European Space Agency engineers would be able to sustain the craft for a couple more years. But bad luck has struck, and now it appears the mission is in its final days.
A joint mission between ESA and NASA, Ulysses was originally designed for a lifetime of five years. It's powered by plutonium-fueled generators, and their electrical output has been declining slowly. Recently the waning watts reached the point that not everything aboard could be operated at once.
So, last month, the ESA team tried turning off a key part of its communications system called a traveling-wave tube. Unfortunately, the TWT wouldn't switch back on, effectively dooming further operations. Worse, the dwindling power means that onboard heaters won't be able to keep the craft's temperature above 35°F (2°C), at which point the hydrazine fuel onboard will freeze.
Ground controllers are still in contact with Ulysses, but only a trickle of its data is reaching Earth. In an ESA press release about the situation, project scientist Richard Marsden states that his team will keep the craft going for as long as they can.
|
|
Mon-Jas Charan
Message Board Member
"Poena Vigoratus. Pullus cavo vix. Palma , est eternus"
Posts: 2,630
|
Post by Mon-Jas Charan on Feb 29, 2008 21:09:11 GMT -5
NASA Baffled by Unexplained Force Acting on Space Probes By Charles Q. Choi Special to SPACE.com posted: 29 February 2008 11:17 am ET
Mysteriously, five spacecraft that flew past the Earth have each displayed unexpected anomalies in their motions. These newfound enigmas join the so-called "Pioneer anomaly" as hints that unexplained forces may appear to act on spacecraft.
A decade ago, after rigorous analyses, anomalies were seen with the identical Pioneer 10 and 11 spacecraft as they hurtled out of the solar system. Both seemed to experience a tiny but unexplained constant acceleration toward the sun.
A host of explanations have been bandied about for the Pioneer anomaly. At times these are rooted in conventional science — perhaps leaks from the spacecraft have affected their trajectories. At times these are rooted in more speculative physics — maybe the law of gravity itself needs to be modified.
Now Jet Propulsion Laboratory astronomer John Anderson and his colleagues — who originally helped uncover the Pioneer anomaly — have discovered that five spacecraft each raced either a tiny bit faster or slower than expected when they flew past the Earth en route to other parts of the solar system.
'Humble and perplexed'
The researchers looked at six deep-space probes — Galileo I and II to Jupiter, the NEAR mission to the asteroid Eros, the Rosetta probe to a comet, Cassini to Saturn, and the MESSENGER craft to Mercury. Each spacecraft flew past the our planet to either gain or lose orbital energy in their quests to reach their eventual targets.
In five of the six flybys, the scientists have confirmed anomalies.
"I am feeling both humble and perplexed by this," said Anderson, who is now working as a retiree. "There is something very strange going on with spacecraft motions. We have no convincing explanation for either the Pioneer anomaly or the flyby anomaly."
In the one probe the researchers did not confirm a noticeable anomaly with, MESSENGER, the spacecraft approached the Earth at about latitude 31 degrees north and receded from the Earth at about latitude 32 degrees south. "This near-perfect symmetry about the equator seemed to result in a very small velocity change, in contrast to the five other flybys," Anderson explained — so small no anomaly could be confirmed.
The five other flybys involved flights whose incoming and outgoing trajectories were asymmetrical with each other in terms of their orientation with Earth's equator.
For instance, the NEAR mission approached Earth at about latitude 20 south and receded from the planet at about latitude 72 south. The spacecraft then seemed to fly 13 millimeters per second faster than expected. While this is just one-millionth of that probe's total velocity, the precision of the velocity measurements was 0.1 millimeters per second, carried out as they were using radio waves bounced off the craft. This suggests the anomaly seen is real — and one needing an explanation.
The fact this effect seems most evident with flybys most asymmetrical with respect to Earth's equator "suggests that the anomaly is related to Earth's rotation," Anderson said.
As to whether these new anomalies are linked with the Pioneer anomaly, "I would be very surprised if we have discovered two independent spacecraft anomalies," Anderson told SPACE.com. "I suspect they are connected, but I really do not know."
Unbound idea
These anomalies might be effects we see with an object possessing a spacecraft's mass, between 660 and 2,200 lbs. (300 and 1,000 kg), Anderson speculated.
"Another thing in common between the Pioneer and these flybys is what you would call an unbound orbit around a central body," Anderson said. "For instance, the Pioneers are flying out of the solar system — they're not bound to their central body, the sun. For the other flybys, the Earth is the central body. These kinds of orbits just don't occur very often in nature — it could be when you get into an unbound orbit around a central body, something goes on that's not in our standard models."
The researchers are now collaborating with German colleagues to search for possible anomalies in the Rosetta probe's second flyby of the Earth on November 13.
"We should continue to monitor spacecraft during Earth flybys. We should look carefully at newly recovered Pioneer data for more evidence of the Pioneer anomaly," Anderson added. "We should think about launching a dedicated mission on an escape trajectory from the solar system, just to look for anomalies in its motion."
Montana State University physicist Ronald Hellings, who did not participate in this study, said, "There's definitely something going on. Whether that's because of new physics or some problem with the model we have is yet to be worked out, as far as I know. A lot of people are trying to look into this."
Anderson and his colleagues will detail their latest findings in an upcoming issue of the journal Physical Review Letters.
|
|
Mon-Jas Charan
Message Board Member
"Poena Vigoratus. Pullus cavo vix. Palma , est eternus"
Posts: 2,630
|
Post by Mon-Jas Charan on Mar 16, 2008 23:52:42 GMT -5
50 Year Anniversary
On March 17, 2008 the Vanguard 1 satellite, the oldest object in space from Planet Earth, celebrated its 50th year in Earth orbit.
Vanguard 1 was a small earth-orbiting satellite designed to test the launch capabilities of a three-stage launch vehicle and the effects of the environment on a satellite and its systems in Earth orbit. It also was used to obtain geodetic measurements through orbit analysis.
Spacecraft and Subsystems
The spacecraft was a 1.47-kg aluminum sphere 16.5 cm in diameter. It contained a 10-mW, 108-MHz mercury-battery powered transmitter and a 5-mW, 108.03-MHz transmitter powered by six square (roughly 5 cm on a side) solar cells mounted on the body of the satellite. Six 30 cm aerials protruded from the sphere. The transmitters were used primarily for engineering and tracking data, but were also used to determine the total electron content between the satellite and ground stations. Vanguard also carried two thermistors which measured the interior temperature over 16 days in order to track the effectiveness of the thermal protection.
Mission Profile
The three stage launch vehicle placed Vanguard into a 654 x 3969 km 134.2 minute orbit inclined at 34.25 degrees. Original estimates had the orbit lasting for 2000 years, but it was discovered that solar radiation pressure and atmospheric drag during high levels of solar activity produced significant perturbations in the perigee height of the satellite, which caused a significant decrease in its expected lifetime to only about 240 years. The battery powered transmitter stopped operating in June 1958 when the batteries ran down. The solar powered transmitter operated until May 1964 (when the last signals were received in Quito, Ecuador) after which the spacecraft was optically tracked from Earth.
A small group of former U.S. Naval Research Laboratory and NASA workers has been in communication, and a number of government agencies have been asked to commemorate the event. The Naval Research Laboratory will commemorate the event with a day-long meeting at NRL on March 17, 2008. The National Academy of Sciences has scheduled some seminars to mark the 50th anniversary of the International Geophysical Year, but at this time, these are the only official observances known.
|
|
Mon-Jas Charan
Message Board Member
"Poena Vigoratus. Pullus cavo vix. Palma , est eternus"
Posts: 2,630
|
Post by Mon-Jas Charan on Mar 21, 2008 14:04:27 GMT -5
JULES VERNE AND THE ISS: The European Space Agency's new robotic cargo carrier, the Jules Verne, has parked itself in orbit 2000 kilometers ahead of the International Space Station. This sets the stage for some beautiful double flybys in the nights ahead--the Jules Verne appears first, as bright as a 1st magnitude star, followed four and a half minutes later by the even brighter International Space Station. This is a must-see for sky watchers in cities and countryside alike. Visit spaceweather.com for flyby photos and timetables.
|
|
Mon-Jas Charan
Message Board Member
"Poena Vigoratus. Pullus cavo vix. Palma , est eternus"
Posts: 2,630
|
Post by Mon-Jas Charan on Apr 16, 2008 9:24:26 GMT -5
German schoolboy, 13, corrects NASA's asteroid figures: paper Tue Apr 15, 5:44 PM ET
A 13-year-old German schoolboy corrected NASA's estimates on the chances of an asteroid colliding with Earth, a German newspaper reported Tuesday, after spotting the boffins had miscalculated.
Nico Marquardt used telescopic findings from the Institute of Astrophysics in Potsdam (AIP) to calculate that there was a 1 in 450 chance that the Apophis asteroid will collide with Earth, the Potsdamer Neuerster Nachrichten reported.
NASA had previously estimated the chances at only 1 in 45,000 but told its sister organisation, the European Space Agency (ESA), that the young whizzkid had got it right.
The schoolboy took into consideration the risk of Apophis running into one or more of the 40,000 satellites orbiting Earth during its path close to the planet on April 13 2029.
Those satellites travel at 3.07 kilometres a second (1.9 miles), at up to 35,880 kilometres above earth -- and the Apophis asteroid will pass by earth at a distance of 32,500 kilometres.
If the asteroid strikes a satellite in 2029, that will change its trajectory making it hit earth on its next orbit in 2036.
Both NASA and Marquardt agree that if the asteroid does collide with earth, it will create a ball of iron and iridium 320 metres (1049 feet) wide and weighing 200 billion tonnes, which will crash into the Atlantic Ocean.
The shockwaves from that would create huge tsunami waves, destroying both coastlines and inland areas, whilst creating a thick cloud of dust that would darken the skies indefinitely.
The 13-year old made his discovery as part of a regional science competition for which he submitted a project entitled: "Apophis -- The Killer Astroid."
|
|
Mon-Jas Charan
Message Board Member
"Poena Vigoratus. Pullus cavo vix. Palma , est eternus"
Posts: 2,630
|
Post by Mon-Jas Charan on Apr 16, 2008 23:23:53 GMT -5
April 16, 2008NASA Statement on Student Asteroid Calculations
Dwayne Brown Headquarters, Washington 202-358-1726 dwayne.c.brown@nasa.gov
RELEASE: 08-103
NASA STATEMENT ON STUDENT ASTEROID CALCULATIONS
WASHINGTON -- The Near-Earth Object Program Office at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., has not changed its current estimates for the very low probability (1 in 45,000) of an Earth impact by the asteroid Apophis in 2036.
Contrary to recent press reports, NASA offices involved in near-Earth object research were not contacted and have had no correspondence with a young German student, who claims the Apophis impact probability is far higher than the current estimate.
This student's conclusion reportedly is based on the possibility of a collision with an artificial satellite during the asteroid's close approach in April 2029. However, the asteroid will not pass near the main belt of geosynchronous satellites in 2029, and the chance of a collision with a satellite is exceedingly remote.
Therefore, consideration of this satellite collision scenario does not effect the current impact probability estimate for Apophis, which remains at 1 in 45,000.
|
|
|
Post by Emerita on Apr 18, 2008 14:54:47 GMT -5
Halley's Comet in 2062 - other than that I don't know I'll be 110 years old. I hope I can stay awake long enough to see it.......
|
|
|
Post by Emerita on Apr 18, 2008 15:02:50 GMT -5
NASA Baffled by Unexplained Force Acting on Space Probes
I was just watching...honest........ I don't practice anymore when I am skywatching......
|
|
Mon-Jas Charan
Message Board Member
"Poena Vigoratus. Pullus cavo vix. Palma , est eternus"
Posts: 2,630
|
Post by Mon-Jas Charan on Aug 26, 2008 9:59:09 GMT -5
Tests clear way for "Big Bang" experiment Mon Aug 25, 2008 2:55pm EDT by Robert Evans GENEVA (Reuters) - Tests have cleared the way for the start-up next month of an experiment to restage a mini-version underground of the "Big Bang" which created the universe 15 billion years ago, the project chief said on Monday.
Lyn Evans of the European Organization for Nuclear Research (CERN) said weekend trials in the vast underground LHC machine in which the particle-smashing experiment will take place over the coming months and years "went without a hitch".
"We look forward to a resounding success when we make our first attempt to send a beam all the way round the LHC," said Evans, who heads the multinational team of scientists that shaped the project and the machine, the Large Hadron Collider.
The final tests involved pumping a single bunch of energy particles from the project's accelerator into the 27-km (17-mile) beam pipe of the collider and steering them counter- clockwise around it for about 3 kms (2 miles).
Earlier in the month a clockwise trial in the LHC -- which runs deep under French and Swiss territory between the Jura Mountains and Lake Geneva -- had been equally successful, CERN said.
The LHC team now plans to send a full particle beam all the way around the collider pipe in one direction on September 10 as a prelude to sending beams in both directions and smashing them together later in the year. That collision, in which both particle clusters will be traveling at the speed of light, will be monitored on computers at CERN and laboratories around the world by scientists looking for, among other things, a particle that made life possible. The elusive particle, which has been dubbed the "Higgs boson" after Scottish physicist Peter Higgs who first postulated nearly 50 years ago that it must exist, is thought to be the mysterious factor that holds matter together. Recreating a "Big Bang," which most scientists believe is the only explanation of an expanding universe, ought to show how stars and planets came together out of the primeval chaos that followed, the CERN team believes. Efforts to track it down in a predecessor to the LHC at CERN, and in another experiment in the United States, failed. But scientists are confident that the vast leap in technologies represented by the LHC will make the difference. Higgs, a 79-year-old Edinburgh University professor who as an atheist angrily rejects the idea of calling the boson the "God particle" -- believes it will show up very quickly once the beams are colliding in the LHC. "If it doesn't," he said during a visit to CERN earlier this year, "I shall be very, very puzzled." (Editing by Jonathan Lynn and Mary Gabriel)
|
|