Hipparcos data will be released to the public next summer, but now is
the time to order catalogs.  Information and an order form are
available at
http://astro.estec.esa.nl/SA-general/Projects/Hipparcos/hipparcos.html
A compressed binary CDROM along with software sells for US$50, while
a set of six ASCII CDROM’s goes for $100.  The complete catalog in
hard copy and CDROM is $400.

–
Steve Willner            Phone 617-495-7123     swill…@cfa.harvard.edu
Cambridge, MA 02138 USA                
(Bad news service; please email your reply if you want to be sure I see it)

Could someone send me data about the speed of the main five (A,B,C,D,E
and F) rings of the planet Saturn as a function of the mean distance
from the center of the planet.
It could be also useful data on some objects contained in each single
ring.

Thank you very much.

Dott. Lancia

Please answer by E-MAIL:  lab.tri @ mediacom.it

I am a phd student working in atmosphere physics. I am looking for a
program to calculate the height of earth shadow at different time.
If anyone has such a program and would like to share it please contact
me at Email:   k…@irf.se

Karina Waldemark
Swedish Institute for space physics

PHYSICS NEWS UPDATE                        
The American Institute of Physics Bulletin of Physics News
Number 299 December 13, 1996    by Phillip F. Schewe and Ben
Stein

QUARKS ARE POINTLIKE AT THE 10**-19 METER
LEVEL.  Quarks, along with leptons, are the most elementary
things in the universe, as far as experiments can tell.  If quarks,
which are the constituents of protons and neutrons, had
constituents themselves, how would we know?  One way is to
smash quarks together and see what flies out.  Physicists at
Fermilab smash protons (which can be thought of as delivery
vehicles for quarks) and antiprotons with one another and look at
the outgoing jets of debris particles. Previously (Update 258) an
excess of events with high-energy jets shooting away from the
interaction at large angles was interpreted by some (although not
by the experimentalists themselves) as possible evidence for
subquarks.  The latest word on the situation, as reported now by
the CDF collaboration, is that quarks do not have any apparent
structure.  One way of expressing this is to say that if objects are
hiding inside quarks, their energy would have to be greater than
about 1.6 TeV. A still more dramatic way of registering this null
result is to say that having trained their microscope on quarks,
the Fermilab scientists see no objects at the 10**-19–meter level,
the smallest distance scale inside quarks ever explored.  (F. Abe
et al., upcoming article on dijet angular distribution in Physical
Review Letters; contact Robert Harris at Fermilab,
rhar…@cdfsga.fnal.gov; 630-840-4932.) A few other
experiments, such as those that search for proton decay, have in
effect probed even finer distance scales without finding any tiny
lurking things.

SONOLUMINESCENCE RESEARCH VIBRATES WITH
ACTIVITY.  At last week’s joint meeting of the Acoustical
Societies of America and Japan in Honolulu, researchers presented
the latest results on sonoluminescence (SL), the mysterious
phenomenon in which acoustic waves aimed at a water tank create
oscillating bubbles which collapse and release ultrashort light
flashes representing trillion-fold concentrations of the original sound
energy.   Presenting new experimental results, groups at Yale, the
University of Washington (UW), and UCLA bolstered the
front-running explanation for SL, namely, that a collapsing bubble
creates an imploding shock wave which heats up gas inside the
bubble and generates light.  The three groups all recorded sharp
acoustical pops during the SL process, suggesting the creation of
shock waves.  UW’s Tom Matula presented preliminary results of
SL experiments on a NASA astronaut-training plane showing that
the same maximum light output was produced in high gravity,
microgravity, and normal gravity.  These results weakened recent
speculations that SL occurs when an imploding bubble forms a
needle-like spike or "jet" on one side which punctures the other side
of the bubble to produce a flash of light, since different gravity
conditions would surely vary the shape of the bubble and the
formation of any resulting jets.

HELIUM-3 CAN REMAIN SUPERFLUID IN AEROGEL, albeit
at a lower temperature.  When He-3 was injected into a sample of
aerogel, a wispy glass gel with a density not that much greater than
air, some expected the gel’s filaments to disrupt entirely the pairing
of He-3 atoms necessary for superfluidity. This didn’t happen.  A
new surprise is the fact that an applied magnetic field does have an
effect on superfluidity in the aerogel; it depresses the superfluid
transition temperature further (Sprague et al., Physical Review
Letters, 25 November).  Research on superfluid He-3 in aerogel
may have implications for the study of superconductivity since the
pairing of He-3 atoms in superfluids is analogous to electron pairing
(the BCS mechanism) in some superconductors.  (Science News, 7
December 1996.)

Data mining is a relatively new concept in which one searches large
volumes of data for fragments to be identified and assimilated to yield
knowledge discovery in data bases. The idea is not to format the data
but keep it original and possibly on-line. I would like to test
my algorithm on a large (20-200 MB) astronomical database, ascii or binary.
Please contact me if you have inquiries or can help provide such
databases.

Ciao Thomas

Douglas Isbell
Headquarters, Washington,               December 16, 1996
(Phone:  202/358-1753)
Sender: owner-press-release
Precedence: bulk

David Morse
Ames Research Center, Mountain View, CA
(Phone:  415/604-4724)

RELEASE: 96-259

NASA AWARDS CONTRACT FOR AIRBORNE ASTRONOMICAL OBSERVATORY

     NASA has selected a team led by the Universities Space
Research Association (USRA), Columbia, MD, for the award of
an estimated $ 484.2 million contract to acquire, develop and
operate the new Stratospheric Observatory For Infrared
Astronomy (SOFIA).

     The Cost-Plus-Incentive and Award Fee-type contract has
a base period for development plus one five-year operations
cycle.  The contract also contains an option period for one
additional five-year operations cycle. SOFIA is expected to
be operated for at least 20 years.  The total contract value
includes the base period plus all priced options.  The
contract will be managed by NASAs Ames Research Center,
Mountain View, CA.

     Other team members include Central Texas Airborne
Systems (CTAS), Waco, TX, a division of Raytheon; United
Airlines, San Francisco; an alliance of the Astronomical
Society of the Pacific and The SETI Institute, both of
Mountain View, CA; Sterling Software, Redwood City, CA; and,
the University of California at Berkeley and Los Angeles.

      The SOFIA program is a stellar example of NASA’s new
ways of doing business.  We have taken the parts of a space
science program that the private sector can do better and
more cost effectively than the government, and had a
competitive selection for the privilege of performing those
duties, said NASA Administrator Daniel S. Goldin.  In
addition, we’ve combined the development and operations
phases of the program into one seamless transition, ensuring
that this flexible, international airborne observatory will
serve the scientific community efficiently for two decades or
more.

     The contract calls for the selected company to acquire
an existing Boeing 747 SP aircraft, design and implement a
modification program to accommodate installation of a large
infrared telescope, test and deliver the flying astronomical
observatory to NASA, and provide mission and operations
support in five-year increments. USRA’s proposal calls for
operating the aircraft out of Moffett Federal Airfield,
Mountain View, CA.

     All of the offerors submitted very good proposals,
said Dr. Wesley T. Huntress Jr., NASA Associate Administrator
for Space Science.  The USRA proposal stood out amongst
these on the basis of mission suitability and cost.

     SOFIA will fly in the Earth’s stratosphere, between
41,000 and 45,000 feet, carrying a 98-inch (2.5 meter)
telescope to view objects in the Universe in the infrared
region of the electromagnetic spectrum.  At this altitude, in
the clear, dry environment on the very edge of space, SOFIA
will enable scientists to study radiant heat patterns from
stars, planets and other celestial sources.

    The SOFIA  telescope will be provided by the German space
agency, DARA, pending completion of a formal Memorandum of
Understanding with NASA.  DARA also will participate in the
operation of SOFIA.  In addition, as many as 15 state-of-the-
art science instruments will be developed by SOFIA
researchers and integrated within the flying laboratory on an
annual basis by the selected contract awardee.  The
contractor also will manage an extensive SOFIA educational
outreach program for teachers and students in kindergarten
through college.

     It is anticipated that the 747 SP aircraft will be
purchased in early 1997 and modifications to the vehicle will
begin in mid-1998.  The telescope will be integrated and
tested by late in the year 2000, with science flights
scheduled to begin in 2001.

     Radiation data from astronomical sources cannot
typically be collected at terrestrial sites because it is
absorbed by atmospheric water vapor before it reaches the
Earth’s surface.  This applies to most infrared light, gamma
rays, X-rays and ultraviolet light.

     SOFIA will overcome this limitation by operating above
more than 85 percent of the Earth’s atmosphere and 99 percent
of its radiation-absorbing water vapor.  SOFIA will also have
the advantage of being able to switch science instruments, to
be upgraded, and to be deployed rapidly to diverse geographic
locations throughout the northern or southern hemisphere to
observe astronomical areas of emerging interest.

     The primary science objectives of SOFIA are to study the
composition of planetary atmospheres and surfaces; to
investigate the structure, evolution and composition of
comets; to determine the physics and chemistry of the
interstellar medium; and to explore the formation of stars
and other stellar objects.  With up to 160 flights annually,
SOFIA will be able to conduct a wide array of scientific
investigations and provide hands-on, real-world educational
opportunities for an anticipated 500 teachers and students.

     The innovative SOFIA contract calls for development and
operation of the flying observatory in a totally privatized
manner.  The SOFIA science program is modeled on the highly
successful operation of the Hubble Space Telescope by the
Space Telescope Science Institute.

     SOFIA is an updated version of its predecessor, the
Kuiper Airborne Observatory (KAO), named for Gerard P.
Kuiper, a University of Arizona astronomer who conceived the
idea of a
flying astronomical observatory in the mid-1960s.  The KAO
was a converted C-141 military cargo plane equipped with a
36-inch reflecting infrared telescope.  It began operations
in 1974, and for nearly 22 years conducted scientific
missions, making some of the most important discoveries in
infrared astronomical science.

     Notable among the KAO’s accomplishments were the first
sightings of the rings of Uranus, the identification of
Pluto’s atmosphere, the discovery of water vapor in the thick
atmospheres of Jupiter and Saturn, and the development of
clues to the early chemical composition of the solar system.  
SOFIA’s telescope will be more than 2-1/2 times larger than
the KAO’s affording even greater opportunity for scientific
discovery.

     The winning proposal by USRA was selected over others
submitted by Hughes STX, Lanham, MD; Lockheed Martin Missiles
and Space, Sunnyvale, CA; and the University of Texas at
Austin.

     Additional information about SOFIA can be obtained by
visiting the project’s homepage web site on the Internet at:

               http://sofia.arc.nasa.gov

     A full-color artist’s conception of SOFIA can be found
at:

   http://ccf.arc.nasa.gov/dx/basket/storiesetc/SOFIATX.html

                           -end-

Can anyone tell me whats the temperature on the Jupiter’s moon, Callisto?
Thank you!      Dennis A. Kaledin       Amateur Astronomer

    A       DDDD     SSSS             Astrophysics Data System
   A A      D   D   S                 Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory
  AAAAA     D   D    SSS              a…@cfa.harvard.edu
 A     A    D   D       S             http://adswww.harvard.edu
A       A   DDDD    SSSS              (617) 495-7154

The Astrophysics Data System (ADS) is a NASA-funded project whose primary
resource is an Abstract Service with over 3/4 million abstracts from
journals, proceedings, PhD Theses, and NASA reports.  The abstracts may
be searched by author, object name, title, and/or abstract text words.

The service is FREE on the World Wide Web, from the URL

    http://adsabs.harvard.edu/ads_abstracts.html

or

    http://cdsads.u-strasbg.fr/ads_abstracts.html

We’d like to announce several recent additions to the ADS Abstract Service:

 – Mirror Site
 – Scanning Summary
 – New Logic Options
 – New Planetary References
 – Saving Preferences
 – Link to Your Bibliography
 – Donate Journals to Us!

Mirror Site:
 – We have brought online a mirror site at the CDS in Strasbourg.
    Users in Europe and Asia may want to use that server for quicker
    searches.

Scanning Summary:
 – We currently have approximately 40,000 articles online and are adding
    more on a regular basis.  Currently online are:

    ApJ:    v.271 – v.454   (8/83 – 12/95)
    ApJL:   v.195 – v.473   (1/75 – 12/96)
    AJ:     v.80 – v.110    (1/75 – 12/95)
    PASP:   v.87 – v.108    (1/75 – 6/96)
    RMxAA:  v.2 – v.32#1    (11/74 – 4/96)
    PASA:   v.3 – v.10      (1976 – 1993)
    CoSka:  v.11 – v.24     (1983 – 1994)
    MNRAS:  v.212 – v.271   (1985 – 1994)

    We will be adding A&A soon, followed by the rest of MNRAS and ApJ.

New Logic Options:
 – We have added new options for search logic allowing users to require
    or exclude individual words and to use more complicated boolean
    construction on queries.  We have also included an exact author
    searching option which allows users to specify both first and middle
    initials for authors with popular names.

New Planetary References:
 – We are in the process of including the complete bibliography
    from the Lunar and Planetary Institute in the ADS.  This will
    provide access to references for all articles about lunar and
    planetary astronomy since the 60′s.  We currently get the table
    of contents for Icarus and abstracts for Meteoritics.

Saving Preferences:
 – We now use cookies to enable us to save user preferences.  This allows
    users to save their printing preferences and to customize their own
    query pages.

Link to Your Bibliography:
 – We have implemented the capability of linking to your own papers in
    the database through a URL of the form:

       http://adsabs.harvard.edu/
                   cgi-bin/abs_connect?author=last,+f.&return_req=no_params

    See the FAQ http://adsabs.harvard.edu/abs_doc/faq.html for more details.

Donate Journals to Us!
 – Last, we are always looking for OLD JOURNALS if you have some collecting
    dust on your bookshelves.  We are trying to scan all the major astronomy
    journals before 1975 and need a copy which can be destroyed (the bindings
    have to be cut to scan them).  Please let us know if you might be
    able to contribute journals.

As always, if you have any questions or problems, please contact us at

  a…@cfa.harvard.edu

Astronomer Carl Sagan died today after a two-year battle with bone marrow
disease. He was 62.

CNN covers an obituary (http://www.cnn.com/US/9612/20/sagan/).

He was a great man and a very gifted storyteller.

—————————————————————————-
                                                                 .
   Carl Koppeschaar                                        *      
   science journalist                                                *
   Haarlem – The Netherlands

   carl…@xs4all.nl                                             . ‘      
   ASTRONET information service:                               ‘  
   Astronomy, Space Flight, Earth Sciences, Meteorology           .
   http://www.xs4all.nl/~carlkop/astroeng.html                    ’     *
                                                            *          
—————————————————————————-

All,

I am currently doing research on the origin and meanings of various star
names and am looking for references that might help me with my
interpretation.  I’ve already poured through Burnham’s Handbook and Star
Names by Allen, and while they prove very useful, there are still some
gaps I need to plug.  Any additional sources would be greatly
appreciated.

Phil Harrington