Nigeria military closes state border with Cameroon

February 22, 2014

YOLA, Nigeria (AP) — Nigeria's military says it has closed hundreds of miles (kilometers) of its northeastern border with Cameroon to stop Islamic extremists using the country as a haven and launch pad for attacks.

Brig. Gen. Rogers Nicholas of the 23rd Armored Brigade told reporters Saturday he was exercising emergency powers because it is "imperative" to seal the border between Cameroon and Nigeria's Adamawa state against illegal crossings.

He said customs and immigration officials are working with soldiers and police "to ensure that nothing crosses into Nigeria." Large stretches of that porous border are generally left unpatrolled. The border between Borno state and Cameroon, which Nigerian troops and a jet bomber crossed last month in pursuit of extremists, apparently remains open.

The move will affect hundreds of traders who routinely cross the border.

Attackers hurts dozens at Thai anti-govt rally

February 22, 2014

BANGKOK, Thailand (AP) — At least 35 people were hurt Saturday night when an anti-government rally in eastern Thailand was attacked by gunmen, police said.

Police Lt. Thanabhum Newanit said assailants in a pick-up truck attacked a the rally held by the People's Democratic Reform Committee in the province of Trat, about 300 kilometers (180 miles) east of Bangkok.

He said attackers shot into the crowd and two explosive devices went off. It was not clear if the protest group, which uses armed guards, fought back. Hospitals said several of those hurt were in intensive care or undergoing surgery.

Protest-linked violence has increased recently, in the forms of fighting with police and attacks by unknown parties on the protest sites, which are mainly in the capital, Bangkok. On Friday night six people were hurt when unknown attackers threw a grenade into a protest crowd in the capital.

In the past three months 15 people have been killed and hundreds injured. The protesters want Prime Minister Yingluck Shinawatra to resign to make way for an appointed interim government to implement anti-corruption reforms.

Thailand has been riven by sometimes violent political conflict since 2006, when then-Prime Minister Thaksin Shinawatra, Yingluck's brother, was ousted by a military coup after being accused of corruption and abuse of power. Thaksin's supporters and opponents have since then taken to the streets for extended periods in a power struggle.

In 2010, pro-Thaksin "Red Shirts" occupied part of Bangkok for two months. When the army was called out to control them, more than 90 people were killed in violent confrontations. The Red Shirts have mostly kept a low profile during the current political unrest, but as Yingluck faces what her supporters feel are unfair court rulings loosening her grip on power, there are fears they will take to the streets again.

Thaksin and his allies have won every national election since 2001, with his sister taking office in 2011 with a majority of parliamentary seats. Yingluck late last year called early elections to try to reaffirm her mandate, but the protesters disrupted polling, which has yet to be completed, leaving Thailand with a caretaker government. She also faces several legal challenges that could oust her from office.

Thaksin's opponents claim he unfairly uses money politics and populist policies to dominate Thai politics.

ISS technology to 'hear' potential leaks

Houston TX (SPX)
Jul 03, 2013

The hiss of air escaping from a leaky car tire is no one's favorite sound. Even less pleasant? Hearing that hiss of escaping air 250 miles above Earth's surface while inside the pressurized confines of the International Space Station.

According to Eric Madaras, an aerospace technologist at NASA's Langley Research Center in Hampton, Va., if an air leak were to occur aboard the station, alarms would sound, and the astronauts would locate and correct the problem according to procedures. But with only the crew's eyes and ears to go on, pinpointing the source of a leak could be tricky.

Madaras is trying to fix that problem. As the principal investigator for the Ultrasonic Background Noise Test (UBNT) he's leading a study that potentially could help prevent a catastrophic loss of air pressure on a crewed spacecraft.

By observing the high-frequency noise levels generated by hardware and equipment operating in the Destiny laboratory and Tranquility module aboard the space station, Madaras and his team are helping to develop an automated system that would locate air leaks in a space structure's pressure wall - the outside part of the orbiting laboratory that keeps in oxygen.

"If a leak does occur, it's one of those things where you may not have a lot of time," Madaras said. "These guys can always go sit in the Soyuz capsule and close the door and go home. They've got that capability. But no one wants to just abandon ship, so there's always this desire to deal with it."

But dealing with a leak means identifying the source. Right now, that would require someone to listen for the signature hiss of escaping air - not an easy or quick task, especially on a noisy space station that has structures covering the wall where the leak might originate.

That's why, as part of UBNT, astronauts are in the process of installing several distributed impact detection system (DIDS) units on the pressure walls of the space station. DIDS units are high-speed, four-channel digitizers that record ultrasonic noises. Instead of listening for the hiss of air, these units detect the high-frequency sounds moving through the metal itself. Each unit has four pressure-sensitive transducers, which Madaras compares to the pickup coils on an electric guitar.

"That's where the rubber meets the road," Madaras said. "[The transducer] would essentially be stuck on the surface and anything that moves the surface up or down would be picked up."

Fourteen DIDS units will be installed aboard the space station: seven in Destiny and seven in Tranquility.

If all goes according to plan, and Madaras and his UBNT team are able to identify and characterize the day-to-day background noises on the orbiting outpost, they then will be able to develop a system that can pick out leak-generated noises from the clutter.

"One way to look at that is to think about a cocktail party," Madaras said. "It's sometimes very hard to hear people, even near you, because of all the background noises. That's the same phenomenon that this has got to deal with. How do you get that cleaned up so that you can hear specifically the type of noise - the signal - that you're looking for?"

The ability to locate pressure leaks in this way may have applications on Earth. According to Madaras, systems like the one he's working on could be useful when dealing with large pressure vessels containing critical material, like radioactive water at a nuclear plant.

Right now, though, the focus of the research is on providing the crew aboard the space station with a useful tool, one that may give an astronaut just enough advanced warning to patch a leak and save a module from being permanently closed off.

"The idea of giving them more time, trying to help them out and get that part done so they can get to the leak, and now they have the tools to fix the leak," Madaras said. "That, to me, would be a good deal."

Source: Space-Travel.
Link: http://www.space-travel.com/reports/ISS_technology_to_hear_potential_leaks_999.html.

Kerberos and Styx: Welcome to the Pluto System

Laurel MD (SPX)
Jul 03, 2013

The names of Pluto's two smallest known moons, previously referred to as "P4" and "P5," have been formally approved by the International Astronomical Union (IAU). P4 has been named Kerberos, after the three-headed dog of Greek mythology.

P5 has been named Styx, after the mythological river that separates the world of the living from the realm of the dead. They join Pluto's previously known moons Charon, Nix and Hydra. According to IAU rules, Pluto's moons are named for characters associated with the Underworld of Greek and Roman mythology.

Mark Showalter, senior research scientist at the SETI Institute in Mountain View, Calif., led the team of astronomers that discovered Kerberos and Styx. Both were first seen in lengthy exposures of the Pluto system obtained by the Hubble Space Telescope. Kerberos was discovered in 2011 and Styx in 2012. The images were obtained in support of NASA's New Horizons mission, which will fly past Pluto in July 2015.

The names were selected based on the results of an unprecedented Internet vote that was held during February 2012. The ballot at plutorocks.seti.org received almost 500,000 votes, including 30,000 write-in suggestions. "I was overwhelmed by the public response to the naming campaign," says Showalter, adding that the website received international attention and half the votes came from outside the U.S.

Kerberos is the Greek form of the name Cerberus, which ranked second in the voting. Styx ranked third. The top vote-getter was "Vulcan," based on a suggestion from actor William Shatner of TV's "Star Trek" fame. Vulcan was the name of the home planet of Star Trek character Mr. Spock.

The IAU gave serious consideration to this name, which happens to be shared by the Roman god of volcanoes. However, because the name has already been used in astronomy, and because the Roman god is not closely associated with Pluto, this proposal was rejected. "I am grateful to the IAU for giving such careful consideration to our suggestions," says Showalter.

New Horizons will provide up-close looks at Kerberos, Styx and their companion moons in 2015, when it becomes the first spacecraft to fly through the Pluto system. "The discoveries of Kerberos and Styx add to the mysteries surrounding the formation of the Pluto system," says New Horizons Principal Investigator Alan Stern, of the Southwest Research Institute.

During the flyby, the spacecraft will also search for additional moons, which might be too small for the Hubble telescope to detect. Afterward, New Horizons will go on to explore the more distant Kuiper Belt.

Source: Space Daily.
Link: http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Kerberos_and_Styx_Welcome_to_the_Pluto_System_999.html.

Former shuttle runway to launch 'space plane'

June 27, 2013
By Mark K. Matthews

WASHINGTON — A new breed of vacationers — space tourists — could launch from Central Florida as early as 2015 thanks to a new agreement that would put Florida officials in charge of the 3-mile runway at Kennedy Space Center that once was used by the space shuttle.

The preliminary deal, to be announced at KSC on Friday by NASA Administrator Charlie Bolden, would give Space Florida control of one of the largest landing strips in the world and one that's enshrined in space history: Nearly 80 shuttle crews landed there before NASA ended the 30-year program in 2011.

Now it looks likely that the shuttle runway will host a new different type of space traveler: tourists and scientists making suborbital trips on new "space planes" that can launch and land from the massive landing strip.

A top executive with the California company XCOR Aerospace, a space-plane builder that has expressed interest in the runway for months, said the preliminary agreement makes it all but certain that it would establish a base at the strip for "participant flights" — beginning as soon as 2015.

"It's always been our hope to fly from the shuttle-landing facility, and it looks like that's starting to materialize," said Andrew Nelson, chief operating officer of XCOR. A deal to locate at KSC was "99 percent of the way there," he said, with only paperwork remaining.

A new XCOR base at KSC could bring as many as 150 jobs by late 2018 — as well as some wealthy tourists. It costs $95,000 for one seat aboard an XCOR space plane, which is designed to blast a pilot and a tourist as high as 330,000 feet for a five-minute stay in the weightless environment of suborbital space.

No tourists yet have flown, but XCOR hopes to begin test flights with a pilot by the end of this year. The company already has sold 22 seats to the parent company of Axe body spray, which will award them in a global marketing contest that has attracted more than 500,000 entrants.

"Our flight participants will be ecstatic in flying from Florida," Nelson said.

Neither NASA nor Space Florida, the state's public-private promoter of the space industry, would say much publicly before the announcement.

The shuttle-landing facility "provides a unique capability for new and expanding suborbital launch providers … and other aerospace-related businesses," said Frank DiBello, the president of Space Florida, in a statement.

Sources close to the negotiations said a few wrinkles were still being worked out, including when Space Florida would take control of the runway and other nearby buildings such as a control tower. It's not certain whether Space Florida would pay NASA to use the facility, though it would remain under NASA ownership.

Even if there's no "rent" or transfer fee, there's still a clear benefit for NASA. The agency has been under pressure from Washington to cut expenses, and transferring control could save NASA an estimated $2.1 million in operations and maintenance costs, according to NASA documents.

Once in charge, Space Florida would assume these expenses, with the intent of recouping the money from the new tenants it hopes to attract.

In addition to XCOR, another potential customer is Stratolaunch Systems. The Alabama-based company, which counts former NASA chief Mike Griffin on its board, is looking to build a massive aircraft — about twice the size of a 747 — to enable the launch of crew and cargo into space.

The plane would carry a space vehicle high into the atmosphere before releasing it to fly the rest of the way on its own. Stratolaunch officials have said that KSC is one option for a launch site.

A bigger prize, however, could be in the growing business of unmanned aerial vehicles, better known as drones.

After years of use overseas by the U.S. military, drones are poised to go into widespread domestic use — according to one estimate, there could be as many as 30,000 drones in U.S. skies by 2030 — and Space Florida wants to make the state a leader in the fledgling industry.

Space Florida has applied to become one of six sites that the Federal Aviation Administration plans to use to test the integration of drones into U.S. airspace. A key part of Space Florida's bid is using the shuttle-landing facility as a base of operations, with the long-term goal of making the area a hub of drone flights and testing.

Any added activity at KSC also could be a boon for NASA, which is doing what it can to prove its worth in Florida in the aftermath of the shuttle's retirement. Indeed, the announcement comes just a day before Bolden is scheduled to appear at the KSC visitor complex for the opening of its shuttle Atlantis exhibit.

Source: Orlando Sentinel.
Link: http://articles.orlandosentinel.com/2013-06-27/news/os-nasa-shuttle-runway-transfer-20130627_1_space-florida-space-plane-space-shuttle.

Gas-giant exoplanets seen clinging close to their parent stars

Honolulu (UPI)
Jun 27, 2013

U.S. astronomers say they've found distant gas-giant planets are rare around many types of stars and prefer to cling close to their parent stars.

Astronomers at the Gemini Observatory and the University of Hawaii's Institute of Astronomy say the finding could have a significant impact on theories of planetary formation.

Gemini Observatory's recently completed Planet-Finding Campaign found the vast outlying orbital space around many types of stars is largely devoid of gas-giant planets, which apparently tend to dwell close to their parent stars, a university release said Thursday.

"It seems that gas-giant exoplanets are like clinging offspring," Michael Liu, UH astronomer and leader of the Planet-Finding Campaign said.

"Most tend to shun orbital zones far from their parents," he said. "In our search, we could have found gas giants beyond orbital distances corresponding to Uranus and Neptune in our own Solar System, but we didn't find any."

The Gemini Observatory is an international collaboration with two identical 8-meter telescopes, one in Hawaii and one in Chile.

The results from the Gemini South telescope in Chile will help scientists better understand how gas-giant planets form, as the orbital distances of planets are a key signature that astronomers use to test exoplanet formation theories, Liu said.

The findings are mirrored in our own solar system, the researchers said.

"The two largest planets in our Solar System, Jupiter and Saturn, are huddled close to our Sun, within 10 times the distance between the Earth and sun," Eric Nielsen of the University of Hawaii points out. "We found that this lack of gas-giant planets in more distant orbits is typical for nearby stars over a wide range of masses."

Source: Space Daily.
Link: http://www.spacedaily.com/reports/Gas-giant_exoplanets_seen_clinging_close_to_their_parent_stars_999.html.

8 Russians convicted over 2012 anti-Putin protest

February 21, 2014

MOSCOW (AP) — A Moscow judge on Friday convicted eight anti-government protesters of rioting during a 2012 protest against Vladimir Putin, following a trial seen as part of the Kremlin's efforts to stifle dissent.

The judge pronounced the defendants guilty of a wide range of charges at the start of her verdict statement Friday. Sentencing was postponed until Monday. Outside the court building, several hundred people, including two freed members of the punk band Pussy Riot, rallied in support of the defendants, and cries of "Freedom!" and "Shame!" wafted into the courtroom. Police arrested about 50 people.

The May 6, 2012, protest on the eve of Putin's inauguration for a third presidential term turned violent after police restricted access to Bolotnaya Square, across the river from the Kremlin, where the protesters had planned to gather. Some of the blocked demonstrators hurled bottles and pieces of asphalt at police, who struck protesters with clubs and arrested more than 400.

The Bolotnaya protest followed bigger rallies against Putin that attracted an estimated 100,000 onto the streets of Moscow, the largest show of discontent since the collapse of the Soviet Union. After his inauguration, Putin introduced tough anti-protest laws that sharply hiked fines for participants in unapproved demonstrations and imposed restrictions on non-government organizations.

"I came here because I was there too on May 6," said Diana Tishino, a manager in an IT firm who was standing outside the court. "I hope this (the verdict) will be some kind of impetus — maybe not for a ton of people, but for the most active ones."

Twenty-nine Bolotnaya protesters faced criminal charges, but 11 were released as part of a December amnesty that was widely seen as an attempt by Putin to improve Russia's image before the Winter Olympic Games in Sochi. Others have already been convicted or are still facing trial.