This Week in Science - online science radio program

[Marshall Clark]

Hi All,

Just wanted to take a moment to introduce our radio show “This Week in Science”.

This Week in Science (TWIS) is an irreverent look at the week in science and technology news. Each week we discuss the latest events in science and technology in a way that is entertaining yet informative. The show is hosted by Kirsten Sanford, a PhD candidate in neuroscience; and Justin Jackson, a smart-alek part-time washing machine salesman & full-time quantum physics aficionado.

TWIS has been radio broadcasting for over five years on KDVS 90.3 FM at the University of California, Davis. The show is also available online via archived MP3s at our website http://www.twis.org as well as via podcasting through iTunes.

For those of you not familiar with it, Podcasting is a very convenient way to receive the online audio broadcasts since you only need to subscribe one time – after that the latest episode of the broadcast is automatically downloaded to your computer so you can listen to it at your convenience. Here’s a link with instructions on how to receive the TWIS Podcast for any who are interested: http://www.twis.org/podcast_subscribe.html

If you have any questions, comments, or recommendations please contact either myself or the show producer Kirsten Sanford at kirstenATthisweekinscience.com. We try to reply to every email we receive and welcome all criticism (constructive or otherwise).

Hope you enjoy the show.

Cheers,
Marshall Clark
Technical Director
This Week in Science - The Weekly Science Radio Show
http://www.twis.org
http://phobos.apple.com/WebObjects/M...st?id=73330501

[Tormod]

Thanks! I'll check out your podcasts.

[UncleAl]

Now ya done it - ya went and pissed off Uncle Al by bleating Official truth - Not A Space Agency voluminous cheap propagandistic swill that would not entertain anybody capable of balancing a checkbook.

http://www.twis.org/
Wednesday, July 13, 2005

"a successful shuttle launch will bring the US back into the forefront of space exploration."

1) The execrable Space Scuttle was designed as a low Earth orbit nuclear bomber - complete with EMP-resistant woven ferrite core memory.

2) The Space Scuttle was an expensive dysfunctional disaster from Day One. The major payload of the Space Scuttle is the Space Scuttle. Boosting mass into low Earth orbit in the Space Scuttle costs $30/gram. Look up the price of gold. Cf: Pieces of the One True Cross. The energetic cost of ground to low Earth orbit is almost exactly an object's weight in coal, burned. How much does coal cost? (at the end)

3) The entire Space Scuttle exercise is political cynosure and porkbarrelling. No sane engineer casts booster segments in California, hauls them to Florida, wastes tonnes of payload with balky joints (Challenger boom-boom) and recovery packages, then recovers and refurbishes the damaged monstrosities at higher cost than that of their original fabrication.

4) A decade of Space Scuttle progam could be boosted in total with a single augmented Saturn V launch at less than 1% of the cumulative price,

http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/nasa2.htm
http://www.mazepath.com/uncleal/nasa3.htm

5) International Space Station Freedom FUBAR Space Hole One Alpha is worse. What idiot at NASA has it orbiting tangent to the surface of the Earth? Tidal forces (quadrupole components of the Earth's divergent gravitational field) want it to be radial to the Earth's center. That's why the hugely useless money burner perpetually destroys $million gyros whose forced precession keeps it aligned.

6)ISS FUBAR has more surface area then ten China Clippers at full sail. It is perpetually de-orbiting from residual air friction. It cannot go into higher orbit where the vacuum is better because the Space Scuttle cannot go into higher orbit if it carries payload. Where is ISS FUBAR gonna splash when the piggybank goes dry?

7) Look up the incidence of radiation cataracts in any astronaut or cosmonaut who spent time in Mir or ISS FUBAR. While you are doing chair parade, locate a SINGLE achievement of micro-gee processing. When you push aside all the goo and dribble of NASA smoke and mirrors you will find... nothing. Not one single real world achievement

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Compare the heat of combustion of coal lump to the kinetic energy of that coal lump in low Earth orbit.

Tabulated heats of combustion for coals range from 2.4-3.2x10^7 J/kg. For an object in low Earth orbit v^2 = Rg, and the kinetic energy/kilogram is Rg/2. With R = 6x10^6 m (from the center of mass) and g =10 m/s^2 that works out to 3x10^7 J/kg. A rocket uses 100X as much energy to put a kilogram of payload in low Earth orbit. The Space Scuttle is nowhere near that efficient - total energy expended vs. boosted mass of net payload.

(gee is ~840 cm/sec^2 at 300 miles altitude)