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4176161 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Geosat | Geosat | The GEOSAT (GEOdetic SATellite) was a U.S. Navy Earth observation satellite, launched on March 12, 1985 into an 800 km, 108° inclination orbit, with a nodal period of about 6040 seconds. The satellite carried a radar altimeter capable of measuring the distance from the satellite to sea surface with a relative precision of about 5 cm. The initial phase was an 18-month classified Geodetic Mission (GM) have a ground-track with a near-23-day repeat with closure to within 50 kilometers. The effect of atmospheric drag was such that by fall 1986 GEOSAT was in an almost exact 23-day repeat orbit.
Mission
The Geosat GM goal was to provide information on the marine gravity field. If the ocean surface were at rest, and no forces such as tides or winds were acting on it, the water surface would lie along the geoid. To first order, the Earth shape is an oblate spheroid. Subsurface features such as seamounts create a gravitational pull, and features such as ocean trenches create lower gravity areas. Spatial variations in gravity exert influence on the ocean surface and thereby cause spatial structure in the geoid. The deviations of the geoid from the first order spheroid are on the order of ± 100m. By measuring the position of the water surface above the Earth center, the geoid is observed, and the gravity field can be computed through inverse calculations.
Exact Repeat Mission
After the GM concluded 30 September 1986, GEOSAT's scientific Exact Repeat Mission (ERM) began on November 8, 1986 after being maneuvered into a 17.05 day, 244 pass exact repeat orbit that was more favorable for oceanographic applications. When the ERM ended in January 1990, due to failure of the two on-board tape recorders, more than three years of ERM data were collected and made available to the scientific community.
Once the GM goal had been reached, the satellite still had a useful life. An opportunity existed to observe the next order physical process that affects the ocean surface. Currents, tides and wind forcing all create changes in water levels. While there are extreme waves and events (tsunamis and hurricane surge), typical ocean features would be considered large if the water level change caused by them were 1 m. Most areas of the world experience features of typical amplitude of 20 cm. The ERM established the satellite in an exact repeat orbit. The satellite would orbit the Earth, and after 17.05 days the satellite would return to the same point. The satellite was actively controlled through thrust maneuvers to maintain the exact repeat orbit to within 1 km of the predefined ground track. In this manner, the satellite could observe long term changes at the points along the ground track.
Declassification
The U.S. Navy declassified parts of the Geodetic Mission data in 1990 that covered a doughnut-shaped area of ocean that surrounds Antarctica between 60 and 72 degrees south latitude. In 1992, further parts of the Geodetic Mission data over the oceans south of 30 degrees south were released. The GEOSAT data for the entire global sea surface was declassified in July 1995 after the competition of the geodetic phase of ESA ERS-1 mission. These data were subsequently widely used to estimate ocean bathymetry along with additional satellite altimeters.
GFO
The successor to GEOSAT is the Geosat Follow-On (GFO) mission, launched 10 February 1998 by a Taurus rocket from Vandenberg AFB. GFO carried a water vapor radiometer as well as a radar altimeter, and operated in the same orbit as GEOSAT's Exact Repeat Mission. In addition, GFO carried a GPS receiver (which was never used operationally), Doppler receivers, and laser retro-reflectors for orbit determination. GFO was scheduled for retirement on December 31, 2008, but in late September 2008, the deteriorating state of the spacecraft resulted in a decision to accelerate the shutdown. Despite a series of system failures aboard the spacecraft, controllers were able to successfully lower GFO to a disposal orbit and shut it down on November 25, 2008. A successor mission, named GFO-2, was planned for launch in 2014, and would have featured a dual-band altimeter, instead of the single-band altimeter on the previous spacecraft. GFO-2 was cancelled by the U.S. Navy on 30 June 2010.
See also
Gladys West
References
External links
Geosat Handbook
Earth observation satellites of the United States
Military space program of the United States
Spacecraft launched in 1985
United States Navy
Geodetic satellites
Earth satellite radar altimeters
Satellites in low Earth orbit |
4179702 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yelp | Yelp | Yelp Inc. is an American company that develops the Yelp.com website and the Yelp mobile app, which publishes crowd-sourced reviews about businesses. It also operates Yelp Guest Manager, a table reservation service. It is headquartered in San Francisco, California.
Yelp was founded in 2004 by former PayPal employees Russel Simmons and Jeremy Stoppelman. It has since become one of the leading sources of user-generated reviews and ratings for businesses.
Yelp grew in usage and raised several rounds of funding in the following years. By 2010, it had $30 million in revenue, and the website had published about 4.5 million crowd-sourced reviews. From 2009 to 2012, Yelp expanded throughout Europe and Asia. In 2009, it entered unsuccessful negotiations to be acquired by Google. Yelp became a public company via an initial public offering in March 2012 and became profitable for the first time two years later.
As of December 31, 2021, approximately 244.4 million reviews were available on its business listing pages. In 2021, the company had 46 million unique visitors to its desktop webpages and 56.7 million unique visitors to its mobile sites. Over 50% of the company's audience has an annual household income of more than $100,000.
The company has been accused of using unfair practices to raise revenue from the businesses that are reviewed on its site e.g., by presenting more negative review information for companies that do not purchase its advertising services or by prominently featuring advertisements of the competitors of such non-paying companies or conversely by excluding negative reviews from companies' overall rating on the basis that the reviews "are not currently recommended". There have also been complaints of aggressive and misleading tactics by some of its advertising sales representatives. The company's review system's reliability has also been affected by the submission of fake reviews by external users, such as false positive reviews submitted by a company to promote its own business or false negative reviews submitted about competing businesses a practice sometimes known as "astroturfing", which the company has tried to combat in various ways.
Company history (2004–present)
Origins (2004–2009)
Two former PayPal employees, Jeremy Stoppelman and Russel Simmons, founded Yelp at a business incubator, MRL Ventures, in 2004. Stoppelman and Simmons conceived the initial idea for Yelp as an email-based referral network, after Stoppelman caught the flu and had a difficult time finding an online recommendation for a local doctor. Max Levchin, the co-founders' former colleague as founding chief technology officer of PayPal and founder of MRL Ventures, provided $1 million in Angel financing. MRL co-founder David Galbraith, who instigated the local services project based on user reviews, came up with the name "Yelp". Stoppelman explained that they decided on "Yelp" for the company's name because "it was short, memorable, easy to spell, and was familiar with 'the help' and 'yellow pages'".
According to Fortune, Yelp's initial email-based system was "convoluted". The idea was rejected by investors and did not attract users beyond the cofounders' friends and family. Usage data showed that users were not answering requests for referrals, but were using the "Real Reviews" feature, which allowed them to write reviews unsolicited. According to The San Francisco Chronicle, "the site's popularity soared" after it was re-designed in late 2005 with the distinctive Burst logo. Yelp raised $5 million in funding in 2005 from Bessemer Venture Partners and $10 million in November 2006 from Benchmark Capital. The number of reviewers on the site grew from 12,000 in 2005, to 100,000 in 2006. By the summer of 2006, the site had one million monthly visitors. It raised $15 million in funding from DAG Ventures in February 2008. In 2010, Elevation Partners invested $100 million; $75 million was spent on purchasing equity from employees and investors, while $25 million was invested in sales staff and expansion. Yelp grew from 6 million monthly visitors in 2007 to 16.5 million in 2008 and from 12 to 24 cities during the same time period. By 2009, the site had 4.5 million reviews. By 2010, Yelp's revenues were estimated to be $30 million and it employed 300 people.
Private company (2009–2012)
Yelp introduced a site for the United Kingdom in January 2009 and one for Canada that August. The first non-English Yelp site was introduced in France in 2010; users had the option to read and write content in French or English. From 2010 to 2011, Yelp launched several more sites, in Austria, Germany, Spain, and the Netherlands. International website traffic doubled during the same time period. An Australian website went live in November 2011. It was supported through a partnership with Telstra, which provided one million initial business listings, and was initially glitchy. Yelp had a presence in 20 countries by the end of 2012, including Turkey and Denmark. Yelp's first site in Asia was introduced in September 2012 in Singapore, which was followed by Japan in 2014.
In December 2009, Google entered into negotiations with Yelp to acquire the company, but the two parties failed to reach an agreement. According to The New York Times, Google offered about $500 million, but the deal fell through after Yahoo offered $1 billion. TechCrunch reported that Google refused to match Yahoo's offer. Both offers were later abandoned following a disagreement between Yelp's management and board of directors about the offers. In June 2015, Yelp published a study alleging Google was altering search results to benefit its own online services.
Yelp began a service called Yelp Deals in April 2011, but by August it cut back on Deals due to increased competition and market saturation. That September, the Federal Trade Commission investigated Yelp's allegations that Google was using Yelp web content without authorization and that Google's search algorithms favored Google Places over similar services provided by Yelp. In a January 2014 agreement, Google was not subject to anti-trust litigation from the FTC, but did have to allow services like Yelp the ability to opt out of having their data scraped and used on Google's websites.
Public entity (2012–present)
Having filed for an initial public offering (IPO) with the Securities Exchange Commission in November 2011, Yelp's stock began public trading on the New York Stock Exchange on March 2, 2012. In 2012, Yelp acquired its largest European rival, Qype, for $50 million. The following year, CEO Jeremy Stoppelman reduced his salary to $1. Yelp acquired start-up online reservation company SeatMe for $12.7 million in cash and stock in 2013. Yelp's second quarter 2013 revenue of $55 million "exceeded expectations", but the company was not yet profitable.
In 2012/13, Yelp moved into its new corporate headquarters, occupying about 150,000 square feet on 12 floors of 140 New Montgomery (the former PacBell building) in San Francisco.
The company was profitable for the first time in the second quarter of 2014, as a result of increasing ad spending by business owners and possibly from changes in Google's local search algorithm. It is dubbed as Google Pigeon, which helped authoritative local directory sites like Yelp and TripAdvisor, in getting more visibility. Over the course of the year, Yelp websites were launched in Mexico, Japan, and Argentina. Also in 2014, Yelp expanded in Europe through the acquisitions of German-based restaurant review site Restaurant-Kritik and French-based CityVox.
In early February 2015, Yelp announced it bought Eat24, an online food-ordering service, for $134 million. Then in August 2017, Yelp sold Eat24 to Grubhub for $287.5 million. The acquisition resulted in a partnership to integrate Grubhub delivery into the Yelp profiles of restaurants.
In late 2015, a "Public Services & Government" section was introduced to Yelp, and the General Services Administration began encouraging government agencies to create and monitor official government pages. For example, the Transportation Security Administration created official TSA Yelp pages. Later that year Yelp began experimenting in San Francisco with consumer alerts that were added to pages about restaurants with poor hygiene scores in government inspections. Research conducted by the Boston Children's Hospital found that Yelp reviews with keywords associated with food poisoning correlates strongly with poor hygiene at the restaurant. Researchers at Columbia University used data from Yelp to identify three previously unreported restaurant-related food poisoning outbreaks.
On November 2, 2016, concurrent with its earnings report for Q3 2016, Yelp announced it would drastically scale back its operations outside North America and halt international expansion. This resulted in the termination of essentially all international employees across Yelp's 30+ international markets from the sales, marketing, public relations, business outreach, and government relations departments. Overseas employees now primarily consist of engineering and product management staff. These layoffs affected only 175 individuals or 4% of its total workforce.
In March 2017, Yelp acquired the restaurant reservation app Nowait for $40 million. In April 2017, Yelp acquired Wi-Fi marketing company Turnstyle Analytics for $20 million.
In early 2020, Yelp listed space at 55 Hawthorne Street, San Francisco, for 235 employees as available for sublease. Business closures and stay-at-home orders during the COVID-19 pandemic in the United States caused a massive decline in searches on Yelp (down 64–83% from March to April, depending on category) and company revenues. On April 9, the company announced it would lay off 1,000 employees, furlough about 1,100 with benefits, reduce hours for others, cut executive pay by 20–30%, and stop paying the CEO for the rest of 2020.
In September 2021, Yelp announced that it was relocating its corporate headquarters to a smaller space at 350 Mission Street to be subleased from Salesforce.
On June 1, 2023, Yelp decided to close its offices in Phoenix, Arizona and Hamburg, Germany. According to an announcement made by the company, less than 6 percent of the available workstations in these offices were being utilized. This move comes after Yelp had already shut down its New York, Chicago, and Washington, D.C offices.
As of mid-2023, Yelp maintains a single remaining office in the United States in San Francisco. Additionally, the company will continue its operations in Toronto, Canada, and London, United Kingdom. The closure and downsizing of these offices are expected to result in approximately $27 million in annual cost savings for Yelp during the 2023-24 fiscal year.
Features
Yelp's website, Yelp.com, is a crowd-sourced local business review and social networking site. The site has pages devoted to individual locations, such as restaurants or schools, where Yelp users can submit a review of their products or services using a one to five stars rating scale. Businesses can update contact information, hours, and other basic listing information or add special deals. In addition to writing reviews, users can react to reviews, plan events, or discuss their personal lives.
78% of businesses listed on the site had a rating of three stars or better, but some negative reviews were very personal or extreme. Some of the reviews are written entertainingly or creatively. As of 2014, users could give a "thumbs-up" to reviews they liked, which caused these reviews to be featured more prominently in the system. As of 2008, each day a "Review of the Day" was determined based on a vote by users.
72% of Yelp searches are done from a mobile device. The Yelp iPhone mobile app was introduced in December 2008. In August 2009, Yelp released an update to the iPhone app with a hidden Easter Egg augmented reality feature called Monocle, which allowed users looking through their iPhone camera to see Yelp data on businesses seen through the camera. Check-in features were added in 2010.
Yelp users can make restaurant reservations in Yelp through Yelp Reservations, a feature initially added in June 2010; in 2021 the service was consolidated with others into "Yelp Guest Manager". Yelp's reservation features have been done through SeatMe, which was acquired by Yelp in 2013. Prior to that, Yelp had offered reservation services through OpenTable. In 2013, features to have food ordered and delivered were added to Yelp as well as the ability to view hygiene inspection scores and make appointments at spas. Yelp's content was integrated into Apple Inc.'s Siri "virtual assistant" and the mapping and directions app of Apple's September 2012 release of the iOS 6 computer operating system.
In March 2014, Yelp added features for ordering and scheduling manicures, flower deliveries, golf games, and legal consultations, among other things. In October 2014, the company, working in collaboration with hotel search site Hipmunk, added features to book hotels through Yelp.
Yelp started a 7–10% cash-back program at some US restaurants in 2016 through a partnership with Empyr, which links credit card purchases to online advertising.
On February 14, 2017, Yelp launched Yelp Questions and Answers, a feature for users to ask venue-specific questions about businesses.
In June 2020, Yelp launched a COVID-19 section that enables businesses to update their health and safety measures as well as their service offering changes. Starting January 2021, users can provide detailed feedback regarding what health and safety measures the business has implemented through editing in the COVID-19 section on Yelp business pages.
Features for businesses
Yelp added the ability for business owners to respond to reviews in 2008. Businesses can respond privately by messaging the reviewer or publicly on their profile page. In some cases, Yelp users that had a bad experience have updated their reviews more favorably due to the business's efforts to resolve their complaints. In some other cases, disputes between reviewers and business owners have led to harassment and physical altercations. The system has led to criticisms that business owners can bribe reviewers with free food or discounts to increase their rating. However, Yelp users say this rarely occurs. A business owner can "claim" a profile, which allows them to respond to reviews and see traffic reports. Businesses can also offer discounts to Yelp users that visit often using a Yelp "check in" feature. In 2014, Yelp released an app for business owners to respond to reviews and manage their profiles from a mobile device. Business owners can also flag a review to be removed, if the review violates Yelp's content guidelines.
Yelp's revenues primarily come from selling ads and sponsored listings to small businesses. Advertisers can pay to have their listing appear at the top of search results or feature ads on the pages of their competitors. In 2016, advertising revenue grew at a rate of 30% year over year. Yelp will only allow businesses with at least a three-star rating to sign up for advertising. Originally a sponsored "favorite review" could place a positive review above negative ones, but Yelp stopped offering this option in 2010 in an effort to deter the valid criticism that advertisers were able to obtain a more positive review appearance in exchange for pay.
On June 5, 2020, Yelp launched a tool to allow businesses on the platform to identify themselves as black-owned, allowing customers to search for black-owned companies they want to support. There were more than 2.5 million searches for black-owned businesses on Yelp from May 25 to July 10. Searches for black-owned businesses were up 2,400% in 2020. In August 2021 Yelp added a feature to let users filter businesses based on their COVID precautions.
Relationship with businesses
A Harvard Business School study published in 2011 found that each "star" in a Yelp rating affected the business owner's sales by 5–9%. A 2012 study by two University of California, Berkeley economists found that an increase from 3.5 to 4 stars on Yelp resulted in a 19% increase in the chances of the restaurant being booked during peak hours. A 2014 survey of 300 small business owners done by Yodle found that 78% were concerned about negative reviews. Also, 43% of respondents said they felt online reviews were unfair, because there is no verification that the review is written by a legitimate customer.
Controversy and litigation
Yelp has a complicated relationship with small businesses. Criticism of Yelp continues to focus on the legitimacy of reviews, public statements of Yelp manipulating and blocking reviews in order to increase ad spending, as well as concerns regarding the privacy of reviewers.
Astroturfing
As Yelp became more influential, the phenomenon of business owners and competitors writing fake reviews, known as "astroturfing", became more prevalent. A study from Harvard Associate Professor Michael Luca and Georgios Zervas of Boston University analyzed 316,415 reviews in Boston and found that the percentage of fake reviews rose from 6% of the site's reviews in 2006 to 20% in 2014. Yelp's own review filter identifies 25% of reviews as suspicious.
Yelp has a proprietary algorithm that attempts to evaluate whether a review is authentic and filters out reviews that it believes are not based on a patron's actual personal experiences, as required by the site's Terms of Use. The review filter was first developed two weeks after the site was founded and the company saw their "first obviously fake reviews". Filtered reviews are moved into a special area and not counted towards the businesses' star-rating. The filter sometimes filters legitimate reviews, leading to complaints from business owners. New York Attorney General Eric T. Schneiderman said Yelp has "the most aggressive" astroturfing filter out of the crowd-sourced websites it looked into. Yelp has also been criticized for not disclosing how the filter works, which it says would reveal information on how to defeat it.
Yelp also conducts "sting operations" to uncover businesses writing their own reviews. In October 2012, Yelp placed a 90-day "consumer alert" on 150 business listings believed to have paid for reviews. The alert read "We caught someone red-handed trying to buy reviews for this business". In June 2013, Yelp filed a lawsuit against BuyYelpReview/AdBlaze for allegedly writing fake reviews for pay. In 2013, Yelp sued a lawyer it alleged was part of a group of law firms that exchanged Yelp reviews, saying that many of the firm's reviews originated from their own office. The lawyer said Yelp was trying to get revenge for his legal disputes and activism against Yelp. An effort to win dismissal of the case was denied in December 2014. In September 2013, Yelp cooperated with Operation Clean Turf, a sting operation by the New York Attorney General that uncovered 19 astroturfing operations. In April 2017, a Norfolk, Massachusetts, jury awarded a jewelry store over $34,000 after it determined that its competitor's employee had filed a false negative Yelp review that knowingly caused emotional distress.
In December 2019, Yelp won a court case that challenged the company's explanation of how its review recommendation software worked. The court ruling stated that "None of the evidence presented at the trial showed anything nefarious or duplicitous on the part of Yelp in connection with the assertions made in the Challenged Statements." This was one of a number of court cases that ruled in favor of Yelp over the years.
Alleged unfair business practices
Yelp has a complicated relationship with small businesses. There have been allegations that Yelp has manipulated reviews based on participation in its advertising programs. Many business owners have said that Yelp salespeople have offered to remove or suppress negative reviews if they purchase advertising. Others report seeing negative reviews featured prominently and positive reviews buried, and then soon afterwards, they would receive calls from Yelp attempting to sell paid advertising.
Yelp staff acknowledged that they had allowed their advertising partners to move their favorite review to the top of the listings as a "featured review", but said the reviews were not otherwise manipulated to favor the partner businesses. Such featured reviews were shown with a strip above them that said "One of [Insert Business Here]'s Favorite Reviews" and "This business is a Yelp sponsor." The company also said it might have had some rogue salespeople that misrepresented their practices when selling advertising services. In response to the criticism of their allowing their advertising partners to manipulate the review listing, Yelp ceased its "featured review" practice in 2010.
Several lawsuits have been filed against Yelp accusing it of extorting businesses into buying advertising products. Each has been dismissed by a judge before reaching trial. In February 2010, a class-action lawsuit was filed against Yelp alleging it asked a Long Beach veterinary hospital to pay $300 a month for advertising services that included the suppression or deletion of disparaging customer reviews. The following month, nine additional businesses joined the class-action lawsuit, and two similar lawsuits were filed. That May the lawsuits were combined into one class-action lawsuit, which was dismissed by San Francisco U.S. District Judge Edward Chen in 2011. Chen said the reviews were protected by the Communications Decency Act of 1996 and that there was no evidence of manipulation by Yelp. The plaintiffs filed an appeal. In September 2014, the United States Court of Appeals for the Ninth Circuit upheld the dismissal, finding that even if Yelp did manipulate reviews to favor advertisers, this would not fall under the court's legal definition of extortion.
In August 2013, Yelp launched a series of town hall style meetings in 22 major American cities in an effort to address concerns among local business owners. Many attendees expressed frustration with seeing Yelp remove positive reviews after they declined to advertise, receiving reviews from users that never entered the establishment, and other issues. A 2011 "working paper" published by Harvard Business School from Harvard Associate Professor Michael Luca and Georgios Zervas of Boston University found that there was no significant statistical correlation between being a Yelp advertiser and having more favorable reviews. The Federal Trade Commission received 2,046 complaints about Yelp from 2008 to 2014, most from small businesses regarding allegedly unfair or fake reviews or negative reviews that appear after declining to advertise. According to Yelp, the Federal Trade Commission finished a second examination of Yelp's practices in 2015 and in both cases did not pursue an action against the company.
Journalist David Lazarus of the Los Angeles Times also criticized Yelp in 2014 for the practice of selling competitors' ads to run on top of business listings and then offering to have the ads removed as part of a paid feature.
In 2015, San Francisco filmmaker Kaylie Milliken was reportedly producing a documentary film titled Billion Dollar Bully about Yelp's alleged business practices.
In 2018, in the case Hassell v. Bird, the California Supreme Court held by a narrow 4-3 margin that a business cannot force Yelp to remove a review, even if the review is defamatory of the business.
A 2019 investigation by Vice News and the podcast Underunderstood found that in some cases, Yelp was replacing restaurant's direct phone numbers with numbers that routed through GrubHub, which would then charge restaurants for the calls under marketing agreements GrubHub has with restaurants.
Political expression and politically motivated ratings
Eater reported that between 2012 and 2015, a number of users who review restaurants on the site have posted reviews that contained comments about the political activities and political views of businesses and their owners or have submitted ratings affected by political motivations. The article found that in some instances, the Yelp review area for a business has become flooded with such review submissions after a business was involved in politically sensitive action. Yelp has removed reviews of this nature and has tried to suppress their submission.
Litigation over review content
According to data compiled in 2014 by the Wall Street Journal, Yelp receives about six subpoenas a month asking for the names of anonymous reviewers, mostly from business owners seeking litigation against those writing negative reviews. In 2012, the Alexandria Circuit Court and the Virginia Court of Appeals held Yelp in contempt for refusing to disclose the identities of seven reviewers who anonymously criticized a carpet-cleaning business. In 2014, Yelp appealed to the Virginia Supreme Court. A popular public argument in favor of Yelp at the time was that a ruling against Yelp would negatively affect free speech online. The judge from an early ruling said that if the reviewers did not actually use the businesses' services, their communications would be false claims not protected by free speech laws. The Virginia Supreme Court ruled that Yelp, a non-resident company in the state of Virginia, could not be subpoenaed by a lower court. Also in 2014, a California state law was enacted that prohibits businesses from using "disparagement clauses" in their contracts or terms of use that allow them to sue or fine customers that write negatively about them online.
Business Insider Investigation
A 2020 Business Insider Investigation questioned the culture, ethics and practices within Yelp.
“Elite” reviewers Selling Reviews
An April 2022 Vice article highlighted that some Elite reviewers use their status to sell reviews.
Community
According to Inc. Magazine most reviewers (sometimes called "Yelpers") are "well-intentioned" and write reviews in order to express themselves, improve their writing, or to be creative. In some cases, they write reviews in order to lash out at corporate interests or businesses they dislike. Reviewers may also be motivated by badges and honors, such as being the first to review a new location, or by praise and attention from other users. Many reviews are written in an entertaining or creative manner. Users can give a review a "thumbs-up" rating, which will cause it to be ranked higher in the review listings. Each day a "Review of the Day" is determined based on a vote by users. According to The Discourse of Online Consumer Reviews many Yelp reviewers are internet-savvy adults aged 18–25 or "suburban baby boomers".
Reviewers are encouraged to use real names and photos. Each year members of the Yelp community are invited or self-nominated to the "Yelp Elite Squad" and some are accepted based on an evaluation of the quality and frequency of their reviews. Members may nominate other reviewers for elite status. Users must use their real name and photo on Yelp to qualify for the Elite Squad. To accept a nomination, members must not own a business. Elite Squad Yelpers are governed by a council and estimated to include several thousand members. Yelp does not disclose how the Yelp Elite are selected. Elite Squad members are given different color badges based on how long they've been an elite member. The Yelp Elite Squad originated with parties Yelp began throwing for members in 2005, and in 2006 it was formally codified; the name came from a joking reference to prolific reviewers that were invited to Yelp parties as the "Yelp Elite Squad"." Members are invited to special opening parties, given gifts, and receive other perks. As of 2017, there are over 80 local Elite Squads in North America.
As of 2017, Yelp employed a staff of over 80 community managers that organize parties for prolific reviewers, send encouraging messages to reviewers, and host classes for small business owners. Yelp reviewers are not required to disclose their identity, but Yelp encourages them to do so.
See also
Crowdsourcing
Reputation management
You're Not Yelping
References
External links
Official websites
United States
United Kingdom
Yelp Reservations official website
2012 initial public offerings
American companies established in 2004
American review websites
Android (operating system) software
Companies based in San Francisco
Companies listed on the New York Stock Exchange
Consumer guides
Geosocial networking
Internet properties established in 2004
IOS software
Online companies of the United States
Recommender systems
Restaurant guides
South of Market, San Francisco
WatchOS software
Windows Phone software |
4183205 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Xinglong%20Station%20%28NAOC%29 | Xinglong Station (NAOC) | Xinglong Station () is an observatory (IAU code 327) situated south of the main peak of the Yan Mountains in Xinglong County, Chengde, Hebei province, China. Installed are seven telescopes: a Mark-III photoelectric astrolabe; a 60 cm reflector; an 85 cm reflector; a 60/90 cm Schmidt telescope; a 1.26-meter infrared telescope; and a 2.16-meter telescope. The most recent telescope is the 4m LAMOST. As of 2014 the observatory installed a 5.2-meter telescope as part of their Gamma-ray astronomy program, known colloquially as Sām Tām for its aggressive focal length. It is a popular tourist site.
See also
Beijing Schmidt CCD Asteroid Program
List of astronomical observatories
References
External links
Astronomical observatories in China
Buildings and structures in Hebei
Minor-planet discovering observatories |
4184819 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Museo%20Galileo | Museo Galileo | Museo Galileo (formerly Istituto e Museo di Storia della Scienza; Institute and Museum of the History of Science) is located in Florence, Italy, in Piazza dei Giudici, along the River Arno and close to the Uffizi Gallery. The museum, dedicated to astronomer and scientist Galileo Galilei, is housed in Palazzo Castellani, an 11th-century building which was then known as the Castello d'Altafronte.
Museo Galileo owns one of the world's major collection of scientific instruments, which bears evidence of the role that the Medici and Lorraine Grand Dukes attached to science and scientists.
The Museo di Storia della Scienza has re-opened to the public under the new name Museo Galileo since June 10, 2010, after a two-year closure due to redesigning and renovation works. It has been inaugurated four hundred years after the publication in March 1610 of Galileo's Sidereus Nuncius (The Starry Messenger).
The museum
The museum features the valuable scientific instruments from the Medici Collections which were first displayed in the Stanzino delle Matematiche (Mathematics Room) in the Uffizi Gallery. They were later on moved to the Museo di Fisica e Storia Naturale (Museum of Physics and Natural History) founded by Grand Duke Peter Leopold in 1775. During the reign of the Lorraine Grand Dukes, new instruments were added to the scientific collections. In 1929, the First Italian Exhibition of the History of Science in Florence highlighted the importance of scientific collections within Italy's cultural heritage. As a consequence, in 1930 the University of Florence gave birth to the Istituto di Storia della Scienza con annesso Museo (Institute of the History of Science and attached Museum). The institute was housed in Palazzo Castellani and was entrusted with the instrument collections of the Medici and Lorraine dynasties. The permanent exhibition is arranged by chronological and thematic paths.
The museum directors
1930-1961 Andrea Corsini
1961-1981 Maria Luisa Righini Bonelli
1982-2021 Paolo Galluzzi
since 2021 Roberto Ferrari (Executive Director)
from July until December 2021 Marco Ciardi (Scientific Director)
since December 2021 Filippo Camerota (Scientific Director)
The Medici Collection
The first floor's nine rooms are devoted to the Medici Collections, dating from the 15th century through the 18th century. The permanent exhibition includes all of Galileo's unique artifacts, among which are his only two extant telescopes and the framed objective lens from the telescope with which he discovered the Galilean moons of Jupiter; thermometers used by members of the Accademia del Cimento; and an extraordinary collection of terrestrial and celestial globes, including Santucci's Armillary Sphere, a giant armillary sphere designed and built by Antonio Santucci.
The Lorraine Collection
The nine rooms on the second floor house instruments and experimental apparatus collected by the Lorraine dynasty (18th-19th century), which bear witness of the remarkable contribution of Tuscany and Italy to the progress of electricity, electromagnetism and chemistry. The exhibits include obstetrical wax models from Santa Maria Nuova Hospital, Grand Duke Peter Leopold’s chemistry cabinet and the beautiful machines made in the workshop of the Museo di Fisica e Storia Naturale to illustrate the fundamental physical laws.
Gallery
Research and documentation
Museo Galileo carries out research and documentation in the history of science and technology, as well as in the field of preservation and improvement of museum collections. The library's book collection and a number of online resources are available to scholars. The museum is partner with important institutions, such as the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences, the Nobel Foundation, the Max Planck Society’s institutes and the Harvard University, and co-sponsors several research projects. It also organizes and takes part in many conferences on scientific museology and the history of science and technology.
Temporary exhibitions
Museo Galileo has been enhancing and promoting the dissemination of scientific culture for many years. In order to meet this commitment effectively, it promotes exhibitions on the history of science and the relationship between science, technology and art. Among the most important exhibitions in Italy and the world: Renaissance Engineers: From Brunelleschi to Leonardo da Vinci; The Mind of Leonardo: The Universal Genius at Work; The Medici and Science; Galileo’s Telescope: The Instrument that Changes the World; Galileo: Images of the Universe from Antiquity to the Telescope; Vinum Nostrum: Art, Science and Myths of Wine in Ancient Mediterranean Cultures; Archimedes: The Art and Science of Invention, and the most recent (2019-2020) Water as Microscope of Nature: Leonardo da Vinci's Codex Leicester, Leonardo and His Books: The Library of the Universal Genius, Leonardo da Vinci and Perpetual Motion, The Art of Building a Masterpiece: Trajan Column.
Publications
Museo Galileo publishes historical scientific works and two journals, which are Nuncius: Journal of the Material and Visual History of Science, and Galilaeana, devoted to research about the figure, work and scientific findings of Galileo Galilei. The Nuncius Library series publishes the results of original research in the history of science and technology as well as editions of sources, while the Galilaeana Library series publishes critical essays, document collections and text editions related to Galileo and to the cultural scenario of the early modern period. To be mentioned also the Archive of Italian Scientists’ Correspondence and the Italian Science Library series. In addition, the museum publishes catalogues relevant to its collections and the temporary exhibitions it promotes.
The library
The library—which has been a part of the institute since its foundation—was completely remodelled in 2002, when it was moved to the third floor of Palazzo Castellani. The new architectural set-up was awarded the “Bibliocom Biblioteche in vetrina” prize. The library houses about 150,000 works concerning the history of science. The antique book collection consists of nearly 5,000 works. It includes the Medici-Lorraine Collection, made of scientific books mostly about physics and mathematics, gathered by Tuscan dynasties over five centuries. The library is also home to several 18th- to 20th-century archival collections and a photo archive related to the history of the museum's collections, ancient instruments and places of scientific interest. The contemporary collection includes books in Italian and the major European languages and has an annual growth of about 1,800 new acquisitions. All of the library's material can be searched on the online catalogue.
Among the library's activities are the compiling of bibliographies –notably the International Galilaean Bibliography– and the cataloguing of documents relevant to the history of science, even not in the library's possession.
In 2004, a Digital Library was created to preserve and publish digital collections of historical scientific interest.
The Multimedia Lab
Aware of the growing importance of information and communication technologies, Museo Galileo started its own Multimedia Lab in 1991. The Lab produces offline and online interactive applications related to the dissemination and documentation of both permanent collections and temporary exhibitions. It also creates digital archives for historical scientific research.
See also
Galileo Galilei
Paolo Galluzzi
References
Bibliography
External links
Museo Galileo
Museums in Florence - Museum Galileo - History of Science
1930 establishments in Italy
Museums established in 1930
Museums in Florence
History of science museums
Research institutes in Italy |
4185092 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Northeast%20India%E2%80%93Myanmar%20pine%20forests | Northeast India–Myanmar pine forests | The Northeast India-Myanmar pine forests is a montane subtropical coniferous forest ecoregion in the mountains of Northeastern India and adjacent portions of Myanmar (also known as Burma).
Setting
The ecoregion covers an area of of the Naga Hills that with the Patkai (including the Lushai Hills) and the Manipur Hills form part of the Burmese-Java arc of folded mountains that run south-east of the Himalayas and make up the India-Myanmar border region. The pine forests are found between in elevation, and occur in three separate enclaves. The largest enclave straddles the boundary between India's Nagaland state and Myanmar, and the two smaller enclaves grows in the southern part of India's Mizoram state, also along the Myanmar border. The pine forests are surrounded at lower elevations by the predominantly broadleaf Mizoram–Manipur–Kachin rain forests and are part of the huge Burma Monsoon Forest transition zone between the South Asia and Indochina regions.
Flora
The pine forests forms a habitat that is rare in the Indomalayan realm. Tenasserim pine (Pinus latteri) is the dominant species at lower elevations, sometimes associated with dipterocarps. At higher elevations, Khasi pine (P. kesiya) and blue pine (P. wallichiana) are the predominant species, associated with other evergreens including hemlocks (Tsuga) and firs (Abies), and broadleaf trees, including oaks (Quercus) and maples (Acer), while Rhododendron, Ilex, Prunus, and bamboo (Arundinaria) are common understory shrubs.
Fauna
Although home to a smaller variety of wildlife than the surrounding rainforest these pine forests are relatively unspoilt and therefore still important habitat for a number of species adapted to the rocky heights. When the area was surveyed by the Wildlife Conservation Society in the 1950s mammals of the pine forest included Red serow (Capricornis rubidus), sambar (rusa unicolor), Indian muntjac (Muntiacus muntjac), wild boar (Sus scrofa), and Asian black bear (ursus thibetanus) while smaller mammals include Oriental giant squirrels, Indian giant flying squirrel and civets. None of these mammals are endemic to this ecoregion.
Birds reported in the survey include the silver-breasted broadbill (Serilophus lunatus), white-naped yuhina (Yuhina bakeri), rufous-vented tit (Periparus rubidiventris), stripe-throated yuhina (Yuhina gularis), a number of Old World babblers, grey-sided laughingthrush (Garrulax caerulatus), rufous-chinned laughingthrush (Garrulax rufogularis), striated laughingthrush (Garrulax striatus), purple and green cochoas, beautiful nuthatch (Sitta formosa), sultan tit (Melanochlora sultana), some leafbirds and white-browed fulvetta (fulvetta vinipectus) while large numbers of shelduck and bar-headed goose were seen on the Chindwin River. Two more species of laughingthrush are thought to be endemic to these mountains: brown-capped laughingthrush (Garrulax austeni) and striped laughingthrush (Garrulax virgatus).
Threats and preservation
These mountains have been poorly researched since the 1950s, when it was noted that patches were being systematically cleared for farming and this shifting cultivation continues today resulting in soil erosion and loss of habitat for wildlife.
See also
List of ecoregions in India
References
Wikramanayake, Eric; Eric Dinerstein; Colby Loucks; et al. (2002). Terrestrial Ecoregions of the Indo-Pacific: a Conservation Assessment. Island Press; Washington, D.C. (U.S.)
Ecoregions of India
Ecoregions of Myanmar
Tropical and subtropical coniferous forests
Forests of India
Forests of Myanmar
Montane forests
Indomalayan ecoregions |
4189127 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/River%20ecosystem | River ecosystem | River ecosystems are flowing waters that drain the landscape, and include the biotic (living) interactions amongst plants, animals and micro-organisms, as well as abiotic (nonliving) physical and chemical interactions of its many parts. River ecosystems are part of larger watershed networks or catchments, where smaller headwater streams drain into mid-size streams, which progressively drain into larger river networks. The major zones in river ecosystems are determined by the river bed's gradient or by the velocity of the current. Faster moving turbulent water typically contains greater concentrations of dissolved oxygen, which supports greater biodiversity than the slow-moving water of pools. These distinctions form the basis for the division of rivers into upland and lowland rivers.
The food base of streams within riparian forests is mostly derived from the trees, but wider streams and those that lack a canopy derive the majority of their food base from algae. Anadromous fish are also an important source of nutrients. Environmental threats to rivers include loss of water, dams, chemical pollution and introduced species. A dam produces negative effects that continue down the watershed. The most important negative effects are the reduction of spring flooding, which damages wetlands, and the retention of sediment, which leads to the loss of deltaic wetlands.
River ecosystems are prime examples of lotic ecosystems. Lotic refers to flowing water, from the Latin , meaning washed. Lotic waters range from springs only a few centimeters wide to major rivers kilometers in width. Much of this article applies to lotic ecosystems in general, including related lotic systems such as streams and springs. Lotic ecosystems can be contrasted with lentic ecosystems, which involve relatively still terrestrial waters such as lakes, ponds, and wetlands. Together, these two ecosystems form the more general study area of freshwater or aquatic ecology.
The following unifying characteristics make the ecology of running waters unique among aquatic habitats: the flow is unidirectional, there is a state of continuous physical change, and there is a high degree of spatial and temporal heterogeneity at all scales (microhabitats), the variability between lotic systems is quite high and the biota is specialized to live with flow conditions.
Abiotic components (non-living)
The non-living components of an ecosystem are called abiotic components.
E.g. stone, air, soil, etc.
Water flow
Unidirectional water flow is the key factor in lotic systems influencing their ecology. Streamflow can be continuous or intermittent, though. Streamflow is the result of the summative inputs from groundwater, precipitation, and overland flow. Water flow can vary between systems, ranging from torrential rapids to slow backwaters that almost seem like lentic systems. The speed or velocity of the water flow of the water column can also vary within a system and is subject to chaotic turbulence, though water velocity tends to be highest in the middle part of the stream channel (known as the thalveg). This turbulence results in divergences of flow from the mean downslope flow vector as typified by eddy currents. The mean flow rate vector is based on the variability of friction with the bottom or sides of the channel, sinuosity, obstructions, and the incline gradient. In addition, the amount of water input into the system from direct precipitation, snowmelt, and/or groundwater can affect the flow rate. The amount of water in a stream is measured as discharge (volume per unit time). As water flows downstream, streams and rivers most often gain water volume, so at base flow (i.e., no storm input), smaller headwater streams have very low discharge, while larger rivers have much higher discharge. The "flow regime" of a river or stream includes the general patterns of discharge over annual or decadal time scales, and may capture seasonal changes in flow.
While water flow is strongly determined by slope, flowing waters can alter the general shape or direction of the stream bed, a characteristic also known as geomorphology. The profile of the river water column is made up of three primary actions: erosion, transport, and deposition. Rivers have been described as "the gutters down which run the ruins of continents". Rivers are continuously eroding, transporting, and depositing substrate, sediment, and organic material. The continuous movement of water and entrained material creates a variety of habitats, including riffles, glides, and pools.
Light
Light is important to lotic systems, because it provides the energy necessary to drive primary production via photosynthesis, and can also provide refuge for prey species in shadows it casts. The amount of light that a system receives can be related to a combination of internal and external stream variables. The area surrounding a small stream, for example, might be shaded by surrounding forests or by valley walls. Larger river systems tend to be wide so the influence of external variables is minimized, and the sun reaches the surface. These rivers also tend to be more turbulent, however, and particles in the water increasingly attenuate light as depth increases. Seasonal and diurnal factors might also play a role in light availability because the angle of incidence, the angle at which light strikes water can lead to light lost from reflection. Known as Beer's Law, the shallower the angle, the more light is reflected and the amount of solar radiation received declines logarithmically with depth. Additional influences on light availability include cloud cover, altitude, and geographic position.
Temperature
Most lotic species are poikilotherms whose internal temperature varies with their environment, thus temperature is a key abiotic factor for them. Water can be heated or cooled through radiation at the surface and conduction to or from the air and surrounding substrate. Shallow streams are typically well mixed and maintain a relatively uniform temperature within an area. In deeper, slower moving water systems, however, a strong difference between the bottom and surface temperatures may develop. Spring fed systems have little variation as springs are typically from groundwater sources, which are often very close to ambient temperature. Many systems show strong diurnal fluctuations and seasonal variations are most extreme in arctic, desert and temperate systems. The amount of shading, climate and elevation can also influence the temperature of lotic systems.
Chemistry
Water chemistry in river ecosystems varies depending on which dissolved solutes and gases are present in the water column of the stream. Specifically river water can include, apart from the water itself,
dissolved inorganic matter and major ions (calcium, sodium, magnesium, potassium, bicarbonate, sulphide, chloride)
dissolved inorganic nutrients (nitrogen, phosphorus, silica)
suspended and dissolved organic matter
gases (nitrogen, nitrous oxide, carbon dioxide, oxygen)
trace metals and pollutants
Dissolved ions and nutrients
Dissolved stream solutes can be considered either reactive or conservative. Reactive solutes are readily biologically assimilated by the autotrophic and heterotrophic biota of the stream; examples can include inorganic nitrogen species such as nitrate or ammonium, some forms of phosphorus (e.g., soluble reactive phosphorus), and silica. Other solutes can be considered conservative, which indicates that the solute is not taken up and used biologically; chloride is often considered a conservative solute. Conservative solutes are often used as hydrologic tracers for water movement and transport. Both reactive and conservative stream water chemistry is foremost determined by inputs from the geology of its watershed, or catchment area. Stream water chemistry can also be influenced by precipitation, and the addition of pollutants from human sources. Large differences in chemistry do not usually exist within small lotic systems due to a high rate of mixing. In larger river systems, however, the concentrations of most nutrients, dissolved salts, and pH decrease as distance increases from the river's source.
Dissolved gases
In terms of dissolved gases, oxygen is likely the most important chemical constituent of lotic systems, as all aerobic organisms require it for survival. It enters the water mostly via diffusion at the water-air interface. Oxygen's solubility in water decreases as water pH and temperature increases. Fast, turbulent streams expose more of the water's surface area to the air and tend to have low temperatures and thus more oxygen than slow, backwaters. Oxygen is a byproduct of photosynthesis, so systems with a high abundance of aquatic algae and plants may also have high concentrations of oxygen during the day. These levels can decrease significantly during the night when primary producers switch to respiration. Oxygen can be limiting if circulation between the surface and deeper layers is poor, if the activity of lotic animals is very high, or if there is a large amount of organic decay occurring.
Suspended matter
Rivers can also transport suspended inorganic and organic matter. These materials can include sediment or terrestrially-derived organic matter that falls into the stream channel. Often, organic matter is processed within the stream via mechanical fragmentation, consumption and grazing by invertebrates, and microbial decomposition. Leaves and woody debris recognizable coarse particulate organic matter (CPOM) into particulate organic matter (POM), down to fine particulate organic matter. Woody and non-woody plants have different instream breakdown rates, with leafy plants or plant parts (e.g., flower petals) breaking down faster than woody logs or branches.
Substrate
The inorganic substrate of lotic systems is composed of the geologic material present in the catchment that is eroded, transported, sorted, and deposited by the current. Inorganic substrates are classified by size on the Wentworth scale, which ranges from boulders, to pebbles, to gravel, to sand, and to silt. Typically, substrate particle size decreases downstream with larger boulders and stones in more mountainous areas and sandy bottoms in lowland rivers. This is because the higher gradients of mountain streams facilitate a faster flow, moving smaller substrate materials further downstream for deposition. Substrate can also be organic and may include fine particles, autumn shed leaves, large woody debris such as submerged tree logs, moss, and semi-aquatic plants. Substrate deposition is not necessarily a permanent event, as it can be subject to large modifications during flooding events.
Biotic components (living)
The living components of an ecosystem are called the biotic components. Streams have numerous types of biotic organisms that live in them, including bacteria, primary producers, insects and other invertebrates, as well as fish and other vertebrates.
Biofilm
A biofilm is a combination of algae (diatoms etc.), fungi, bacteria, and other small microorganisms that exist in a film along the streambed or the benthos. Biofilm assemblages themselves are complex, and add to the complexity of a streambed.
The different biofilm components (algae and bacteria are the principal components) are embedded in an exopolysaccharide matrix (EPS), and are net receptors of inorganic and organic elements and remain submitted to the influences of the different environmental factors.
Biofilms are one of the main biological interphases in river ecosystems, and probably the most important in intermittent rivers, where the importance of the water column is reduced during extended low-activity periods of the hydrological cycle. Biofilms can be understood as microbial consortia of autotrophs and heterotrophs, coexisting in a matrix of hydrated extracellular polymeric substances (EPS). These two main biological components are respectively mainly algae and cyanobacteria on one side, and bacteria and fungi on the other. Micro- and meiofauna also inhabit the biofilm, predating on the organisms and organic particles and contributing to its evolution and dispersal. Biofilms therefore form a highly active biological consortium, ready to use organic and inorganic materials from the water phase, and also ready to use light or chemical energy sources. The EPS immobilize the cells and keep them in close proximity allowing for intense interactions including cell-cell communication and the formation of synergistic consortia. The EPS is able to retain extracellular enzymes and therefore allows the utilization of materials from the environment and the transformation of these materials into dissolved nutrients for the use by algae and bacteria. At the same time, the EPS contributes to protect the cells from desiccation as well from other hazards (e.g., biocides, UV radiation, etc.) from the outer world. On the other hand, the packing and the EPS protection layer limits the diffusion of gases and nutrients, especially for the cells far from the biofilm surface, and this limits their survival and creates strong gradients within the biofilm. Both the biofilm physical structure, and the plasticity of the organisms that live within it, ensure and support their survival in harsh environments or under changing environmental conditions.
Microorganisms
Bacteria are present in large numbers in lotic waters. Free-living forms are associated with decomposing organic material, biofilm on the surfaces of rocks and vegetation, in between particles that compose the substrate, and suspended in the water column. Other forms are also associated with the guts of lotic organisms as parasites or in commensal relationships. Bacteria play a large role in energy recycling (see below).
Diatoms are one of the main dominant groups of periphytic algae in lotic systems and have been widely used as efficient indicators of water quality, because they respond quickly to environmental changes, especially organic pollution and eutrophication, with a broad spectrum of tolerances to conditions ranging, from oligotrophic to eutrophic.
Primary producers
Algae, consisting of phytoplankton and periphyton, are the most significant sources of primary production in most streams and rivers. Phytoplankton float freely in the water column and thus are unable to maintain populations in fast flowing streams. They can, however, develop sizeable populations in slow moving rivers and backwaters. Periphyton are typically filamentous and tufted algae that can attach themselves to objects to avoid being washed away by fast currents. In places where flow rates are negligible or absent, periphyton may form a gelatinous, unanchored floating mat.
Plants exhibit limited adaptations to fast flow and are most successful in reduced currents. More primitive plants, such as mosses and liverworts attach themselves to solid objects. This typically occurs in colder headwaters where the mostly rocky substrate offers attachment sites. Some plants are free floating at the water's surface in dense mats like duckweed or water hyacinth. Others are rooted and may be classified as submerged or emergent. Rooted plants usually occur in areas of slackened current where fine-grained soils are found. These rooted plants are flexible, with elongated leaves that offer minimal resistance to current.
Living in flowing water can be beneficial to plants and algae because the current is usually well aerated and it provides a continuous supply of nutrients. These organisms are limited by flow, light, water chemistry, substrate, and grazing pressure. Algae and plants are important to lotic systems as sources of energy, for forming microhabitats that shelter other fauna from predators and the current, and as a food resource.
Insects and other invertebrates
Up to 90% of invertebrates in some lotic systems are insects. These species exhibit tremendous diversity and can be found occupying almost every available habitat, including the surfaces of stones, deep below the substratum in the hyporheic zone, adrift in the current, and in the surface film.
Insects have developed several strategies for living in the diverse flows of lotic systems. Some avoid high current areas, inhabiting the substratum or the sheltered side of rocks. Others have flat bodies to reduce the drag forces they experience from living in running water. Some insects, like the giant water bug (Belostomatidae), avoid flood events by leaving the stream when they sense rainfall. In addition to these behaviors and body shapes, insects have different life history adaptations to cope with the naturally-occurring physical harshness of stream environments. Some insects time their life events based on when floods and droughts occur. For example, some mayflies synchronize when they emerge as flying adults with when snowmelt flooding usually occurs in Colorado streams. Other insects do not have a flying stage and spend their entire life cycle in the river.
Like most of the primary consumers, lotic invertebrates often rely heavily on the current to bring them food and oxygen. Invertebrates are important as both consumers and prey items in lotic systems.
The common orders of insects that are found in river ecosystems include Ephemeroptera (also known as a mayfly), Trichoptera (also known as a caddisfly), Plecoptera (also known as a stonefly, Diptera (also known as a true fly), some types of Coleoptera (also known as a beetle), Odonata (the group that includes the dragonfly and the damselfly), and some types of Hemiptera (also known as true bugs).
Additional invertebrate taxa common to flowing waters include mollusks such as snails, limpets, clams, mussels, as well as crustaceans like crayfish, amphipoda and crabs.
Fish and other vertebrates
Fish are probably the best-known inhabitants of lotic systems. The ability of a fish species to live in flowing waters depends upon the speed at which it can swim and the duration that its speed can be maintained. This ability can vary greatly between species and is tied to the habitat in which it can survive. Continuous swimming expends a tremendous amount of energy and, therefore, fishes spend only short periods in full current. Instead, individuals remain close to the bottom or the banks, behind obstacles, and sheltered from the current, swimming in the current only to feed or change locations. Some species have adapted to living only on the system bottom, never venturing into the open water flow. These fishes are dorso-ventrally flattened to reduce flow resistance and often have eyes on top of their heads to observe what is happening above them. Some also have sensory barrels positioned under the head to assist in the testing of substratum.
Lotic systems typically connect to each other, forming a path to the ocean (spring → stream → river → ocean), and many fishes have life cycles that require stages in both fresh and salt water. Salmon, for example, are anadromous species that are born in freshwater but spend most of their adult life in the ocean, returning to fresh water only to spawn. Eels are catadromous species that do the opposite, living in freshwater as adults but migrating to the ocean to spawn.
Other vertebrate taxa that inhabit lotic systems include amphibians, such as salamanders, reptiles (e.g. snakes, turtles, crocodiles and alligators) various bird species, and mammals (e.g., otters, beavers, hippos, and river dolphins). With the exception of a few species, these vertebrates are not tied to water as fishes are, and spend part of their time in terrestrial habitats. Many fish species are important as consumers and as prey species to the larger vertebrates mentioned above.
Trophic level dynamics
The concept of trophic levels are used in food webs to visualise the manner in which energy is transferred from one part of an ecosystem to another. Trophic levels can be assigned numbers determining how far an organism is along the food chain.
Level one: Producers, plant-like organisms that generate their own food using solar radiation, including algae, phytoplankton, mosses and lichens.
Level two: Consumers, animal-like organism that get their energy from eating producers, such as zooplankton, small fish, and crustaceans.
Level three: Decomposers, organisms that break down the dead matter of consumers and producers and return the nutrients back to the system. Example are bacteria and fungi.
All energy transactions within an ecosystem derive from a single external source of energy, the sun. Some of this solar radiation is used by producers (plants) to turn inorganic substances into organic substances which can be used as food by consumers (animals). Plants release portions of this energy back into the ecosystem through a catabolic process. Animals then consume the potential energy that is being released from the producers. This system is followed by the death of the consumer organism which then returns nutrients back into the ecosystem. This allow further growth for the plants, and the cycle continues. Breaking cycles down into levels makes it easier for ecologists to understand ecological succession when observing the transfer of energy within a system.
Top-down and bottom-up affect
A common issue with trophic level dynamics is how resources and production are regulated. The usage and interaction between resources have a large impact on the structure of food webs as a whole. Temperature plays a role in food web interactions including top-down and bottom-up forces within ecological communities. Bottom-up regulations within a food web occur when a resource available at the base or bottom of the food web increases productivity, which then climbs the chain and influence the biomass availability to higher trophic organism. Top-down regulations occur when a predator population increases. This limits the available prey population, which limits the availability of energy for lower trophic levels within the food chain. Many biotic and abiotic factors can influence top-down and bottom-up interactions.
Trophic cascade
Another example of food web interactions are trophic cascades. Understanding trophic cascades has allowed ecologists to better understand the structure and dynamics of food webs within an ecosystem. The phenomenon of trophic cascades allows keystone predators to structure entire food web in terms of how they interact with their prey. Trophic cascades can cause drastic changes in the energy flow within a food web. For example, when a top or keystone predator consumes organisms below them in the food web, the density and behavior of the prey will change. This, in turn, affects the abundance of organisms consumed further down the chain, resulting in a cascade down the trophic levels. However, empirical evidence shows trophic cascades are much more prevalent in terrestrial food webs than aquatic food webs.
Food chain
A food chain is a linear system of links that is part of a food web, and represents the order in which organisms are consumed from one trophic level to the next. Each link in a food chain is associated with a trophic level in the ecosystem. The numbered steps it takes for the initial source of energy starting from the bottom to reach the top of the food web is called the food chain length. While food chain lengths can fluctuate, aquatic ecosystems start with primary producers that are consumed by primary consumers which are consumed by secondary consumers, and those in turn can be consumed by tertiary consumers so on and so forth until the top of the food chain has been reached.
Primary producers
Primary producers start every food chain. Their production of energy and nutrients comes from the sun through photosynthesis. Algae contributes to a lot of the energy and nutrients at the base of the food chain along with terrestrial litter-fall that enters the stream or river. Production of organic compounds like carbon is what gets transferred up the food chain. Primary producers are consumed by herbivorous invertebrates that act as the primary consumers. Productivity of these producers and the function of the ecosystem as a whole are influenced by the organism above it in the food chain.
Primary consumers
Primary consumers are the invertebrates and macro-invertebrates that feed upon the primary producers. They play an important role in initiating the transfer of energy from the base trophic level to the next. They are regulatory organisms which facilitate and control rates of nutrient cycling and the mixing of aquatic and terrestrial plant materials. They also transport and retain some of those nutrients and materials. There are many different functional groups of these invertebrate, including grazers, organisms that feed on algal biofilm that collects on submerged objects, shredders that feed on large leaves and detritus and help break down large material. Also filter feeders, macro-invertebrates that rely on stream flow to deliver them fine particulate organic matter (FPOM) suspended in the water column, and gatherers who feed on FPOM found on the substrate of the river or stream.
Secondary consumers
The secondary consumers in a river ecosystem are the predators of the primary consumers. This includes mainly insectivorous fish. Consumption by invertebrate insects and macro-invertebrates is another step of energy flow up the food chain. Depending on their abundance, these predatory consumers can shape an ecosystem by the manner in which they affect the trophic levels below them. When fish are at high abundance and eat lots of invertebrates, then algal biomass and primary production in the stream is greater, and when secondary consumers are not present, then algal biomass may decrease due to the high abundance of primary consumers. Energy and nutrients that starts with primary producers continues to make its way up the food chain and depending on the ecosystem, may end with these predatory fish.
Food web complexity
Diversity, productivity, species richness, composition and stability are all interconnected by a series of feedback loops. Communities can have a series of complex, direct and/or indirect, responses to major changes in biodiversity. Food webs can include a wide array of variables, the three main variables ecologists look at regarding ecosystems include species richness, biomass of productivity and stability/resistant to change. When a species is added or removed from an ecosystem it will have an effect on the remaining food web, the intensity of this effect is related to species connectedness and food web robustness. When a new species is added to a river ecosystem the intensity of the effect is related to the robustness or resistance to change of the current food web. When a species is removed from a river ecosystem the intensity of the effect is related to the connectedness of the species to the food web. An invasive species could be removed with little to no effect, but if important and native primary producers, prey or predatory fish are removed you could have a negative trophic cascade. One highly variable component to river ecosystems is food supply (biomass of primary producers). Food supply or type of producers is ever changing with the seasons and differing habitats within the river ecosystem. Another highly variable component to river ecosystems is nutrient input from wetland and terrestrial detritus. Food and nutrient supply variability is important for the succession, robustness and connectedness of river ecosystem organisms.
Trophic relationships
Energy inputs
Energy sources can be autochthonous or allochthonous.
Autochthonous (from the Latin "auto" = "self) energy sources are those derived from within the lotic system. During photosynthesis, for example, primary producers form organic carbon compounds out of carbon dioxide and inorganic matter. The energy they produce is important for the community because it may be transferred to higher trophic levels via consumption. Additionally, high rates of primary production can introduce dissolved organic matter (DOM) to the waters. Another form of autochthonous energy comes from the decomposition of dead organisms and feces that originate within the lotic system. In this case, bacteria decompose the detritus or coarse particulate organic material (CPOM; >1 mm pieces) into fine particulate organic matter (FPOM; <1 mm pieces) and then further into inorganic compounds that are required for photosynthesis. This process is discussed in more detail below.
Allochthonous energy sources are those derived from outside the lotic system, that is, from the terrestrial environment. Leaves, twigs, fruits, etc. are typical forms of terrestrial CPOM that have entered the water by direct litter fall or lateral leaf blow. In addition, terrestrial animal-derived materials, such as feces or carcasses that have been added to the system are examples of allochthonous CPOM. The CPOM undergoes a specific process of degradation. Allan gives the example of a leaf fallen into a stream. First, the soluble chemicals are dissolved and leached from the leaf upon its saturation with water. This adds to the DOM load in the system. Next microbes such as bacteria and fungi colonize the leaf, softening it as the mycelium of the fungus grows into it. The composition of the microbial community is influenced by the species of tree from which the leaves are shed (Rubbo and Kiesecker 2004). This combination of bacteria, fungi, and leaf are a food source for shredding invertebrates, which leave only FPOM after consumption. These fine particles may be colonized by microbes again or serve as a food source for animals that consume FPOM. Organic matter can also enter the lotic system already in the FPOM stage by wind, surface runoff, bank erosion, or groundwater. Similarly, DOM can be introduced through canopy drip from rain or from surface flows.
Invertebrates
Invertebrates can be organized into many feeding guilds in lotic systems. Some species are shredders, which use large and powerful mouth parts to feed on non-woody CPOM and their associated microorganisms. Others are suspension feeders, which use their setae, filtering aparati, nets, or even secretions to collect FPOM and microbes from the water. These species may be passive collectors, utilizing the natural flow of the system, or they may generate their own current to draw water, and also, FPOM in Allan. Members of the gatherer-collector guild actively search for FPOM under rocks and in other places where the stream flow has slackened enough to allow deposition. Grazing invertebrates utilize scraping, rasping, and browsing adaptations to feed on periphyton and detritus. Finally, several families are predatory, capturing and consuming animal prey. Both the number of species and the abundance of individuals within each guild is largely dependent upon food availability. Thus, these values may vary across both seasons and systems.
Fish
Fish can also be placed into feeding guilds. Planktivores pick plankton out of the water column. Herbivore-detritivores are bottom-feeding species that ingest both periphyton and detritus indiscriminately. Surface and water column feeders capture surface prey (mainly terrestrial and emerging insects) and drift (benthic invertebrates floating downstream). Benthic invertebrate feeders prey primarily on immature insects, but will also consume other benthic invertebrates. Top predators consume fishes and/or large invertebrates. Omnivores ingest a wide range of prey. These can be floral, faunal, and/or detrital in nature. Finally, parasites live off of host species, typically other fishes. Fish are flexible in their feeding roles, capturing different prey with regard to seasonal availability and their own developmental stage. Thus, they may occupy multiple feeding guilds in their lifetime. The number of species in each guild can vary greatly between systems, with temperate warm water streams having the most benthic invertebrate feeders, and tropical systems having large numbers of detritus feeders due to high rates of allochthonous input.
Community patterns and diversity
Local species richness
Large rivers have comparatively more species than small streams. Many relate this pattern to the greater area and volume of larger systems, as well as an increase in habitat diversity. Some systems, however, show a poor fit between system size and species richness. In these cases, a combination of factors such as historical rates of speciation and extinction, type of substrate, microhabitat availability, water chemistry, temperature, and disturbance such as flooding seem to be important.
Resource partitioning
Although many alternate theories have been postulated for the ability of guild-mates to coexist (see Morin 1999), resource partitioning has been well documented in lotic systems as a means of reducing competition. The three main types of resource partitioning include habitat, dietary, and temporal segregation.
Habitat segregation was found to be the most common type of resource partitioning in natural systems (Schoener, 1974). In lotic systems, microhabitats provide a level of physical complexity that can support a diverse array of organisms (Vincin and Hawknis, 1998). The separation of species by substrate preferences has been well documented for invertebrates. Ward (1992) was able to divide substrate dwellers into six broad assemblages, including those that live in: coarse substrate, gravel, sand, mud, woody debris, and those associated with plants, showing one layer of segregation. On a smaller scale, further habitat partitioning can occur on or around a single substrate, such as a piece of gravel. Some invertebrates prefer the high flow areas on the exposed top of the gravel, while others reside in the crevices between one piece of gravel and the next, while still others live on the bottom of this gravel piece.
Dietary segregation is the second-most common type of resource partitioning. High degrees of morphological specializations or behavioral differences allow organisms to use specific resources. The size of nets built by some species of invertebrate suspension feeders, for example, can filter varying particle size of FPOM from the water (Edington et al. 1984). Similarly, members in the grazing guild can specialize in the harvesting of algae or detritus depending upon the morphology of their scraping apparatus. In addition, certain species seem to show a preference for specific algal species.
Temporal segregation is a less common form of resource partitioning, but it is nonetheless an observed phenomenon. Typically, it accounts for coexistence by relating it to differences in life history patterns and the timing of maximum growth among guild mates. Tropical fishes in Borneo, for example, have shifted to shorter life spans in response to the ecological niche reduction felt with increasing levels of species richness in their ecosystem (Watson and Balon 1984).
Persistence and succession
Over long time scales, there is a tendency for species composition in pristine systems to remain in a stable state. This has been found for both invertebrate and fish species. On shorter time scales, however, flow variability and unusual precipitation patterns decrease habitat stability and can all lead to declines in persistence levels. The ability to maintain this persistence over long time scales is related to the ability of lotic systems to return to the original community configuration relatively quickly after a disturbance (Townsend et al. 1987). This is one example of temporal succession, a site-specific change in a community involving changes in species composition over time. Another form of temporal succession might occur when a new habitat is opened up for colonization. In these cases, an entirely new community that is well adapted to the conditions found in this new area can establish itself.
River continuum concept
The River continuum concept (RCC) was an attempt to construct a single framework to describe the function of temperate lotic ecosystems from the headwaters to larger rivers and relate key characteristics to changes in the biotic community (Vannote et al. 1980). The physical basis for RCC is size and location along the gradient from a small stream eventually linked to a large river. Stream order (see characteristics of streams) is used as the physical measure of the position along the RCC.
According to the RCC, low ordered sites are small shaded streams where allochthonous inputs of CPOM are a necessary resource for consumers. As the river widens at mid-ordered sites, energy inputs should change. Ample sunlight should reach the bottom in these systems to support significant periphyton production. Additionally, the biological processing of CPOM (coarse particulate organic matter larger than 1 mm) inputs at upstream sites is expected to result in the transport of large amounts of FPOM (fine particulate organic matter smaller than 1 mm) to these downstream ecosystems. Plants should become more abundant at edges of the river with increasing river size, especially in lowland rivers where finer sediments have been deposited and facilitate rooting. The main channels likely have too much current and turbidity and a lack of substrate to support plants or periphyton. Phytoplankton should produce the only autochthonous inputs here, but photosynthetic rates will be limited due to turbidity and mixing. Thus, allochthonous inputs are expected to be the primary energy source for large rivers. This FPOM will come from both upstream sites via the decomposition process and through lateral inputs from floodplains.
Biota should change with this change in energy from the headwaters to the mouth of these systems. Namely, shredders should prosper in low-ordered systems and grazers in mid-ordered sites. Microbial decomposition should play the largest role in energy production for low-ordered sites and large rivers, while photosynthesis, in addition to degraded allochthonous inputs from upstream will be essential in mid-ordered systems. As mid-ordered sites will theoretically receive the largest variety of energy inputs, they might be expected to host the most biological diversity (Vannote et al. 1980).
Just how well the RCC actually reflects patterns in natural systems is uncertain and its generality can be a handicap when applied to diverse and specific situations. The most noted criticisms of the RCC are: 1. It focuses mostly on macroinvertebrates, disregarding that plankton and fish diversity is highest in high orders; 2. It relies heavily on the fact that low ordered sites have high CPOM inputs, even though many streams lack riparian habitats; 3. It is based on pristine systems, which rarely exist today; and 4. It is centered around the functioning of temperate streams. Despite its shortcomings, the RCC remains a useful idea for describing how the patterns of ecological functions in a lotic system can vary from the source to the mouth.
Disturbances such as congestion by dams or natural events such as shore flooding are not included in the RCC model. Various researchers have since expanded the model to account for such irregularities. For example, J.V. Ward and J.A. Stanford came up with the Serial Discontinuity Concept in 1983, which addresses the impact of geomorphologic disorders such as congestion and integrated inflows. The same authors presented the Hyporheic Corridor concept in 1993, in which the vertical (in depth) and lateral (from shore to shore) structural complexity of the river were connected. The flood pulse concept, developed by W. J. Junk in 1989, further modified by P. B. Bayley in 1990 and K. Tockner in 2000, takes into account the large amount of nutrients and organic material that makes its way into a river from the sediment of surrounding flooded land.
Human impacts
Humans exert a geomorphic force that now rivals that of the natural Earth. The period of human dominance has been termed the Anthropocene, and several dates have been proposed for its onset. Many researchers have emphasised the dramatic changes associated with the Industrial Revolution in Europe after about 1750 CE (Common Era) and the Great Acceleration in technology at about 1950 CE.
However, a detectable human imprint on the environment extends back for thousands of years, and an emphasis on recent changes minimises the enormous landscape transformation caused by humans in antiquity. Important earlier human effects with significant environmental consequences include megafaunal extinctions between 14,000 and 10,500 cal yr BP; domestication of plants and animals close to the start of the Holocene at 11,700 cal yr BP; agricultural practices and deforestation at 10,000 to 5000 cal yr BP; and widespread generation of anthropogenic soils at about 2000 cal yr BP. Key evidence of early anthropogenic activity is encoded in early fluvial successions, long predating anthropogenic effects that have intensified over the past centuries and led to the modern worldwide river crisis.
Pollution
River pollution can include but is not limited to: increasing sediment export, excess nutrients from fertilizer or urban runoff, sewage and septic inputs, plastic pollution, nano-particles, pharmaceuticals and personal care products, synthetic chemicals, road salt, inorganic contaminants (e.g., heavy metals), and even heat via thermal pollutions. The effects of pollution often depend on the context and material, but can reduce ecosystem functioning, limit ecosystem services, reduce stream biodiversity, and impact human health.
Pollutant sources of lotic systems are hard to control because they can derive, often in small amounts, over a very wide area and enter the system at many locations along its length. While direct pollution of lotic systems has been greatly reduced in the United States under the government's Clean Water Act, contaminants from diffuse non-point sources remain a large problem. Agricultural fields often deliver large quantities of sediments, nutrients, and chemicals to nearby streams and rivers. Urban and residential areas can also add to this pollution when contaminants are accumulated on impervious surfaces such as roads and parking lots that then drain into the system. Elevated nutrient concentrations, especially nitrogen and phosphorus which are key components of fertilizers, can increase periphyton growth, which can be particularly dangerous in slow-moving streams. Another pollutant, acid rain, forms from sulfur dioxide and nitrous oxide emitted from factories and power stations. These substances readily dissolve in atmospheric moisture and enter lotic systems through precipitation. This can lower the pH of these sites, affecting all trophic levels from algae to vertebrates. Mean species richness and total species numbers within a system decrease with decreasing pH.
Flow modification
Flow modification can occur as a result of dams, water regulation and extraction, channel modification, and the destruction of the river floodplain and adjacent riparian zones.
Dams alter the flow, temperature, and sediment regime of lotic systems. Additionally, many rivers are dammed at multiple locations, amplifying the impact. Dams can cause enhanced clarity and reduced variability in stream flow, which in turn cause an increase in periphyton abundance. Invertebrates immediately below a dam can show reductions in species richness due to an overall reduction in habitat heterogeneity. Also, thermal changes can affect insect development, with abnormally warm winter temperatures obscuring cues to break egg diapause and overly cool summer temperatures leaving too few acceptable days to complete growth. Finally, dams fragment river systems, isolating previously continuous populations, and preventing the migrations of anadromous and catadromous species.
Invasive species
Invasive species have been introduced to lotic systems through both purposeful events (e.g. stocking game and food species) as well as unintentional events (e.g. hitchhikers on boats or fishing waders). These organisms can affect natives via competition for prey or habitat, predation, habitat alteration, hybridization, or the introduction of harmful diseases and parasites. Once established, these species can be difficult to control or eradicate, particularly because of the connectivity of lotic systems. Invasive species can be especially harmful in areas that have endangered biota, such as mussels in the Southeast United States, or those that have localized endemic species, like lotic systems west of the Rocky Mountains, where many species evolved in isolation.
See also
Betty's Brain software that "learns" about river ecosystems
Flood pulse concept
Lake ecosystem
Rheophile
Riparian zone
River continuum concept
River drainage system
RIVPACS
The Riverkeepers
Upland and lowland rivers
References
Further reading
Brown, A. L. 1987. Freshwater Ecology. Heinimann Educational Books, London. P. 163.
Carlisle, D. M. and M. D. Woodside. 2013. Ecological health in the nation's streams, United States Geological Survey. P. 6.
Edington, J. M., Edington, M. A., and J. A. Dorman. 1984. Habitat partitioning amongst hydrophyschid larvae of a Malaysian stream. Entomologica 30: 123–129.
Hynes, H. B. N. 1970. Ecology of Running Waters. Originally published in Toronto by University of Toronto Press, 555 p.
Morin, P. J. 1999. Community Ecology. Blackwell Science, Oxford. P. 424.
Ward, J. V. 1992. Aquatic Insect Ecology: biology and habitat. Wiley, New York. P. 456.
External links
USGS real time stream flow data for gauged systems nationwide
Aquatic ecology
Ecosystems
Freshwater ecology
Limnology
Riparian zone
Rivers
Water streams |
4196659 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tisserand%27s%20criterion | Tisserand's criterion | Tisserand's criterion is used to determine whether or not an observed orbiting body, such as a comet or an asteroid, is the same as a previously observed orbiting body.
While all the orbital parameters of an object orbiting the Sun during the close encounter with another massive body (e.g. Jupiter) can be changed dramatically, the value of a function of these parameters, called Tisserand's relation (due to Félix Tisserand) is approximately conserved, making it possible to recognize the orbit after the encounter.
Definition
Tisserand's criterion is computed in a circular restricted three-body system. In a circular restricted three-body system, one of the masses is assumed to be much smaller than the other two. The other two masses are assumed to be in a circular orbit about the system's center of mass. In addition, Tisserand's criterion also relies on the assumptions that a) one of the two larger masses is much smaller than the other large mass and b) the comet or asteroid has not had a close approach to any other large mass.
Two observed orbiting bodies are possibly the same if they satisfy or nearly satisfy Tisserand's criterion:
where a is the semimajor axis, e is the eccentricity, and i is the inclination of the body's orbit.
In other words, if a function of the orbital elements (named Tisserand's parameter) of the first observed body (nearly) equals the same function calculated with the orbital elements of the second observed body, the two bodies might be the same.
Tisserand's relation
The relation defines a function of orbital parameters, conserved approximately when the third body is far from the second (perturbing) mass.
The relation is derived from the Jacobi constant selecting a suitable unit system and using some approximations. Traditionally, the units are chosen in order to make μ1 and the (constant) distance from μ2 to μ1 a unity, resulting in mean motion n also being a unity in this system.
In addition, given the very large mass of μ1 compared μ2 and μ3
These conditions are satisfied for example for the Sun–Jupiter system with a comet or a spacecraft being the third mass.
The Jacobi constant, a function of coordinates ξ, η, ζ, (distances r1, r2 from the two masses) and the velocities remains the constant of motion through the encounter.
The goal is to express the constant using orbital parameters.
It is assumed, that far from the mass μ2, the test particle (comet, spacecraft) is on an orbit around μ1 resulting from two-body solution. First, the last term in the constant is the velocity, so it can be expressed, sufficiently far from the perturbing mass μ2, as a function of the distance and semi-major axis alone using vis-viva equation
Second, observing that the component of the angular momentum (per unit mass) is
where is the mutual inclination of the orbits of μ3 and μ2, and .
Substituting these into the Jacobi constant CJ, ignoring the term with μ2<<1 and replacing r1 with r (given very large μ1 the barycenter of the system μ1, μ3 is very close to the position of μ1) gives
See also
Orbital elements
Orbital mechanics
n-body problem
References
Orbits |
4198055 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Flag%20and%20coat%20of%20arms%20of%20Transylvania | Flag and coat of arms of Transylvania | The flag and coat of arms of Transylvania were granted by Maria Theresa in 1765, when she established a Grand Principality within the Habsburg monarchy. While neither symbol has official status in present-day Romania, the coat of arms is marshalled within the national Romanian arms; it was also for decades a component of the Hungarian arms. In its upper half, it prominently includes the eagle, which may have been one of the oldest regional symbols, or is otherwise a localized version of the Polish eagle. Early versions of the Transylvanian charges were first designed in Habsburg Hungary at some point before 1550, and were therefore symbols of pretence.
The arms were only attested as in use by the Transylvanian Principality in or after 1580. The first Prince to recognize and use them was Sigismund Báthory, who also simplified the charges. They entered the heraldic patrimony over the next few decades, and, during Ákos Barcsay's reign, were codified as representing three separate jurisdictions: the eagle stood for Transylvania-proper, the sun-and-crescent is for Székely Land (as in the coat of arms of the Székelys), while the seven towers are canting arms of the Saxon-populated cities. They are also widely understood as ethnic symbols of the three privileged nations (therefore excluding Romanians), but this interpretation is criticized as inaccurate by various historians.
Before Maria Theresa, Transylvania's rulers used a variety of flags, which more often than not included family or factional symbols, such as the Báthory "wolf teeth"; Prince Sigismund also used a prototype of the Hungarian tricolor, but the practice died out long before the Habsburg conquest. Transylvania's Habsburg tricolor and the flag of Romania resemble each other superficially: Transylvania has blue-red-yellow displayed horizontally, while Romania has blue-yellow-red, vertically. The Transylvanian colors were codified from the heraldic tinctures, but Romanian scholars such as Iosif Sterca-Șuluțiu ascribe them a Dacian origin and links to the Romanian ethnogenesis. They became popular among the Romanian community of Transylvania in the later stages of the 1848 Revolution, after replacing combinations of blue, red and white.
On such grounds, Transylvanian flags were often used in Austria-Hungary to camouflage celebrations of Romanian nationalism, and as such contributed to a simmering Hungarian–Romanian conflict before and during World War I. In this context, references to the "Transylvanian tricolor" often referred to a blue-yellow-red horizontal variation. Saxon organizations have traditionally reduced the tricolor to a blue-over-red or red-over-blue arrangement, which was also disliked by Hungarian authorities. Both sets of flags were flown by communities supporting the 1918 union with Romania; in its aftermath, Transylvanian or Tranylvanian-derived symbols were sometimes used by Hungarians seeking autonomy for the region as a whole. In parallel, pro-autonomy activists in Székely Land have adopted a blue-gold-silver pattern.
History
Origins
Some of the earliest heraldic traditions in Transylvania relate to the 12th and 13th centuries—which is after the age of Hungarian conquest. They refer to the conquest's chronicling in the manuscript known as Gesta Hungarorum, which claims that Transylvania was settled by five Hungarian clans. Subsequent tradition codified their family crests, all of which had totem-like animal figures—Agmánd had a wolf's head; Borsa, a fish, Gyerő, a fish; Kalocsa, a bird; and Zsombor, a lion. The region had a distinct jurisdiction under a Voivode of Transylvania, the first of whom were attested in the 12th century. Whether it used a heraldic symbol at this stage is a matter of dispute among modern heraldists. Dan Cernovodeanu dismisses the notion, arguing that there was a general uninterest in regional heraldry, manifested throughout high-medieval Hungary; similarly, Károly Kisteleki argues that: "Transylvania did not have an independent coat of arms in the pre-1526 medieval Hungarian Kingdom." Historian Zsigmond Jakó argues that, since "the voivode received his commission directly from the king, [he] probably received a flag from the ruler, as proof of his appointment before an illiterate society."
The Book of Knowledge of All Kingdoms claims a "green flag with a red scimitar" as standing for the "Kingdom of Siluana" or "Septem Castra". The latter is a reference to Transylvania as the country of "seven cities". According to historian Iulian Marțian, this name may predate Hungarian conquest, and is traceable to Roman Dacia. He argues that seven towers may have already been a Transylvanian symbol at that stage, noting that the "Dacian" metropolis of Sirmium was represented by a tower on a field of gules. Hungarian sources, analyzed in the 19th century by Josef Bedeus von Scharberg and Nicolae Densușianu, suggest that Transylvanian troops fought under an eagle banner, but the accuracy of such reporting is altogether doubtful. Several 15th-century armorials also feature a "Duke of Weydn" or "Weiden", which may refer to the Transylvanian Voivodes or Dukes, using an eagle on a field of argent and azure. Among the modern experts, Tudor-Radu Tiron argues for the existence of a Transylvanian eagle shield, taking as evidence a Black Church relief and the attested seal of Fehér County. Both, he argues, may be "heraldizations" of the Roman aquila, and as such folk symbols of "Dacia". At this earliest stage, individual Voivodes also had their own attested arms. Thomas Szécsényi, who governed in the 1350s, used a lion combined with the Árpád stripes. One theory proposes that Bartholomew Drágffy, rising to the position in the 1490s, used the aurochs head, which was also a staple of Moldavian heraldry.
The right to use individual coat of arms was severely limited by the codes of István Werbőczy, introduced in 1514. These effectively excluded many Vlachs (Romanians) from the ranks of Hungarian nobility. In tandem, some alternative collective symbols were being introduced within two distinct ethnic communities: the Transylvanian Saxons (German-speaking) and the Székely (Hungarian-speaking). The former group had its "one single seal" as early as 1224, though it is not recorded what that symbol was. According to Marțian, its design was the same as a 1302 seal, which depicts three kneeling men and a standing one holding up a crown. It was replaced in 1370 by a variant combining the Hungarian and Capetian arms of Louis I. Also included was a third shield, which is as either an eagle-and-rose composition or the first appearance of "three leaves", joined in triquetra, as the leading symbol of the Saxons at large. According to historian Jean-Paul Van der Elst, they are possibly water-lily leaves, establishing a connection with the heraldic traditions of the Low Countries. A tradition reported in 1896 by lawyer Vilmos Bruckner held that a Saxon flag and seal from 1222 carried the slogan AD RETINENDAM CORONAM ("To protect the Crown", in Medieval Latin). The latter's earliest documented usage is on the 1302 seal.
The original Székely symbol featured an arm holding a sword, often piercing through a crown, a bear's severed head, and a heart, sometimes alongside a star-and-crescent; the field, though often interpreted as azure, was most likely gules. Threatened by the peasant revolt of 1437, the estates of the realm established a regime of feudal privileges known as Unio Trium Nationum. This event is traditionally held as the source of a new Székely coat of arms, which only shows the sun and waxing moon (see Count of the Székelys). Marțian notes that these two devices were also used in medieval armorials as visual representations of Cumania and of the Vlachs.
The Ottoman Empire eventually took hold of central Hungary in 1541, leaving Transylvania to reestablish itself as a rump Hungarian Kingdom. During the first decades of reorganization under John Sigismund Zápolya, the region effectively used Hungary's arms, although one popular legend attributes the creation of Transylvania's arms to the same Zápolya. Zápolya's military ordinances imposed recruitment rules on the counties of Transylvania, specifying that each county would have its own banner. Meanwhile, a rival claim to Transylvania had been placed by Habsburg Hungary, which was part of the larger Habsburg monarchy and thus dynastically attached to the Holy Roman Empire. A Transylvanian symbol was probably designed at the court of Ferdinand I, and was based on Saxon heraldry, showing crossed swords and a triquetra. This is the version published by Georg Reicherstorffer (1550) and Martin Schrot (1581).
A manuscript at the Bavarian State Library (Cod. icon. 391) preserves what is perhaps the first version of the modern Transylvanian arms—designed under Habsburg influence, and probably dating back to Zápolya's reign. It has a crowned eagle's head in chief, and seven towers, gules, on seven hills, vert, over a argent field. Its design may join the earlier eagle flag with canting arms for Siebenbürgen ("Seven Cities", the German name of Transylvania); the color scheme seems to be purposefully based on the Hungarian arms. In the 1560s, the seven towers were featured on coinage issued by Habsburg client Iacob Heraclid, who became Prince of Moldavia. These artifacts also feature the Moldavian aurochs and the Wallachian bird, showing Heraclid's ambition of unifying the three realms under one crown. In 1596, Levinus Hulsius of Nuremberg published another recognizable version of Transylvania's arms, showing a crowned eagle over seven hills, with each hill topped by a tower; tinctures cannot be reconstructed.
Báthorys and Michael the Brave
The Eastern Kingdom was downgraded by its Ottoman suzerains to a Transylvanian Principality in 1570. Like with other Ottoman clients, the new Princes were granted banners-of-rule by the Sublime Porte; these were paraded in ceremonies, alongside the kaftans and scepters. Transylvania also preserved the Zápolyan practice of organizing military units under separate county banners. In heraldic practice, it perpetuated the use of Hungarian royal diadems. Their mantling was gules–argent and or–azure, which were probably remnants of the Croatian and Dalmatian tinctures. Zápolya's former realm was taken over by Stephen Báthory in 1576. Though he was the first to emphasize his princely title, he did not create any heraldic symbol for the region, and instead introduced the Báthory family arms (three "wolf's teeth") as a stand-in. Serving as regent in 1580, Christopher Báthory may have issued a heraldic medal showing an eagle and seven towers alongside the Székely sun and waxing moon, but this may be a forgery.
Stephen's son, Sigismund Báthory, rejected Ottoman rule and joined the Habsburgs in the Holy League, being recognized as a Reichsfürst in 1595. By January 1596, he had ambitions to expand his realm, and his Transylvanian troops, stationed in Moldavia, used a flag inscribed Sigismundus Rex Ungariae ("Sigismund King of Hungary"). His elevation in status allowed him to marshall the Báthory and Hulsius versions into a single coat of arms, which also included the Moldavian aurochs and the Wallachian eagle, reflecting Báthory's claim to suzerainty over both countries. No colored versions of the seal survive. While tinctures have been deduced by the authors of Siebmachers Wappenbuch during the 1890s, and are described by historian Constantin Moisil as sable devices on azure (for the eagle) and or (for the seven towers), such readings are criticized by Cernovodeanu—as he notes, the seal's hatching preceded modern conventions, and therefore could not be properly reconstructed. A relief of the Transylvanian arms was carved, probably on Sigismund's orders, in the Moldavian capital of Suceava, again highlighting his regional dominance. This variant kept only the seven towers, and replaced the eagle with an "imperial crown" supported by two lions. Sigismund's heraldry standardizes the towers' depiction by removing the corresponding hills. It, therefore, became the basic template for more modern subsequent representations, being also the first one to definitely include the Székely sun-and-moon.
The latter innovation is often described as fulfilling the visual representation of the Unio Trium Nationum, with the implicit omission of Transylvania's Romanians. In this reading, the eagle represents Hungarian nobility and the towers are a stand-in for the Saxon cities. According to historian Szabolcs de Vajay, neither of these symbols preexisted the 1590s but were appropriated by their armigers after first appearing on Sigismund's seal. Similarly, Marțian argues that the Saxons circulated an invented tradition about the origins of the seven towers as an ethnic symbol, backdating them to the 13th century. Joseph Bedeus von Scharberg and other researchers propose that the eagle is from the coat of arms of Poland, hinting to Stephen Báthory's rule as King of Poland. The bird had special significance for the superstitious Sigismund, who credited his victories in Wallachia to ornithomancy; in similar vein, he used an alternative coat of arms depicting three suns, which apparently referred to his witnessing a sun dog.
In 1599, following defeat at Șelimbăr, the Báthorys were ousted from Transylvania by Wallachian Prince Michael the Brave, who later also extended his control into Moldavia. During his interval in power, Michael issued documents bearing new seals, which included both Wallachian and Moldavian symbols; also featured were two lions rampant. Romanian scholars are in disagreement as to whether the latter symbol is meant to represent Transylvania. While Grigore Tocilescu, Dimitrie Onciul and Paul Gore have supported the notion, others, including Moisil and Ioan C. Filitti, have cast "serious doubts", and see the lions as Michael's personal emblem. Cernovodeanu proposes that the lions could represent Transylvania indirectly, as "Dacia", noting similar descriptions of "Dacian arms" in the works of Nicolae Costin and Pavao Ritter Vitezović.
In November 1599, Michael ordered new military flags to be made by the Hungarian tailor János Thamásfalvi. Flags captured by Michael and his Habsburg ally Giorgio Basta during the Battle of Guruslău, some of which are also depicted in paintings by Hans von Aachen, give additional insight into the Principality's heraldic symbolism. Samples include blue and white Székely flags displaying the old and new symbols together. A variety of Báthory flags were captured on the field of battle, prominently displaying the "wolf's teeth", but with no element from the coat of arms. As noted in 1910 by historian Iosif Sterca-Șuluțiu, "they are of all sort of colors and shapes, none of which have any significance." According to researcher Constantin Rezachevici, the white variant in Aachen's painting (displaying what Rezachevici identifies as "elephant tusks") was the inspiration for Michael the Brave's own flag of Wallachia.
17th-century variants
In 1601, at the beginning of his third and final reign in Transylvania, Prince Sigismund received from his overlord Mehmed III a red-white-green flag which superficially resembled the modern Hungarian tricolor. Scholar Péter Váczy notes that, overall, this "decidedly Hungarian" color scheme was more often embraced by Hungarians in Habsburg-held territories, including Hussars who attempted to take Transylvania in 1611; these had "20 red-white-green silk flags". By contrast: "The princes of Transylvania had their own flags, which were almost always monochrome, with their own coat of arms and that of the country."
One of Michael's allies and rivals, Moses Székely, briefly took the throne of Transylvania in 1603. His seals included a representation of the lions rampant, but there is disagreement as to whether these alluded to Michael's heraldry or to Moses' own family arms. Taking over as Prince in 1605, Stephen Bocskai removed the lions and briefly restored the seven mountains, also changing the overall arrangement. Bocskai was also the first Transylvanian Prince to include the state arms on coinage, featuring them alongside his family arms or those of the Zápolyan monarchy; all three symbols appeared on flags carried separately during his funeral procession in 1607. His successor Sigismund Rákóczi used a different design for the eagle which, according to historians such as Bedeus and Marțian, was actually a revival of the Polish arms; Moisil sees it as a borrowing from the Prince's personal arms. At that stage, a Transylvanian eagle was used on coinage issued by the Saxon city of Kronstadt (Brașov), which had risen in rebellion against Rákóczi.
Before 1621, anti-Habsburg Prince Gabriel Bethlen incorporated his claim to the Lands of the Hungarian Crown by depicting Hungary and Transylvania's arms on a single shield. His crimson swallowtail, reuniting the Bethlen family arms and Transylvanian symbols (black eagle, seven red towers on gold etc.), was preserved and reproduced in later centuries. Another red flag, which survives only through two contemporary engravings, references Bethlen's status as a defender of the Protestant faith, and was as such carried in battle by Imre Thurzó and his Hungarian–Transylvanian troops in the Thirty Years' War. It depicts a "Turkish warship" and the Lamb of God alongside Latin poetry and slogans; in one version, these include the motto CONSILIO FIRMATA DEI ("It is settled by God's decree"), which also features on Bethlen's Transylvanian coinage, alongside an arm-and-sword emblem. The latter symbol is depicted in portrait engravings of Bethlen, often at the top of the image. The bottom edge reunites the arms of Transylvania, the Bethlen family arms, and somewhat less frequently, those of Hungary as well. Other records suggest that Bethlen used countless flags during his reign, including black-and-purple or red-and-purple flags of mourning in preparation for his own death.
Historian Vencel Bíró argues that in the 1630s, under George I Rákóczi, Transylvania already had a "blue, red, gold-yellow" tricolor as its state flag. This appears in heraldry used by the Transylvanian post riders. George II Rákóczi, whose reign began in 1648, used a vast range of Transylvanian arms, freely mixing the elements and including his family's arms. A portrait of his by John Overton features the three elements as separate shields, with the Székely moon wrongly depicted as a bird's head. From 1637, the regular coat of arms, combined with dynastic symbols, was still used as a watermark by the Rákóczian paper mill of Lámkerék (Lancrăm). Between the reigns of Bethlen and Rákóczi, knowledge about "heraldic art" was spread in Transylvania by writer Ferenc Pápai Páriz, whose book standardized descriptions of both princely families' arms. While this revival saw a surge in the number of arms granted by Transylvanian Princes to their Transylvanian or Moldavian subjects and allies, the arms themselves were seldom depicted, as most recipients could not afford the cost of having them painted.
Various other designs of the state arms, featuring the same basic elements, continued under several Princes until 1659, when Ákos Barcsay restored Sigismund's basic arrangement. This was probably the result of a ruling by the Transylvanian Diet, associating each heraldic element with a distinct entity of Transylvania, and issuing orders for each to be made into a separate seal. A Diet writ also specified the introduction of distinct arms for Partium—an area of Hungary-proper which had been attached to the Principality. This subregion was to be represented by four bars and a Patriarchal cross. Nevertheless, a symbol of Partium never appeared on Barcsay's Transylvanian arms, and the notion was eventually abandoned. As attested in the 1650s by Claes Rålamb, the various towns of this area flew their own symbols, a multitude of "flags and colors".
The 1659 ruling is widely read as the first to explicitly associate each component privileged class, social as well as national. This interpretation is seen as erroneous by various historians: Marțian notes that the bird was not intended as a stand-in for the Hungarian Transylvanians, but for the multinational nobility and the regular, non-autonomous, counties; this verdict is also backed by Attila István Szekeres and Sándor Pál-Antal: the Diet ascribed a primarily geographical meaning to each element, separating between "the counties", represented by the eagle, and the two autonomous enclaves. Moisil also highlights a non-ethnic definition of the "nation" represented by the eagle, but also comments that, by that moment in time, Romanian nobles were being "gradually Magyarized".
Habsburg conquest
According to Moisil, the late adoption of a Transylvanian coat of arms, and its "few connections with the past and soul of the Romanian people", meant that the symbolism was rarely evoked in Romanian folk literature—unlike the Moldavian or Wallachian arms. The tower symbolism preserved some popularity in Romanian-inhabited areas outside Transylvania's borders. Shortly before Barcsay's ascendancy, Wallachian intellectual Udriște Năsturel used a heraldic device with gules tower appearing in crest. Researchers see this usage as reflecting a belief that "red towers" stood for Transylvanian cities in general, and for Udriște's claim to descent from the Boyar of Fogaras. Seven towers of presumed Transylvanian origin were also depicted on a stove top, dated to ca. 1700, which was recovered during excavations at the Moldavian court in Huși.
In the 1680s, at the height of the Great Turkish War, Emeric Thököly led a Hungarian–Transylvanian Kuruc army which assisted the Ottomans against the Habsburgs. This force is known to have used two banners: a blue one with an arm-and-sword, and a red one with the Thököly arms. In reaction, Leopold I and his Habsburg court backed Michael II Apafi as a rival claimant to the Transylvanian fiefdom. In June 1686, they formalized an alliance, under terms which specified that: "His Imperial Majesty may never lay claim to either the princely title or the coat of arms [of Transylvania]". Thököly's revolt ultimately failed; Apafi was briefly the Transylvanian Prince. During this time, the mint of Fogaras (Făgăraș) produced ducats, "reserved for the prince's use as gifts", with "the combined arms of Transylvania and the Apafi family". Transylvania and Partium were fully incorporated into the Habsburg realms under the Treaty of Karlowitz (1699). In anticipation, Leopold already used the Transylvanian arms on his large coat of arms, by 1691, and on his coinage, by 1694.
Habsburg Transylvania, which remained a principality attached to the Hungarian Crown, issued polturas with its own markings throughout the early 18th century. These depictions introduced the practice of showing regional arms superimposed on the Reichsadler, something which was also done, with the respective arms, for coins used in Hungary, Milan or Tuscany. In Partium, Leopold also granted nobility to the Romanian peasant families Sida and Iuga in 1701. Their diploma has separate shields of Transylvania, showing the towers on azure and the eagle sable on a barry shield of or and gules. The Partium arms with the Patriarchal cross are also revived for this document, with bars of or and gules.
Transylvanian independence was briefly restored in the War of 1703–1711 by Prince Francis II Rákóczi, who also claimed the Hungarian throne. This episode began in July 1704, when the Diet abolished the instruments of Habsburg rule, including the seal of the Gubernium, which had served as a centralized body of administration. Rákóczi's Kuruc cavalry fought under a seven-bars variant of the Árpád stripes, with the slogan IUSTAM CAUSAM DEUS NON DERELINQUET ("God will not abandon the just cause"). Tradition about Transylvania's coat of arms was preserved in other Hungarian circles: in 1734, Ioannes Szegedi published an engraving of it, showing a crowned eagle, sable, and seven towers, argent, over seven mountains, vert, all on azure background; here, the Székelys were no longer represented by celestial bodies, but by the older arm-and-sword.
The Dictionarium heraldicum, printed at Vienna in 1746, referred to the Transylvanian arms as being: "Seven cities over which shines the moon". Regional symbolism was again in focus during the 1740s, when Maria Theresa took over as Queen and Empress. A medal she issued in 1740 is also the first official one to have readable hatching, with an azure background throughout. The following year, Hristofor Žefarović published a version more closely resembling the Báthory design but replacing the "teeth" with an Austrian badge. Žefarović placed the eagle on a field of or; his towers and mountains were argent and placed on a gules field.
Standardized symbols
Upon creating a "Grand Principality of Transylvania" on November 2, 1765, Maria Theresa finally standardized the coat of arms, introducing the definitive tinctures and adding the gules fess. Following this redesign, the crescent was also rendered as a waning moon. These new Transylvanian arms were also the basis for a Transylvanian blue-red-yellow banner, which may also date back to 1765. Transylvania's promotion and its modernized heraldry were both supervised by Chancellor Wenzel von Kaunitz, who encouraged a rift between Transylvania and the Hungarian Kingdom; on such grounds, Kaunitz rejected heraldic submissions by the Hungarian nobles, who wished to include a Patriarchal cross into the design. In 1769, he shocked his Hungarian adversaries by refusing to add the Transylvanian arms into those of the Kingdom. The arms still appeared on the third great seal used by Maria Theresia, which combined all her "German-Austrian and Hungarian provincial coats of arms" into a design that parted with "old heraldic simplicity and restraint".
In approving of this exclusion and distinction, Maria Theresa noted that interfering with the arms would upset Transylvania's population. By then, Romanians were readily associating with imperial symbolism. Already in 1756, Petru Pavel Aron sponsored an all-Romanian Hussar unit, which flew its own flag in the Seven Years' War. Historians Lizica Papoiu and Dan Căpățînă propose that the definitive selection of azure for the field displaying the eagle was meant to represent Maria Theresa's Romanian subjects, being derived from the Wallachian arms (which, by then, were also standardized as azure). As they note, those Romanian serfs who were raised into Transylvania's nobility also opted for azure shields. In 1762, Adolf Nikolaus von Buccow was entrusted with conscripting Székely and Romanian (or "Dacian") men into the Military Frontier, under a shared Transylvanian coat of arms.
Romanian loyalism remained high as the Székely rebelled (see Siculicidium). A blason included in the 1784 Molitvenic ("Prayer Book") of the Romanian Eastern Catholics focuses attention on the Reichsadler rather than the Transylvanian eagle, expressing solidarity with the "well-beloved", reform-minded, Joseph II. Late that year, during the anti-Hungarian revolt of Romanian peasants, insurgents reportedly carried a flag with Joseph's portrait. Their leader Horea reportedly used an emblem showing a triple cross, either alongside a dagger-pierced heart, or with seven mounds that may evoke the seven cities on the official arms; this arrangement sometimes included a slogan, NOS PRO CESARE, attesting Horea's Habsburg loyalties. In 1791, Romanian intellectuals of the "Transylvanian School" addressed Leopold II an essay demanding increased social rights. Titled Supplex Libellus Valachorum, it was illustrated with an allegory which included the Transylvanian arms. At the same time, Márton Hochmeister was putting out the newspaper Erdélyi Magyar Hírvivő, which fought against Josephinism and Germanization from a Hungarian perspective, and was headlined by the Hungarian arms with the Transylvanian arms inescutcheon.
Joseph II ended Transylvania's separate coinage, including monetary use of the regional arms. Following the consolidation of a Habsburg-ruled Austrian Empire in 1804, Transylvania became one of the crownlands depicted separately from the main arms. On the Hungarian "secret seal" (titkospecsét) of 1804, the Transylvanian arms appear, alongside other provincial arms, in an "arbitrary" arrangement. The imperial arms also came to feature it on the Reichsadler wings; the first such depiction was in 1806. The local flag, meanwhile, was still used in tandem with a multitude of other banners. As reported by historian Auguste de Gérando, in the 1840s Transylvania's chartered towns (oppida nobilia) formed individual units of the Landwehr under their respective county banners. Coins minted in Transylvania no longer had distinguishing heraldic markings after 1780, though Reichsadler-with-arms designs continued to be used by other institutions into the 19th century, including by the salt monopoly in Vizakna (Ocna Sibiului). While the tricolor scheme became a standard in official Habsburg heraldry, nostalgic or ill-informed heraldists continued to use variants without the bar, as with the 1784 Molitvenic. Mapmaker Johann Joseph von Reilly also preferred a three-shield version: the eagle and the Székely sun-and-moon each on gules, and the seven mountains on argent.
In de Gérando's time, the coat of arms was interpreted as an actual visual record of ethnic divisions, omitting the "most populous inhabitants", who were the Romanians, as well as the "tolerated nation" of Armenians. Székely woodcarvers appropriated the coat of arms, which appeared on their wooden gates, though less frequently than the Reichsadler. A unique example is on the 1816 gate at Farcád (Forțeni), where the Transylvanian eagle over seven towers was itself double-headed. One of the two heads was afterwards scratched out, possibly as a political statement. Transylvanian regional symbols, and in particular the chief portion of the crest, were now reclaimed by members of the Hungarian community; the eagle was interpreted a version of the mythical Turul. "The sun, the moon and the eagle" under a "Hungarian sky" were thus referenced in a song by Zsigmond Szentkirályi, dedicated to Governor György Bánffy. It was performed in 1821 at the National Magyar Theater, on a stage bearing a large version of the Transylvanian arms. By contrast, a variant with only towers and two eagles in supporters was used on an 1825 lithograph depicting the Saxon city of Kronstadt.
Revolutionary usage
Political usage of the red-white-green tricolor by Transylvanian Hungarians was first documented in 1846, when it appeared with members of the Védegylet association; as reported by George Barițiu, most locals were still unaware of this color scheme when the Hungarian Revolution of 1848 broke out. The revolution proclaimed Transylvania's absorption by the Hungarian Kingdom, eventually moving toward separation from the Habsburg realm. Revolutionary leader Lajos Kossuth approved a new set of national symbols, including a "medium" coat of arms with marshalled Transylvanian symbols. Unusually, this depiction used the pre-standardization variant of 1740; it also innovated by showing the Transylvanian arms, and other arms not linked to Hungary-proper, as "joined at both ends by a wavy ribbon, imagined as the national tricolor, [and] attached to the crown." One of the first laws adopted by his government specified that "annexed countries" could "each employ its own colors and arms." In practice, this definition excluded Transylvania. On March 30, Hungarians in the Transylvanian Diet symbolically removed the 1765 flag from the conference hall and replaced it with the flag of Hungary, only allowing the "blue-red-yellow tricolor" to be displayed on the tapestry of the Diet throne. When Transylvanian delegates visited Pest on April 23, they were greeted by the flags of both Hungary and Transylvania, alongside a ribbon marked Unió ("Union").
Hungarian communities were committed to the new tricolor, whereas, in 1846, the Saxons had a "national flag" of unspecified colors, with AD RETINENDAM CORONAM. By 1848, they had adopted a variant of the German colors with the arms of Transylvania displayed. Meanwhile, other Saxon communities had the Habsburg flag, or opted for the "Saxon 'national' blue and red colours." The latter's origins are obscure, though writer Teodor V. Păcățian proposes that they may derive from one of the urban flags of Saxon Transylvania. In mid 1848, Saxons were welcomed into the Hungarian National Guard. Many towns, especially Kronstadt and Broos (Orăștie), welcomed this collaboration, but formed their separate units, with distinct symbols. Specifically, these showed, on one side, the seven castles and AD RETINENDAM CORONAM, and on the other, a "coat of arms of the eleven Saxon", alongside FÜR FÜRST, RECHT UND VATERLAND ("For Prince, Law, and Fatherland").
The adoption of separate Saxon flags caused a standoff between the two camps at Regen (Reghin), but created a precedent. The advent of Romanian nationalism produced immediate grievances against this regime and its official heraldry; throughout the Revolution, Romanians and Hungarians fought each other for control of Transylvania, with the former largely loyal to the Habsburg crown. Romanian intellectuals, prompted to adopt their own symbols, opted for white-blue, blue-yellow, red-white, or red-white-blue cockades, also using white flags with blue slogans before May 1848. These groups looked forward to a new arrangement in Transylvania, also proposing a new class of standardized symbols. Their design prominently included a female allegory of "Dacia Felix", alluding to the origin of the Romanians, as well as a lion and aquila. Another proposal was consciously based on 3rd-century coinage issued by Philip the Arab. Also keeping the 1765 format, it added vexilla with markings for Legio V Macedonica and Legio XIII Gemina.
Transylvania's Romanian nationalists continued to experiment with flags, eventually arriving at (generally horizontal) variants of the pan-Romanian tricolor, blue-yellow-red, which, from 1842, had been in use as the flag of Wallachia. Historian Tiberiu Crudu rejects claims that the latter symbol was directly derived from the Transylvanian banner, noting that Romanians in Transylvania did not yet feel represented by the latter; however, he also notes that the "tricolor to which Romanians had been accustomed since 1765" may have had a subtle contribution. Specifically Romanian Transylvanian flags appeared May 1848 assembly in Blaj (Balázsfalva) alongside the Habsburg colors, showing that Romanians remained committed to the monarchy. While some scholars argue that the Romanian color scheme at Blaj already had yellow rather than white, others see this as an invented tradition. Known versions included a blue-white-red or blue-red-white arrangement, claimed by Alexandru Papiu Ilarian as "Transylvania's oldest colors", for being used in the Romanian dress. This origin was also claimed by Ioan Pușcariu, who carried a version of the banner marked with a Romanian version of the slogan Liberté, égalité, fraternité. Pușcariu advocated for the blue-red-yellow of Transylvania and was told by his peers that the gold tassels could reflect that association. Contrasting testimonies suggest that the arrangement was based on the flag of France, or that it was improvised from the "Transylvanian colors [of] red and blue", with the white band as a symbol of peace.
This "flag of the Transylvanian Romanians" was transformed into a red-blue-white, blue-red-white or white-blue-red tricolor, bearing the inscription VIRTUS ROMANA REDIVIVA ("Roman virtue revived"). The slogan's origin can be traced back to Romanian Grenz infantry regiments serving on the Transylvanian Military Frontier. A blue-red-white variant was inscribed with VIRTUTEA ROMÂNĂ REÎNVIATĂ ("Romanian virtue revived"), and carried ribbons in the Habsburg colors, with a slogan honoring Ferdinand I. Several authors note that such a color scheme merely reflected confusion among the Romanians, allowing Hungarians in the Diet to report that it was a pan-Slavic symbol. In Fogaras and Fellak (Feleac), Romanians, specifically Eastern Catholics, opted for alternative flags of blue and yellow.
Barițiu notes that the "white-blue and red tricolor" was used by the Romanian Commission of Sibiu (Nagyszeben), which constituted a "grave error". This flag, he argues, was designed by youth unaware of the "lawful Transylvanian colors", and was even seen by some Romanians as closely resembling the Russian or Serbian flags. Over the following months, blue-yellow-red replaced other variants—either under the influence of flags used in the Wallachian revolution, or because yellow was a Habsburg color. In Habsburg and Hungarian sources, this flag was depicted as a direct successor of the 1765 colors, indicating Romanian "autochtonism" after other Transylvanian communities had embraced ethnic flags. According to museographer Elena Pălănceanu, this tricolor was paraded during the May assembly by the anti-Hungarian folk army gathered by Avram Iancu, and later flown by his guerrilla units throughout the Apuseni Mountains. One variant, featuring an icon and tricolor bordure, is viewed by some historians as one of Iancu's battle flags.
In July 1848, Mór Than designed what would have been the first Hungarian postage stamp, with the Transylvanian arms included. As the conflict turned to military confrontation, anti-Hungarian paramilitaries rallied under the Habsburg or German colors, as well as their own white flag with the slogan AD RETINENDAM CORONAM. In January 1849, during the late stages of this civil war, Ioan Axente Sever's Romanian irregulars, who occupied and ransacked Straßburg (Aiud), also flew the Habsburg bicolor. Following the Hungarian revolutionaries' capitulation, Transylvania was more firmly integrated with the Austrian Empire, with the Székely seal being confiscated. In July 1852, Bishop Andrei Șaguna, as a representative of his Romanian community, met Emperor Franz Joseph I at Kiskossó (Coșevița), on Transylvania's western border. The festivities included a triumphal arch festooned with Habsburg and "blue-yellow-red" Transylvanian flags marked VIRIBUS UNITIS ("With United Forces")—the Habsburg motto. Later that year, Transylvanian Governor Karl von Schwarzenberg ordered the reintroduction of a regional flag, but used an incorrect color scheme, switching the blue and red bands. Various authors describe this as a conscious variation on the Romanian tricolor, meant to underline the connection between the monarchy and loyalist Romanians; the tricolor scheme was also granted to Șaguna upon his appointment as Reichsfreiherr.
Austria-Hungary
During the subsequent reconciliation between Hungarians and Austrians, Transylvania was merged back into Hungary. This process, which included restoring heraldic symbols to the Székely nation in June 1861, was resisted by Romanians. In 1862, ASTRA Society for Cultural Advancement staged an exhibit and political rally, which included tricolor flags and a tapestry with the Transylvanian arms protected by a lion, alongside the slogan INDEPENDENȚA TRANSILVANIEI ("Independence for Transylvania"). In July 1863, Romanian members of the Transylvanian Diet presented a draft law "on the equality of the various nationalities". Its Article 5 specified that: "A symbol particular to the Romanian nation shall be added to the Transylvanian arms." During the elections of late 1865, Romanians gathering to oppose centralization reportedly flew a large flag "in Transylvania's colors"; their Hungarian opponents used the red-white-and-green.
In this context, the Romanian community had opted for the Transylvanian eagle as its own ethnic symbol; in 1865, its representatives in the unified Diet of Hungary submitted a demand for heraldic symbols to represent "the Romanian nation in the Transylvanian bordeland", namely: "an eagle standing on a rock, holding a cross in its beak", and a flag colored "blue, red, yellow". Outside Transylvania, Romanian activists were generally more accepting of the 1765 arms, which were featured, alongside the Moldavian and Wallachian shields, on the medal Norma, issued by Wallachia's Philharmonic Society in 1838. Cezar Bolliac gave this arrangement a colored version in 1856, selecting tinctures that would reflect the Romanian tricolor, with Transylvania in yellow (or). Upon the unification of Moldavia and Wallachia in 1859, Transylvanian emblems were left out of the national arms. The presence of a "Dacian" woman and lions in supporters in all Romanian national arms between 1866 and 1872 was an homage to the 1848 proposal.
Transylvanian symbols were again added to the medium coat of arms of Hungary following the establishment of Austria-Hungary in 1867. They were also prominently marshalled into in the amalgamated state arms of Austria-Hungary. The subsequent centralization cancelled all need for regional symbols, which were relegated to a ceremonial role. The informal Transylvanian flag was again recorded as "blue, red and yellow" in the late 1860s, with prints issued by the Armenian Zacharias Gábrus. A flag for the old crownland was also carried by Antal Esterházy (or, according to other reports, by Albert Bánffy) at Franz Joseph's coronation in June 1867. This marked the first-ever appearance of Transylvanian symbols at the enthronement of a Hungarian Habsburg king. It was not the Gábrus tricolor, but a banner of arms: "The blue flag, about a meter wide, bordered with gold, [is] decorated with the coat of arms of Transylvania in the middle".
Two months later, the coat of arms was on show at the Romanian Literary Society in Bucharest. Though intended to show the cultural unity between Romanians within and without Austria-Hungary, this exhibit was criticized by nationalist writer Bogdan Petriceicu Hasdeu for still describing regional divisions between Transylvanian, Wallachian, and Moldavian Romanians. In a contrary move, Bolliac retained the towers, the sun, and the moon (but not the eagle) in his unusually arranged and hatched design for Transylvanian arms on Michael the Brave's monument in University Square (1874–1876). This heraldic trend was followed by anonymous authors from either Wallachia or Transylvania, who were popularizing nationalist coats of arms for the Banat, Maramureș, and Crișana—three ethnographic subdivisions of Partium. Crișana's arms, as published in 1881 by A. E. Gorjan, were directly inspired by those of Transylvania, in that they featured a derivative eagle.
In 1868, Romanian politicians submitted for review another bill, which stated that "every nation has the right to use its national flag [...] in public political ceremonies and on public buildings, but only alongside the flag of the Hungarian crown". As reported by Pacațian, from 1848 to 1874, Romanians in and around Transylvania, including in the Banat and Maramureș, "used our national tricolor, and bore its colors on any given occasion, with no hindrance or annoyance by anyone". He reports the tricolor being a electoral flag of both pro- and anti-Hungarian Romanians. Hungarian Prime Minister Kálmán Tisza sought to curb this practice in 1874, allowing only the Hungarian tricolor to be used within the Kingdom's borders, and instituting a system of fines and penalties for those who disobeyed. Romanians generally ignored the order, or invented methods for circumventing it—such as wearing red hats decorated with blue leaves and yellow lettering. The standardized regional flag was still flown at various festivities, though its interpretation varied between Romanians and Hungarians. The "Romanian, that is to say Transylvanian flag" and the Habsburg flag were reportedly used together at Maypole dances in Kronstadt by 1881. That year, a Hungarian tricolor and a "Saxon flag" were added; the former's appearance led to a publicized brawl, with claims that Romanian students had put up the national flag of another country.
Over the 1880s, Romanians continued to argue that the Transylvanian tricolor was a cherished symbol, but regional rather than ethnic. In 1885, the community newspaper Tribuna expressed indignation at Hungarian suggestions that the Romanian state tricolor was a derivative of Transylvania's color scheme. The same year, the Romanian Athletic and Singing Society had adopted emblems with the "Transylvanian tricolor". Another incident in June 1888 saw the Romanians of Belényes (Beiuș) removing and desecrating the Hungarian national flag. In the aftermath, the community was ordered by government to cease flying the Transylvanian colors. No flags were on show during Franz Joseph's tour of Beszterce-Naszód in 1891, after local Hungarians explicitly rejected either a "Saxon flag" or the "Romanian tricolor, which is also Transylvania's flag". In 1892, Romanian youth gathering at Nagyszeben defied the ban by flying three separate monochrome flags of red, yellow, and blue.
Transylvanian regional symbols were sometimes reclaimed by other members of the Hungarian community. In May 1896, during celebrations of the Hungarian Millennium, András Bethlen presented the blue banner of 1867 to Franz Joseph; it had been since hidden, lost, and ultimately found in the Bonțida Bánffy Castle. Some Romanians and Saxons also took part in the festivities, carrying "millennial flags" representing their various civic communities. In 1903, Romanian lawyer Eugen Lemeni was fined and imprisoned for decorating a ballroom hall with Habsburg flags and the "Transylvanian emblem". During the Hungarian elections of 1906, the Romanian National Party (PNR) used white flags with green-leaf patterns, as well as green cockades, but these were also confiscated by the authorities. The Romanian (and Transylvanian) colors were camouflaged into another symbolic arrangement: the PNR distributed lapels with a blue quill and a yellow leaf, adding candidates' names in red letters. During those years, Romanian nationalist clubs began using an array of heraldic symbols evoking Dacia and the Romans. As early as 1871, the color scheme also spread into the Duchy of Bukovina, a Romanian-inhabited part of Cisleithania, where it was identified and repressed as a symbol of "anti-Austrian" subversion. Before deciding on this issue, Governor Bourguignon heard reports about flag usage among the Transylvanian loyalists; his panel of experts disagreed on whether the flag was a Transylvanian symbol or a derivation of Romania's flag, but most viewed it as a staple of pan-Romanian "irredentism".
Red and blue (popularly read as symbolic for love and sincerity) survived on flags used by rural communities of Transylvanian Saxons—including those of youth fraternities in Keisd (Saschiz), some of which date back to the 1860s. During the 1890s, this color scheme had been adopted by Hungarian police officers in Saxon cities. At that stage, Saxon activists who frowned upon Magyarization created another regional flag, bearing the old triquetra and the slogan AD RETINENDAM CORONAM—a design originally found in a highly popular print by Georg Bleibtreu (1884). The new Prime Minister, Dezső Bánffy, responded with an explicit ban on Saxon symbols. A red-over-blue bicolor, also identified as the "Saxon flag", sparked litigation in Bistritz (Bistrița) during June 1898, after Hungarian police tried to register and prosecute it as a "foreign flag". A compromised was reached in August, when the authorities of Brassó (Brașov) were allowed to fly the blue-red for Johannes Honter's 400th anniversary, but only if "evenly represented" with the Hungarian colors. The crossed swords were also revisited as a community symbol, with bishop Friedrich Teutsch explaining that they reflected an old Saxon legend: "When our fathers came into the land, they thrust two swords crosswise into the earth and swore allegiance to the king and the land over them." Teutsch himself used blue-over-red flags, which the Gendarmes took down from his parish church in 1909. Other groups of Saxons had similar bicolor banners and ribbons with the Transylvanian arms—as with the Association of Transylvanian Saxons in Munich, founded in 1910.
Romanian Transylvanian tricolor
Writing shortly after the Millennium, Sterca-Șuluțiu proposed that the Transylvanian tinctures and the Romanian flag had a single, "Dacian" and "twice-millennial" origin—though he admitted not being able to tell why Maria Theresa had selected them. He acknowledged that nationalist Romanians in both Transylvania and Bukovina had been using the 1765 color scheme as an excuse to fly the Romanian colors, but also that this practice was dying out under Hungarian pressures. In the 1890s, some Romanians were openly embracing the claim that Romania's flag was an altered "Transylvanian tricolor". One anonymous essayist from Bucharest argued in 1892 that the "red, yellow and blue" scheme was embraced by Transylvanian Romanians opposing merger into Hungary in 1848. He argued that, while Hungarians were forced to reject the "old Transylvanian" tricolor, nationalists in Wallachia and Moldavia also had to renounce traditional tinctures, and embrace a Transylvanian symbol. In 1901, the theory was reviewed as "seductive" and "probable" by Romanian journalist Constantin Berariu. It was embraced by Ștefan Cicio Pop, who, in late 1910, used it to defend flag-wavers arrested in Alsó-Fehér County.
In August 1911, a large Romanian meeting was again hosted by Balázsfalva, in this instance convened by ASTRA. The Hungarian authorities of Alsó-Fehér were convinced to participate, taking seat under a tapestry showing en eagle and tower alongside the "Transylvanian tricolor: blue, yellow and red ." This was a design by Octavian Smigelschi for Blaj Cathedral, with the tower also read as a depiction of "New Jerusalem". ASTRA's other symbols by 1911 were all-blue banners marked with the names of its sections, or generic slogans. Delegate Horia Petra-Petrescu also proposed an all-white flag marked BLAJ, which, he argued, was enough of a symbol for the Romanian communities. The tricolor ambiguity was retained during the celebrations of May 10, 1914, when Romanian students gathered to celebrate the Kingdom of Romania's national holiday. Hungarian authorities broke up the rallies, citing the aggravating presence of Romanian colors. The students were defended by Pop, who claimed that the suspicious color scheme could just as well stand for Transylvania or the Budapest tricolor.
Over the following months, with the outbreak of World War I, the Common Army tolerated, or even encouraged, the use of Romanian banners by Transylvanian conscripts. Brassó was reportedly the first Transylvanian city to allow their flying at a public gathering. In 1915, Prime Minister István Tisza modified his father's 1874 legislation, allowing Romanians to fly "their national colors", but only if accompanied by the "state colors". This reportedly marked the first time in history when Romanian nationalists voluntarily embraced the Hungarian tricolor. Although Romania remained neutral until 1916, Hungarian authorities again introduced proscriptions against the Romanian colors in February 1915. In October, a revamped version of the Hungarian arms, with minor adjustments to its Transylvanian quarter, was done by József Sebestyén Keöpeczi, a Transylvanian Hungarian scholar and painter. This design also entered the new common medium coat of arms adopted that year by Austria-Hungary. This move generated some controversy, with Hungarian nationalists such as Géza Polónyi arguing that the heraldic representation of an obsolete crownland on a major symbol would undermine the monarchy's "parity dualism". Towards the end of the year, Romania failed in her attempt to conquer Transylvania—upon which the Hungarian authorities of Marosvásárhely (Târgu Mureș) issued plaquettes with the Transylvanian arms alongside Saint George and the Dragon (in which the Dragon stood for Romania).
With the crowning of Charles IV in November 1916, Transylvanian colors made a final official appearance at the Habsburg court, being carried there by Count Ádám Teleki. According to Moisil, under Charles the region was no longer depicted in the Hungarian coat of arms, but was still represented within the amalgamated Austro-Hungarian arms. Following the Aster Revolution of 1918, Transylvanian Romanians began organizing themselves to demand union with Romania, flying horizontal tricolors of blue-yellow-red. Transylvanian soldiers stationed in Prague helped turn that city over to the Czechoslovak National Council; in recognition the city populace presented them with tricolor tippets, which were colored red-blue-yellow or yellow-blue-red. Many tricolor variants, with yellow as the middle color, were used during the popular rallies on the event marked in Romania as the Great Union (December 1, 1918). Eyewitness Petru Tămâian described these as being the "beautiful Transylvanian tricolor", distinguishing them from the vertically arranged flag of Romania; when superimposed, they "seemingly create a sign of the cross, symbolizing sufferings on both sides". Activist Vasile Goldiș also mentions the "beautiful Romanian tricolor of Transylvania" as being the flag held by Ioan Arion, who was shot by the Hungarian National Guard on his way to the rally in Alba Iulia.
The Saxons of Sibiu, who favored union with Romania, rallied under both the Romanian flag and a design of their own: "There was a search for the Saxon national banner and, since none was available, they brought in a prapur decked in red and blue ribbons". In Medwesch (Mediaș), a Saxon National Guard, which existed for some six days in December 1918, used a red-over-blue or blue-over-red bicolor, and assorted cockades. Saxon activists displayed their loyalism toward Greater Romania while continuing to show attachment toward regional symbols: Saxon officials greeting ASTRA delegates in Sibiu during July 1920 "carried many a Saxon banner." Attempts to restore an independent Transylvania were still considered by a Hungarian jurist, Elemér Gyárfás. In March 1919, he approached the PNR's Iuliu Maniu with the offer to codify an "indissoluble union of three nations" (Transylvanian Romanians, Hungarians, and Saxons). This proposed state was to have its own seal and flag. Faced with the prospect of being absorbed as a minority in Romania, some Hungarians attempted to resist and invoked the Fourteen Points against the Alba Iulia assembly. Writer István Zágoni reports that a "Székely Republic movement" hoisted its flag in Marosvásárhely, but that other Hungarians wanted it torn down. Artist Károly Kós is reported to have sought the separation of Kalotaszeg, for which he designed a flag and coat of arms.
Later echoes
As part of the union process of 1918–1922, Transylvania's symbols became an integral part of the Romanian arms. One of the first projects to include them in this overall arrangement was drafted in 1921 by Paul Gore, wherein the Transylvanian quarter also represented all of the former Partium. In Gore's original version, the fess was removed, and the field was divided or over purpure, while the towers were again replaced by seven hills, or. Another 1921 design, proposed to the Heraldic Commission by Keöpeczi, was closely based on Maria Theresa's arms of 1765. Under the new conventions, it was also used to symbolize the adjacent lands of Maramureș and Crișana, overshadowing earlier projects to emerge as the Greater Romanian arms. Derivative arms also appeared for Romanian institutions: the 28th Infantry Regiment, stationed in Târgu Mureș, featured both the city arms, with the Székely arm-and-sword, and the seven towers. Such heraldic arrangements still met some opposition, with a formal protest registered soon after adoption by magistrate Constantin Obedeanu and other intellectuals. This group favored only minimal changes to Romania's previous coat of arms, with the inclusion of the lions and hills in Michael the Brave's seal, as a stand-in for Transylvania.
In contrast, the 1765 arms returned as symbols of Hungarian irredentism during the Regency period. Also in 1921, a statue called "East" was erected in Szabadság tér, Budapest. It showed Prince Csaba setting free a female figure bearing the Transylvanian shield. Another political statement was the Transylvanian folk-song collection of Béla Bartók and Zoltán Kodály, which, on its 1921 edition cover, displayed the "coat of arms of Transylvania under the Hungarian royal crown". In April 1922, an "impressive procession" of irredentists took place outside St. Stephen's Basilica in Lipótváros. A "flag of separated Transylvania" was carried therein by Nándor Urmánczy, on behalf of his National Defense Party. The medium arms of 1915, including Transylvania's symbols, were still endorsed by the Regency, but for two decades appeared only rarely on its official insignia; usage again peaked in 1938–1944. A flag of Kalotaszeg was carried at the Vigadó of Pest during celebrations of Otto von Habsburg's birthday, in November 1930.
Some usage of the 1765 arms was also documented among the Hungarians of Romania, as with the Puttonyos Winery, which continued to operate in Aiud under Romanian rule. Activist József Sándor reportedly hid the banner of a main Hungarian cultural association, EMKE, which displayed the arms of Hungary with those of Transylvania inescutcheon. Kós, who designed various versions of the Transylvanian arms (including in his 1922 album, Erdély kövei), eventually established the Hungarian People's Party as a voice of Transylvanianism in Romania—the group is known to have used a flag of its own. In June 1924, Romanian authorities banned the use of Saxon flags on public buildings, and ruled that all private displays need to include Romanian flags of similar size and make. This measure was condemned, on the Romanian side, by Păcățian, who argued that Saxons had both a moral and a legal right to their own bicolor. In early 1939, schoolteacher Georg Kraft of Dedrad (Zepling) successfully defended in court his right to fly the Saxon colors alongside the Romanian ones.
At the height of World War II, following a re-partition of the region, Northern Transylvania was briefly reincorporated with Hungary. Shortly after this, in September 1940, the Székely College Students' Association created a flag for the youth at Franz Joseph University. One side was "embroidered with the coat of arms of Transylvania and the inscription Erdély örök, egyetlen miénk felírás ['Eternal Transylvania is ours forever']." A new set of monuments, featuring the eagle together with the medium arms of Hungary, were erected throughout the annexed areas. In 1941, a Hungarian ethnographer, Gábor Lükő, revisited the blue-red-yellow and its origins, suggesting that it had been invented by Gabriel Bethlen and "was taken over by the Romanians in 1848". He believed this color scheme to have seeped into the folk art of the Csángós, which was being unfairly censored in Hungary for looking "Romanian". During this renewed integration with the Hungarian crown, Béla Teleki and other local intellectuals established a regionalist and corporatist group called Transylvanian Party; it did not use the regional flag and coat of arms, but had a depiction of Saint Ladislaus as its logo.
The region was ultimately recovered by Romania during the Battle of Romania in 1944. In its aftermath, projects for a unified and independent Transylvania received some backing from the Soviet Union, with Romanian flags being routinely removed from official buildings; concrete projects of independence were submitted by Kós and Valter Roman, with Teofil Vescan proclaiming himself Prime Minister of the unrecognized country. A rumor recorded in Telegraful Român in November 1944 had it that former Hungarian officials in Cluj had switched to wearing the red flag as an armband, before switching again to "the colors of Romanian Transylvania: blue, yellow, and red". A draft proposal, submitted anonymously on behalf of the Second Hungarian Republic in mid 1945 (and since attributed to scholar Gábor Balás), discussed a neutral Federal Republic of Transylvania, coterminous with "historical Transylvania". It noted: "The colors of the flag of the Independent Transylvania [are] blue and gold. In addition to the state flag, however, all nations are free to use their own national flag."
Arms with a Transylvanian canton remained a Romanian national symbol throughout this period, until being removed by communist rule (see Emblem of the Socialist Republic of Romania). The regime involved itself in removing signs of Hungarian irredentism, such as plastering over the medium Hungarian arms on the 1941 monument in Lueta (Lövéte). It was cleaned up by community representatives during the Romanian Revolution of 1989. In spring 1990, projects were submitted for the arms of post-revolutionary Romania. Transylvania was prominently displayed in sketches submitted by Maria Dogaru, who also proposed adopting VIRTUS ROMANA REDIVIVA as the national motto. The 1921 arms were reinstated, with some modifications, under the 1992 Constitution, and were again reconfirmed in 2016.
Following the revival of heraldry in post-communist Romania, azure and gules, identified as the "Transylvanian colors", were used for the new arms of Miklós Székely National College; Simeria Reformed Church in Sfântu Gheorghe also features a 1992 mural with the 1765 arms of Transylvania. In 1996, the municipality of Ozun (Uzon) displayed the same symbol at an artificial forest which celebrated Hungarian presence in Transylvania and commemorated the soldiers of 1848. The Saxon diaspora in Germany has also continued to make use of regional symbols. In the 1990s, those who settled in Crailsheim still displayed the "Transylvanian" or "Saxon colors", described as "blue and red". Usage of the flag and coat of arms was being replaced around 2017 by displays of the logo for the Union of Transylvanian Saxons in Germany. Usage of Sibiu's coat of arms (a derivative of the triquetra arms), alongside those of Transylvania-proper, had a major revival beginning in 2007, when the city was a European Capital of Culture.
At the same stage, a Székely autonomist movement had begun using its own derivative symbol—the blue-gold-silver flag with the sun-and-moon. In September 2014, western Transylvanian Hungarians affiliated with the Hungarian People's Party selected a flag and coat of arms for Partium, in a form derived from the unrealized project of 1659. A blue-red-yellow tricolor is also spotted at rallies in support of increased autonomy for the region or its Hungarian communities. A controversy erupted on Hungarian National Day (March 15), 2017, after reports that the Romanian Gendarmerie fined people for displaying the colors. This account was rejected by Gendermerie officials, according to whom the fines were handed out to those demonstrators who refused to disperse after their authorization had expired. Transylvanian symbols, including the coat of arms, have been on display at football matches involving CFR Cluj, which has a mixed Romanian-and-Hungarian fan base.
References
Citations
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Transylvania
Transylvania
History of Transylvania
Culture of Transylvania
Romanian coats of arms
Hungarian coats of arms
1765 introductions
Transylvania
Transylvania
Transylvania
Transylvania
Transylvania
Transylvania
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Maria Theresa |
4202244 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comparison%20of%20communication%20satellite%20operators | Comparison of communication satellite operators | The following is a list of the world's largest fixed service satellite operators in the world. Comparison data is from different time periods and sources and may not be directly comparable.
Note: Revenue in U.S. Dollars
References
Link to 2005 numbers as pdf
Link to 2007 numbers as pdf
Link to 2008 numbers as pdf
External links
2001 numbers
2002 numbers
2003 numbers together with other space firms (total 50) firms reviewed
2004 numbers reviewed in this page from Space News
Largest fixed satellite operators
Space lists
Communication satellite operators |
4207958 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Point%20of%20interest | Point of interest | A point of interest (POI) is a specific point location that someone may find useful or interesting. An example is a point on the Earth representing the location of the Eiffel Tower, or a point on Mars representing the location of its highest mountain, Olympus Mons. Most consumers use the term when referring to hotels, campsites, fuel stations or any other categories used in modern automotive navigation systems.
Users of a mobile device can be provided with geolocation and time aware POI service that recommends geolocations nearby and with a temporal relevance (e.g. POI to special services in a ski resort are available only in winter).
The term is widely used in cartography, especially in electronic variants including GIS, and GPS navigation software. In this context the synonym waypoint is common.
A GPS point of interest specifies, at minimum, the latitude and longitude of the POI, assuming a certain map datum. A name or description for the POI is usually included, and other information such as altitude or a telephone number may also be attached. GPS applications typically use icons to represent different categories of POI on a map graphically.
A region of interest (ROI) and a volume of interest (VOI) are similar in concept, denoting a region or a volume (which may contain various individual POIs).
In medical fields such as histology/pathology/histopathology, points of interest are selected from the general background in a field of view; for example, among hundreds of normal cells, the pathologist may find 3 or 4 neoplastic cells that stand out from the others upon staining.
POI collections
Digital maps for modern GPS devices typically include a basic selection of POI for the map area.
However, websites exist that specialize in the collection, verification, management and distribution of POI which end-users can load onto their devices to replace or supplement the existing POI. While some of these websites are generic, and will collect and categorize POI for any interest, others are more specialized in a particular category (such as speed cameras) or GPS device (e.g. TomTom/Garmin). End-users also have the ability to create their own custom collections.
Commercial POI collections, especially those that ship with digital maps, or that are sold on a subscription basis are usually protected by copyright. However, there are also many websites from which royalty-free POI collections can be obtained, e.g. SPOI - Smart Points of Interest, which is distributed under ODbL license.
Applications
The applications for POI are extensive. As GPS-enabled devices as well as software applications that use digital maps become more available, so too the applications for POI are also expanding. Newer digital cameras for example can automatically tag a photograph using Exif with the GPS location where a picture was taken; these pictures can then be overlaid as POI on a digital map or satellite image such as Google Earth. Geocaching applications are built around POI collections. In vehicle tracking systems, POIs are used to mark destination points and/or offices to that users of GPS tracking software would easily monitor position of vehicles according to POIs.
File formats
Many different file formats, including proprietary formats, are used to store point of interest data, even where the same underlying WGS84 system is used.
Reasons for variations to store the same data include:
A lack of standards in this area (GPX is a notable attempt to address this).
Attempts by some software vendors to protect their data through obfuscation.
Licensing issues that prevent companies from using competitor's file specifications.
Memory saving, for example, by converting floating point latitude and longitude co-ordinates into smaller integer values.
Speed and battery life (operations using integer latitude and longitude values are less CPU-intensive than those that use floating point values).
Requirements to add custom fields to the data.
Use of older reference systems that predate GPS (for example UTM or the British national grid reference system)
Readability/possibility to edit (plain text files are human-readable and may be edited)
The following are some of the file formats used by different vendors and devices to exchange POI (and in some cases, also navigation tracks):
ASCII Text (.asc .txt .csv .plt)
Topografix GPX (.gpx)
Garmin Mapsource (.gdb)
Google Earth Keyhole Markup Language (.kml .kmz)
Pocket Street Pushpins (.psp)
Maptech Marks (.msf)
Maptech Waypoint (.mxf)
Microsoft MapPoint Pushpin (.csv)
OziExplorer (.wpt)
TomTom Overlay (.ov2) and TomTom plain text format (.asc)
OpenStreetMap data (.osm)
Third party and vendor-supplied utilities are available to convert point of interest data between different formats to allow them to be exchanged between otherwise incompatible GPS devices or systems. Furthermore, many applications will support the generic ASCII text file format, although this format is more prone to error due to its loose structure as well as the many ways in which GPS co-ordinates can be represented (e.g. decimal vs degree/minute/second). POI format converters are often named after the POI file format they convert and convert to, such as KML2GPX (converts KML to GPX) and KML2OV2 (converts KML to OV2).
See also
Automotive navigation system
Geocoded photograph
Map database management
OpenLR
Tourist attraction
World Geodetic System (Used to represent GPS co-ordinates)
References
Global Positioning System
Geographical technology
Navigation |
4209327 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Roving%20Mars | Roving Mars | Roving Mars is a 2006 American IMAX documentary film about the development, launch, and operation of the Mars Exploration Rovers, Spirit and Opportunity. The film uses few actual photographs from Mars, opting to use computer generated animation based on the photographs and data from the rovers and other Mars probes. The film has been released on Blu-ray disc by distributor Disney.
Roving Mars has made over US$10 million as of January 25, 2009.
Roving Mars is also the title of a non-fiction book by MER principal investigator Steve Squyres about the rover mission.
Music
The musical score for Roving Mars was composed by Philip Glass. A soundtrack album was released by Lakeshore Records on June 27, 2006. The album also features the song "Glósóli" by Sigur Rós.
Reception
Roving Mars received positive reviews from critics. Rotten Tomatoes reports a 70% rating based on 37 reviews, with an average rating of 6.8/10. Its consensus states that "Roving Mars is a decent thrill ride even when it starts feeling like a commercial plug for NASA's failing space program."
Entertainment Weekly gave the film a B−, stating that "Only a series of pics featuring a set of strange little nodes that look like blueberries planted in a pile of red rocks carry any kind of translatable otherworldly kick." The New York Post called it a "splendidly photographed 2D IMAX film." The Boston Globe said "Despite audiences knowing the happy ending from the get-go, [director] [George] Butler manages to inject considerable drama."
Conversely, the Los Angeles Times claimed, "Not having a way to capture images of the machines at work means that too much of Butler's film... is disappointingly made up of computer simulations.", while the San Francisco Chronicle claimed that "There aren't enough pyrotechnics in the paltry 40-minute run time to justify the ticket price."
References
External links
Boston Globe article about the development of the film
2006 films
2006 short documentary films
American short documentary films
Disney documentary films
Documentary films about the space program of the United States
Films scored by Philip Glass
Films produced by Frank Marshall
IMAX short films
Mars Exploration Rover mission
Mars in film
The Kennedy/Marshall Company films
Walt Disney Pictures films
Disney short films
IMAX documentary films
Documentary films about outer space
Films directed by George Butler (filmmaker)
2000s English-language films
2000s American films
Films with screenplays by George Butler (filmmaker)
Films produced by George Butler (filmmaker) |
4209687 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Comet%20Pojma%C5%84ski | Comet Pojmański | Comet Pojmański is a non-periodic comet discovered by Grzegorz Pojmański on January 2, 2006 and formally designated C/2006 A1. Pojmański discovered the comet at Warsaw University Astronomic Observatory using the Las Campanas Observatory in Chile as part of the All Sky Automated Survey (ASAS). Kazimieras Cernis at the Institute of Theoretical Physics and Astronomy at Vilnius, Lithuania, located it the same night and before the announcement of Pojmański's discovery, in ultraviolet images taken a few days earlier by the SWAN instrument aboard the SOHO satellite. A pre-discovery picture was later found from December 29, 2005.
At the time of its discovery, the comet was roughly 113 million miles (181 million kilometers) from the Sun. But orbital elements indicated that on February 22, 2006, it would reach perihelion at a distance of 51.6 million miles — almost half the Earth's average distance from the Sun.
The comet moved on a northward path across the night sky, and reached maximum brightness around the beginning of March. Comet Pojmański reached the very fringe of naked-eye visibility at about magnitude 5, and was best visible through binoculars or a telescope. It could be found in the dawn sky within the constellation Capricornus, close to the horizon in the northern hemisphere, during late February, but viewing circumstances became better for the northern hemisphere as the comet departed southern skies and continued north.
By early March, the comet was located in Aquila, the Eagle, and by March 7 was located in the constellation Delphinus, the Dolphin.
Comet Pojmański brightened more than initially estimated, perhaps due to over-cautious estimates by astronomers. It had previously been estimated to reach a maximum brightness of around 6.5 magnitude, but became considerably brighter.
During the comet's appearance, it sported a tail of three to seven degrees (six to fourteen times the apparent lunar diameter) and a coma of up to about 10 arcseconds.
See also
All Sky Automated Survey
Bohdan Paczyński
References
External links
Space.com: "New Comet Brightens Rapidly" (Accessed 2/27/06)
Sky and Telescope: "A Surprise Comet in the Dawn" (Accessed 2/27/06)
Comet Data and Images from Warsaw University
Non-periodic comets
20060102
Science and technology in Poland |
4210664 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holidays%20with%20Pay%20Convention%2C%201936 | Holidays with Pay Convention, 1936 | Holidays with Pay Convention, 1936 is an International Labour Organization Convention.
It was established in 1936, with the preamble stating:
Modification
This convention was subsequently revised in 1970 by Convention C132 - Holidays with Pay Convention (Revised), 1970.
Ratifications
The convention was ratified by 54 states. Upon the revised version being ratified by various countries, it was thereby subsequently renounced automatically by 17 of those states.
External links
Text.
Ratifications.
Employee benefits
International Labour Organization conventions
Holidays
Treaties concluded in 1936
Treaties entered into force in 1939
Treaties of the People's Socialist Republic of Albania
Treaties of Azerbaijan
Treaties of Argentina
Treaties of the Byelorussian Soviet Socialist Republic
Treaties of the People's Republic of Bulgaria
Treaties of Burundi
Treaties of the Central African Republic
Treaties of Colombia
Treaties of the Comoros
Treaties of Cuba
Treaties of Ivory Coast
Treaties of Denmark
Treaties of Djibouti
Treaties of the Dominican Republic
Treaties of the Republic of Egypt (1953–1958)
Treaties of the French Third Republic
Treaties of Gabon
Treaties of Georgia (country)
Treaties of the Kingdom of Greece
Treaties of Israel
Treaties of Kuwait
Treaties of Kyrgyzstan
Treaties of the Kingdom of Libya
Treaties of Mali
Treaties of Mauritania
Treaties of Mexico
Treaties of Morocco
Treaties of Myanmar
Treaties of New Zealand
Treaties of Paraguay
Treaties of Panama
Treaties of Peru
Treaties of Senegal
Treaties of Czechoslovakia
Treaties of Slovakia
Treaties of the United Arab Republic
Treaties of Tajikistan
Treaties of Tunisia
Treaties of Uzbekistan
Treaties extended to the Faroe Islands
1936 in labor relations |
4210709 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holidays%20with%20Pay%20Convention%20%28Revised%29%2C%201970 | Holidays with Pay Convention (Revised), 1970 | Holidays with Pay Convention (Revised), 1970 is an International Labour Organization Convention.
It was established in 1970:
Provision
The central provision of the convention is found in Article 3, which states that people to whom the convention applies shall be entitled to an annual paid holiday of a specified minimum length, and that although the ratifying state may select the length of the minimum holiday, it "shall in no case be less than three working weeks for one year of service".
Modification
This Convention revised Convention C52 – Holidays with Pay Convention, 1936.
Ratifications
As of 2020, the convention has been ratified by 38 states.
External links
Text.
Ratifications.
Employee benefits
International Labour Organization conventions
Leave of absence
Holidays
Treaties concluded in 1970
Treaties entered into force in 1973
Treaties of Armenia
Treaties of Azerbaijan
Treaties of Belarus
Treaties of Belgium
Treaties of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Treaties of Brazil
Treaties of Burkina Faso
Treaties of Cameroon
Treaties of Chad
Treaties of Croatia
Treaties of the Czech Republic
Treaties of Finland
Treaties of West Germany
Treaties of Guinea
Treaties of Hungary
Treaties of Ba'athist Iraq
Treaties of Italy
Treaties of Kenya
Treaties of Latvia
Treaties of Luxembourg
Treaties of North Macedonia
Treaties of Madagascar
Treaties of Malta
Treaties of Montenegro
Treaties of Norway
Treaties of Portugal
Treaties of Russia
Treaties of Rwanda
Treaties of Serbia and Montenegro
Treaties of Slovenia
Treaties of Francoist Spain
Treaties of Sweden
Treaties of Switzerland
Treaties of Ukraine
Treaties of Uruguay
Treaties of the Yemen Arab Republic
Treaties of Ireland
Treaties of Moldova
1970 in labor relations |
4210944 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holidays%20with%20Pay%20%28Sea%29%20Convention%2C%201936 | Holidays with Pay (Sea) Convention, 1936 | Holidays with Pay (Sea) Convention, 1936 is an International Labour Organization Convention. It never came into force.
It was established in 1936, with the preamble stating:
Modification
The principles contained in the convention were revised in by ILO Convention C72, Paid Vacations (Seafarers) Convention, 1946.
Ratifications
The convention did not receive enough ratifications to be brought into force.
External links
Text.
Ratifications.
Employee benefits
International Labour Organization conventions
Holidays
Treaties concluded in 1936
Treaties not entered into force
Admiralty law treaties
1936 in labor relations |
4218925 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timeline%20of%20first%20Earth%20observation%20satellites | Timeline of first Earth observation satellites | The timeline of first Earth observation satellites shows, in chronological order, those successful Earth observation satellites, that is, Earth satellites with a program of Earth science. Sputnik 1, while the first satellite ever launched, did not conduct Earth science. Explorer 1 was the first satellite to make an Earth science discovery when it found the Van Allen belts.
1950s
1960s
See also
List of Earth observation satellites
References
Claude LaFleur's The Spacecraft Encyclopedia
Encyclopedia Astronautica
Earth science satellites
Lists of satellites |
4221474 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gottfried%20Kirch | Gottfried Kirch | Gottfried Kirch (; also Kirche , Kirkius; 18 December 1639 – 25 July 1710) was a German astronomer and the first "Astronomer Royal" in Berlin and, as such, director of the nascent Berlin Observatory.
Life and work
The son of Michael Kirch, a shoemaker in Guben, Electorate of Saxony, initially he worked as a schoolmaster in Langgrün and Neundorf near Lobenstein. He also worked as a calendar-maker in Saxonia and Franconia. He began to learn astronomy with Erhard Weigel in Jena, and with Hevelius in Danzig. In Danzig in 1667, Kirch published calendars and built several telescopes and instruments. In 1679 he invented a screw micrometer for astronomical measurements. He became an astronomer working in Coburg, Leipzig and Guben as well from 1700 in Berlin.
In the last quarter of the 17th century, Kirch was the most-read calendar maker and counted as one of the leading Germans. In 1680 he discovered a comet with a telescope for the first time: Komet C/1680 V1, called Kirch's comet. In 1681 he discovered the Wild Duck Cluster M 11. In 1686 he went to Leipzig. Together with the farmer and astronomer Christoph Arnold he observed the comets of that year. In the same year he discovered the Mira variable χ Cygni. He also dedicated much time to observing the double star Mizar. He introduced three new constellations, the "Globus cruciger" (""), the "Electoral Sword" ("") and the Sceptre of Brandenburg, which however were not recognized and adopted by the International Astronomical Union (IAU). Via Arnold he met his second wife Maria Margaretha Winkelmann (1670–1720), who had learnt astronomy from self-study and from Arnold. While jointly observing the comet of 1702, they discovered the globular cluster M 5 (5 May 1702). In 1699, he had observed comet 55P/Tempel-Tuttle but this observation was not recognized until later analysis by Joachim Schubart.
For a long period, he was unable to find employment, so he had to earn his living through the publication of Almanacs/ Calendars. He was assisted in the calculations by his second wife and their children. A few series of almanacs appeared across several decades. For a time, he published up to 13 almanacs a year, a few appearing under pseudonyms, and he also continued established almanacs from other authors under their name. As examples could be cited Christian-, Jewish- und Turkish-Almanac, the Gipsy-Almanac the Sibylla Ptolemaein, a Gipsywoman from Alexandria in Egypten, the Astronomischen Wunder-Kalender, the Wahrhaftigen Himmels-Boten, the Gespenster- und Haushaltungs-Kalender by Johann Friedrich von Rosenfeld / Der Astronomiae Ergebener and from 1700 the various Academy Almanacs as "Astronomer Royal" in Berlin.
It is only recently that the importance of the Kirch's Almanacs has been recognized for the distribution of ideas of the Enlightenment and Pietism to the wider population. The functions of almanacs are Information, Education and Discussion. Kirch's Calendars are noted additionally for the announcement of both his own results as well as results from abroad. A few almanacs anticipate the Astronomisches Jahrbuch. Further aspects are the transmission of new ideas to ordinary people in conjunction with a growing distancing from astrological superstition and criticisms of orthodox beliefs. The accompaniment to all almanacs Zugaben / Oder Astrologisches Bedencken / von dem Lauff und der Wirckung des Gestirnten Himmels / ... (example from the Zigeuner-Kalender) had been demanded by the publishers, as otherwise the almanacs did not sell well. Astrological ideas were still not fully overcome at this time, but he attacked the practice of astrological forecasting and the mendacity of many almanac makers of his time as being a sin against God, especially prophecies regarding war and peace.
Beginning in 1675 he pursued the idea of founding an Astronomical Society in Germany. It was to be open to all astronomers independent of nationality or religious persuasion. He promoted the idea that all astronomers should send their observations to a central location where they could be published as soon as possible. He considered Frankfurt am Main to be the ideal location, for one because of the Messe (fair) and on the other hand because of its easy connection to the Netherlands via the Rivers Main and Rhine. The planned society should also serve to coordinate the observing of astronomical events such as eclipses and transits of planets. In particular he organized observations of the transit of Mercury on 31 October or 1 November 1690 in quasi-military fashion. However he appears to have made no concrete steps to set up such a society.
Then in 1700 he was appointed the first astronomer of the Royal Society of Sciences ("") in Berlin on 10 May by Prince-elector Friedrich III. of Brandenburg (from 1701: King Friedrich I. of Prussia). The founding of the associated Berlin Observatory was a reaction to the new national observatories in Greenwich, Paris and St. Petersburg. To finance the academy, the Prince-Elector conferred the "" on it (a monopoly on publishing almanacs). Kirch and his wife were therefore obliged to finance the academy by their almanac calculations.
After his death, his wife continued the almanac calculations. His son Christfried Kirch became director of the Observatory in 1716. When Prussia incorporated the new province of Silesia in the 1740s, a further almanac was needed to be drawn up for the Catholics, and for that issue the academy employed his daughter Christine Kirch (1696–1782). After 1700, two calendar variants were in force in the Holy Roman Empire: the Gregorian Calendar in the catholic, the (improved Reich calendar) in the Protestant regions, however the latter differed from the former solely in respect of calculation of the date of Easter.
The crater Kirch on the Moon and the asteroid 6841 Gottfriedkirch are named after him.
Kirch studied the double star Mizar.
He died in Berlin at the age of seventy.
Selected publications
Wunderstern am Hals des Walfisches. Leipzig 1678
Eilfertiger kurtzer Bericht an einen guten Freund von dem Neuen Cometen dieses 1682. Jahrs. 1682
Kirch also published his calendar, Philosophical Transactions, an Acta Eruditorum and Miscellanea Berolinensia.
See also
List of astronomical instrument makers
References
Sources
Robert Burnham Jr.: Burnham's Celestial Handbook, Volume Two, p. 762
Messier Catalog: Online Biography of Gottfried Kirch
17th-century German astronomers
Discoverers of comets
1639 births
1710 deaths
Members of the Prussian Academy of Sciences
People from the Electorate of Saxony
University of Jena alumni
18th-century German astronomers |
4223885 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Euromus | Euromus | Euromus or Euromos () – also, Europus or Europos (Εὐρωπός), Eunomus or Eunomos (Εὔνωμος), Philippi or Philippoi (Φίλιπποι); earlier Kyromus and Hyromus – was an ancient city in Caria, Anatolia; the ruins are approximately 4 km southeast of Selimiye and 12 km northwest of Milas (the ancient Mylasa), Muğla Province, Turkey. It was situated at the foot of Mount Grium, which runs parallel to Mount Latmus, and was built by one Euromus, a son of Idris, a Carian.
History
Probably dating from the 6th century BC, Euromus was a member of the Chrysaorian League during Seleucid times. Euromus also minted its own coins from the 2nd century BCE to the 2nd century CE. Under the Roman dominion Euromus belonged to the conventus of Alabanda.
The ruins contain numerous interesting buildings, the most outstanding of which is the temple of Zeus Lepsinos from the reign of Emperor Hadrian.
Archaeology
Archaeologists have found terra cotta shards indicating that the temple site had its origins back at least to the 6th century BC. The temple is one of the best preserved classical temples in Turkey: sixteen columns remain standing and most of the columns are inscribed in honour of the citizen who commissioned their construction. Carian rock-cut tombs are also found at Euromus.
In July 2021, archaeologists led by Abuzer Kızıl have announced the discovery of two 2,500-year-old marble statues and an inscription during excavations at the Temple of Zeus Lepsynos. According to Abuzer Kızıl, one of the statues was naked while other was wearing armor made of leather and a short skirt. Both of the statues were depicted with a lion in their hands.
Gallery
References
Blue Guide, Turkey, The Aegean and Mediterranean Coasts (), pp. 321–3
Archaeological sites in the Aegean Region
Populated places in ancient Caria
Ruins in Turkey
Former populated places in Turkey
Geography of Muğla Province
History of Muğla Province
Buildings and structures in Muğla Province
Ancient Greek archaeological sites in Turkey
Milas District
Temples of Zeus |
4224324 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Origin%20of%20water%20on%20Earth | Origin of water on Earth | The origin of water on Earth is the subject of a body of research in the fields of planetary science, astronomy, and astrobiology. Earth is unique among the rocky planets in the Solar System in having oceans of liquid water on its surface. Liquid water, which is necessary for all known forms of life, continues to exist on the surface of Earth because the planet is at a far enough distance (known as the habitable zone) from the Sun that it does not lose its water, but not so far that low temperatures cause all water on the planet to freeze.
It was long thought that Earth's water did not originate from the planet's region of the protoplanetary disk. Instead, it was hypothesized water and other volatiles must have been delivered to Earth from the outer Solar System later in its history. Recent research, however, indicates that hydrogen inside the Earth played a role in the formation of the ocean. The two ideas are not mutually exclusive, as there is also evidence that water was delivered to Earth by impacts from icy planetesimals similar in composition to asteroids in the outer edges of the asteroid belt.
History of water on Earth
One factor in estimating when water appeared on Earth is that water is continually being lost to space. H2O molecules in the atmosphere are broken up by photolysis, and the resulting free hydrogen atoms can sometimes escape Earth's gravitational pull (see: Atmospheric escape). When the Earth was younger and less massive, water would have been lost to space more easily. Lighter elements like hydrogen and helium are expected to leak from the atmosphere continually, but isotopic ratios of heavier noble gases in the modern atmosphere suggest that even the heavier elements in the early atmosphere were subject to significant losses. In particular, xenon is useful for calculations of water loss over time. Not only is it a noble gas (and therefore is not removed from the atmosphere through chemical reactions with other elements), but comparisons between the abundances of its nine stable isotopes in the modern atmosphere reveal that the Earth lost at least one ocean of water early in its history, between the Hadean and Archean eons.
Any water on Earth during the latter part of its accretion would have been disrupted by the Moon-forming impact (~4.5 billion years ago), which likely vaporized much of Earth's crust and upper mantle and created a rock-vapor atmosphere around the young planet. The rock vapor would have condensed within two thousand years, leaving behind hot volatiles which probably resulted in a majority carbon dioxide atmosphere with hydrogen and water vapor. Afterward, liquid water oceans may have existed despite the surface temperature of due to the increased atmospheric pressure of the CO2 atmosphere. As the cooling continued, most CO2 was removed from the atmosphere by subduction and dissolution in ocean water, but levels oscillated wildly as new surface and mantle cycles appeared.
Geological evidence also helps constrain the time frame for liquid water existing on Earth. A sample of pillow basalt (a type of rock formed during an underwater eruption) was recovered from the Isua Greenstone Belt and provides evidence that water existed on Earth 3.8 billion years ago. In the Nuvvuagittuq Greenstone Belt, Quebec, Canada, rocks dated at 3.8 billion years old by one study and 4.28 billion years old by another show evidence of the presence of water at these ages. If oceans existed earlier than this, any geological evidence has yet to be discovered (which may be because such potential evidence has been destroyed by geological processes like crustal recycling). More recently, in August 2020, researchers reported that sufficient water to fill the oceans may have always been on the Earth since the beginning of the planet's formation.
Unlike rocks, minerals called zircons are highly resistant to weathering and geological processes and so are used to understand conditions on the very early Earth. Mineralogical evidence from zircons has shown that liquid water and an atmosphere must have existed 4.404 ± 0.008 billion years ago, very soon after the formation of Earth. This presents somewhat of a paradox, as the cool early Earth hypothesis suggests temperatures were cold enough to freeze water between about 4.4 billion and 4.0 billion years ago. Other studies of zircons found in Australian Hadean rock point to the existence of plate tectonics as early as 4 billion years ago. If true, that implies that rather than a hot, molten surface and an atmosphere full of carbon dioxide, early Earth's surface was much as it is today (in terms of thermal insulation). The action of plate tectonics traps vast amounts of CO2, thereby reducing greenhouse effects, leading to a much cooler surface temperature and the formation of solid rock and liquid water.
Earth's water inventory
While the majority of Earth's surface is covered by oceans, those oceans make up just a small fraction of the mass of the planet. The mass of Earth's oceans is estimated to be 1.37 × 1021 kg, which is 0.023% of the total mass of Earth, 6.0 × 1024 kg. An additional 5.0 × 1020 kg of water is estimated to exist in ice, lakes, rivers, groundwater, and atmospheric water vapor. A significant amount of water is also stored in Earth's crust, mantle, and core. Unlike molecular H2O that is found on the surface, water in the interior exists primarily in hydrated minerals or as trace amounts of hydrogen bonded to oxygen atoms in anhydrous minerals. Hydrated silicates on the surface transport water into the mantle at convergent plate boundaries, where oceanic crust is subducted underneath continental crust. While it is difficult to estimate the total water content of the mantle due to limited samples, approximately three times the mass of the Earth's oceans could be stored there. Similarly, the Earth's core could contain four to five oceans' worth of hydrogen.
Hypotheses for the origins of Earth's water
Extraplanetary sources
Water has a much lower condensation temperature than other materials that compose the terrestrial planets in the Solar System, such as iron and silicates. The region of the protoplanetary disk closest to the Sun was very hot early in the history of the Solar System, and it is not feasible that oceans of water condensed with the Earth as it formed. Further from the young Sun where temperatures were lower, water could condense and form icy planetesimals. The boundary of the region where ice could form in the early Solar System is known as the frost line (or snow line), and is located in the modern asteroid belt, between about 2.7 and 3.1 astronomical units (AU) from the Sun. It is therefore necessary that objects forming beyond the frost line–such as comets, trans-Neptunian objects, and water-rich meteoroids (protoplanets)–delivered water to Earth. However, the timing of this delivery is still in question.
One hypothesis claims that Earth accreted (gradually grew by accumulation of) icy planetesimals about 4.5 billion years ago, when it was 60 to 90% of its current size. In this scenario, Earth was able to retain water in some form throughout accretion and major impact events. This hypothesis is supported by similarities in the abundance and the isotope ratios of water between the oldest known carbonaceous chondrite meteorites and meteorites from Vesta, both of which originate from the Solar System's asteroid belt. It is also supported by studies of osmium isotope ratios, which suggest that a sizeable quantity of water was contained in the material that Earth accreted early on. Measurements of the chemical composition of lunar samples collected by the Apollo 15 and 17 missions further support this, and indicate that water was already present on Earth before the Moon was formed.
One problem with this hypothesis is that the noble gas isotope ratios of Earth's atmosphere are different from those of its mantle, which suggests they were formed from different sources. To explain this observation, a so-called "late veneer" theory has been proposed in which water was delivered much later in Earth's history, after the Moon-forming impact. However, the current understanding of Earth's formation allows for less than 1% of Earth's material accreting after the Moon formed, implying that the material accreted later must have been very water-rich. Models of early Solar System dynamics have shown that icy asteroids could have been delivered to the inner Solar System (including Earth) during this period if Jupiter migrated closer to the Sun.
Yet a third hypothesis, supported by evidence from molybdenum isotope ratios, suggests that the Earth gained most of its water from the same interplanetary collision that caused the formation of the Moon.
The evidence from 2019 shows that the molybdenum isotopic composition of the Earth's mantle originates from the outer Solar System, likely having brought water to Earth. The explanation is that Theia, the planet said in the giant-impact hypothesis to have collided with Earth 4.5 billion years ago forming the Moon, may have originated in the outer Solar System rather than in the inner Solar System, bringing water and carbon-based materials with it.
Geochemical analysis of water in the Solar System
Isotopic ratios provide a unique "chemical fingerprint" that is used to compare Earth's water with reservoirs elsewhere in the Solar System. One such isotopic ratio, that of deuterium to hydrogen (D/H), is particularly useful in the search for the origin of water on Earth. Hydrogen is the most abundant element in the universe, and its heavier isotope deuterium can sometimes take the place of a hydrogen atom in molecules like H2O. Most deuterium was created in the Big Bang or in supernovae, so its uneven distribution throughout the protosolar nebula was effectively "locked in" early in the formation of the Solar System. By studying the different isotopic ratios of Earth and of other icy bodies in the Solar System, the likely origins of Earth's water can be researched.
Earth
The deuterium to hydrogen ratio for ocean water on Earth is known very precisely to be (1.5576 ± 0.0005) × 10−4. This value represents a mixture of all of the sources that contributed to Earth's reservoirs, and is used to identify the source or sources of Earth's water. The ratio of deuterium to hydrogen may have increased over the Earth's lifetime as the lighter isotope is more likely to leak to space in atmospheric loss processes. However no process is known that can decrease Earth's D/H ratio over time. This loss of the lighter isotope is one explanation for why Venus has such a high D/H ratio, as that planet's water was vaporized during the runaway greenhouse effect and subsequently lost much of its hydrogen to space. Because Earth's D/H ratio has increased significantly over time, the D/H ratio of water originally delivered to the planet was lower than at present. This is consistent with a scenario in which a significant proportion of the water on Earth was already present during the planet's early evolution.
Asteroids
Multiple geochemical studies have concluded that asteroids are most likely the primary source of Earth's water. Carbonaceous chondrites–which are a subclass of the oldest meteorites in the Solar System–have isotopic levels most similar to ocean water. The CI and CM subclasses of carbonaceous chondrites specifically have hydrogen and nitrogen isotope levels that closely match Earth's seawater, which suggests water in these meteorites could be the source of Earth's oceans. Two 4.5 billion-year-old meteorites found on Earth that contained liquid water alongside a wide diversity of deuterium-poor organic compounds further support this. Earth's current deuterium to hydrogen ratio also matches ancient eucrite chondrites, which originate from the asteroid Vesta in the outer asteroid belt. CI, CM, and eucrite chondrites are believed to have the same water content and isotope ratios as ancient icy protoplanets from the outer asteroid belt that later delivered water to Earth.
A further asteroid particle study supported the theory that a large source of earth's water has come from hydrogen atoms carried on particles in the solar wind which combine with oxygen on asteroids and then arrive on earth in space dust. Using atom probe tomography the study found hydroxide and water molecules on the surface of a single grain from particles retrieved from the asteroid 25143 Itokawa by the Japanese space probe Hayabusa.
Comets
Comets are kilometer-sized bodies made of dust and ice that originate from the Kuiper belt (20-50 AU) and the Oort cloud (>5,000 AU), but have highly elliptical orbits which bring them into the inner solar system. Their icy composition and trajectories which bring them into the inner solar system make them a target for remote and in situ measurements of D/H ratios.
It is implausible that Earth's water originated only from comets, since isotope measurements of the deuterium to hydrogen (D/H) ratio in comets Halley, Hyakutake, Hale–Bopp, 2002T7, and Tuttle, yield values approximately twice that of oceanic water. Using this cometary D/H ratio, models predict that less than 10% of Earth's water was supplied from comets.
Other, shorter period comets (<20 years) called Jupiter family comets likely originate from the Kuiper belt, but have had their orbital paths influenced by gravitational interactions with Jupiter or Neptune. 67P/Churyumov–Gerasimenko is one such comet that was the subject of isotopic measurements by the Rosetta spacecraft, which found the comet has a D/H ratio three times that of Earth's seawater. Another Jupiter family comet, 103P/Hartley 2, has a D/H ratio which is consistent with Earth's seawater, but its nitrogen isotope levels do not match Earth's.
See also
Notes
Jörn Müller, Harald Lesch (2003): Woher kommt das Wasser der Erde? - Urgaswolke oder Meteoriten. Chemie in unserer Zeit 37(4), pg. 242 – 246, ISSN 0009-2851
Parts of this article were translated from the original article from the German Wikipedia, on 4/3/06
References
External links
Dr. C's Ocean World: "How the Oceans Formed" (archived copy)
Nature journal: "Earth has water older than the Sun"
Origins of water
Water on Earth
Beginnings
Hadean
Hadean events
Scientific problems
Water |
4225110 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosmos%20605 | Kosmos 605 | Kosmos 605 (), or Bion 1, was a Bion satellite. Kosmos 605 was the first of eleven Bion satellites.
Launch
Kosmos 605 was launched by a Soyuz-U rocket flying from Site 43/3 at the Plesetsk Cosmodrome in the Soviet Union. The satellite was initially launched in a low Earth orbit with a perigee of and an apogee of with an orbital inclination of 62.80° ant an orbital period of 90.70 minutes.
Mission
The spacecraft orbited the Earth for 21 days until its biological capsule returned to Earth on 22 November 1973 in a region of northwestern Kazakhstan. It carried several dozen male rats (possibly 25 or 45 ), six Russian tortoises (Agrionemys horsfieldii) (each in a separate box), a mushroom bed, flour beetles (Tribolium confusum) in various stages of their life cycle, and living bacterial spores. It provided data on the reaction of mammal, reptile, insect, fungal, and bacterial forms to prolonged weightlessness.
Results
After returning, the animals found several functional changes, such as decreased body temperature, difficulty breathing, muscle atrophy, decreased bone mechanical strength and decreased mass of some internal organs and glands. No pathological changes were found. 3–4 weeks after landing, most of these changes receded and the animals returned to normal. In the experiment, for the first time, a second generation of insects was obtained whose weightlessness was developed. No differences were detected between the second and the first generation. The influence of space conditions on the development of fungi was also found. Growing up in a weightless state, they created a very thin and extremely bent leg and a more massive mycelium than on Earth. Kosmos 605 also tested means of protection against ionizing radiation.
See also
1973 in spaceflight
References
Bibliography
Kozlov, D. I. (1996), Mashnostroenie, ed.; Konstruirovanie avtomaticheskikh kosmicheskikh apparatov, Moscow, ISBN
Melnik, T. G. (1997), Nauka, ed.; Voenno-Kosmicheskiy Sili, Moscow, ISBN
"Bion' nuzhen lyudyam", Novosti Kosmonavtiki, (6): 35, 1996
Bion satellites
Kosmos satellites
Spacecraft launched in 1973
1973 in spaceflight
1973 in the Soviet Union |
4225125 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosmos%20690 | Kosmos 690 | Kosmos 690 (in Russian: Бион 2, Космос 690), or Bion 2, was a Bion satellite launched by the Soviet Union.
Launch
Kosmos 690 was launched on 22 October 1974, at 17:59:59 UTC from Plesetsk Cosmodrome with a Soyuz-U launch vehicle. It was placed in low Earth orbit, with perigee of , apogee of and orbital inclination of 62.80°, and orbital period of 98.40 minutes.
Spacecraft
The spacecraft was based on the Zenit spy satellite with emphasis on studying the problems of radiation effects on human beings.
It carried albino rats for biomedical research. Scientists from Czechoslovakia, Romania and Soviet Union subjected the rats to daily radiation doses from a gamma source by ground command. When they were recovered 21 days later, many rats had developed lung problems and their blood and bone marrow had changed more than those of control specimens. It had an on-orbit dry mass of .
An instrument module in the form of 2 connected truncated cones, weighing , in diameter and in length, carries in most of the auxiliary instrumentation in the hermetized part. Outwardly, ball valves with compressed nitrogen are attached to the gas nozzles of the stabilizer system. At the rear, the TDU-1 braking engine is located at a stroke of 15.83 kN and a maximum operating time of 45 seconds. Hypergolic KPL delivers a turbo pump to the combustion chamber. An auxiliary container containing chemical batteries and additional experiments, cylindrical with a diameter of and a height of is placed above the return module and dumped approximately a day before the landing.
Mission
After 21 days, Kosmos 690 returned to Earth and landing in Kazakhstan on 12 November 1974. The return module, weighing and in diameter, was covered with an ablative thermal shield 3 to 18 cm thick.
See also
1974 in spaceflight
Kosmos (satellite)
References
Bibliography
Kozlov, D. I. (1996), Mashnostroenie, ed.; Konstruirovanie avtomaticheskikh kosmicheskikh apparatov, Moscow, ISBN
Melnik, T. G. (1997), Nauka, ed.; Voenno-Kosmicheskiy Sili, Moscow. ISBN
"Bion' nuzhen lyudyam", Novosti Kosmonavtiki (6): 35, 1996
Bion satellites
Kosmos satellites
Spacecraft launched in 1974
1974 in spaceflight
1974 in the Soviet Union
Romania–Soviet Union relations
Czechoslovakia–Soviet Union relations |
4225130 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosmos%20782 | Kosmos 782 | Kosmos 782 (in Russian: Бион 3, Космос 782, or Bion 3) was a Bion satellite. It carried 14 experiments prepared by seven countries in all, with participation from scientists in France, Czechoslovakia, Hungary, Poland, Romania, United States and the Soviet Union.
Launch and return
Launched from Plesetsk Cosmodrome on 25 November 1975, at 14:00:00 UTC. The biosatellite was recovered near Amankaragaj, in Kazakhstan, Soviet Union, on 15 December 1975 after 19.5 days.
Mission
It included a centrifuge with revolving and fixed sections in which identical groups of animals, plants, and cells could be compared. The subject animals included white rats and tortoises. The effects of aging on fruit fly livers and plant tissues with grafted cancerous growths were also studied. More than 20 different species were flown on the mission, including 25 unrestrained male Wistar rats, fruit flies (Drosophila melanogaster), carrot tissues, and 1,000 embryos of the fish Fundulus heteroclitus (a small shallow-water minnow). A United States radiation dosimeter experiment was also carried out without using biological materials. This experiment was the only joint U.S./U.S.S.R. study flown on the Kosmos series of biosatellites that was developed by Johnson Space Center (JSC); all others were developed and managed by Ames Research Center (ARC).
See also
1975 in spaceflight
Bibliography
Kozlov, D. I. (1996), Mashnostroenie, ed.; Konstruirovanie avtomaticheskikh kosmicheskikh apparatov, Moscow, ISBN
Melnik, T. G. (1997), Nauka, ed.; Voenno-Kosmicheskiy Sili, Moscow, ISBN
"Bion' nuzhen lyudyam", Novosti Kosmonavtiki (6): 35, 1996
References
External links
NASA Ames Research Center
Bion satellites
Kosmos satellites
Spacecraft launched in 1975
1975 in spaceflight
1975 in the Soviet Union
Czechoslovakia–Soviet Union relations
Romania–Soviet Union relations
Hungary–Soviet Union relations
Poland–Soviet Union relations
France–Soviet Union relations
Soviet Union–United States relations |
4225132 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bion%20%28satellite%29 | Bion (satellite) | The Bion satellites (), also named Biocosmos, is a series of Soviet (later Russian) biosatellites focused on space medicine.
Bion space program
Bion precursor flights and Bion flights
The Soviet biosatellite program began in 1966 with Kosmos 110, and resumed in 1973 with Kosmos 605. Cooperation in space ventures between the Soviet Union and the United States was initiated in 1971, with the signing of the United States and Soviet Union in Science and Applications Agreement (which included an agreement on space research cooperation). The Soviet Union first offered to fly U.S. experiments on a Kosmos biosatellite in 1974, only a few years after the termination (in 1969) of the U.S. biosatellite program. The offer was realized in 1975 when the first joint U.S./Soviet research were carried out on the Kosmos 782 mission.
The Bion spacecraft were based on the Zenit spacecraft and launches began in 1973 with primary emphasis on the problems of radiation effects on human beings. Launches in the program included Kosmos 110, 605, 690, 782, plus Nauka modules flown on Zenit-2M reconnaissance satellites. of equipment could be contained in the external Nauka module.
The Soviet/Russian Bion program provided U.S. investigators a platform for launching Fundamental Space Biology and biomedical experiments into space. The Bion program, which began in 1966, included a series of missions that flew biological experiments using primates, rodents, insects, cells, and plants on a biosatellite in near Earth orbit. NASA became involved in the program in 1975 and participated in 9 of the 11 Bion missions. NASA ended its participation in the program with the Bion No.11 mission launched in December 1996. The collaboration resulted in the flight of more than 100 U.S. experiments, one-half of all U.S. life sciences flight experiments accomplished with non-human subjects.
The missions ranged from five days (Bion 6) (Kosmos 1514) to around 22 days (Bion 1 and Kosmos 110).
Bion-M
In 2005, the Bion program was resumed with three new satellites of the modified Bion-M type – the first flight was launched on 19 April 2013 from Baikonur Cosmodrome, Kazakhstan. The first satellite of the new series Bion-M1 featured an aquarium by the German Aerospace Center (DLR) and carried 45 mice, 18 Mongolian gerbils, 15 geckos, snails, fish and micro-organisms into orbit for 30 days before re-entry and recovery. All the gerbils died due to a hardware failure, but condition of the rest of the experiments, including all geckos, was satisfactory. Half the mice died as was predicted.
Bion-M2 is scheduled to launch in 2023 on a Soyuz 2.1a rocket to an altitude of 800 km. The orbiter will carry 75 mice and studies will focus on how they are affected at the molecular level by space radiation.
Launch history
See also
BIOPAN
Biosatellite program
EXPOSE
Foton-M2
Interkosmos
List of Kosmos satellites
List of microorganisms tested in outer space
O/OREOS
OREOcube
Tanpopo
Zond 5
References
External links
Zenit Satellites - Bion variant
Astronautix, Bion
TsSKB, Bion images (Russian)
R. W. Ballard, and J. P. Connolly; U.S./U.S.S.R. joint research in space biology and medicine on Kosmos biosatellites, FASEB J. 4: 5-9 (Overview of Bion 1 to 9)
Satellites formerly orbiting Earth
Satellites of the Soviet Union
Satellites of Russia
Animals in space
Astrobiology space missions
Biosatellites
Animal testing in the Soviet Union |
4225142 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosmos%201667 | Kosmos 1667 | Kosmos 1667 ( meaning Kosmos 1667), or Bion 7 was a 1985 biomedical research mission satellite involving scientists from nine countries. It was part of the Bion program. This mission was the scientific participation of nine countries (Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, France, Hungary, Poland, Romania, Soviet Union and United States).
Mission
Kosmos 1667 was the second U.S.S.R. biosatellite mission with a primate payload. Although the American experiment on the Kosmos 1667 mission was meant to be a repeat of the Kosmos 1514 cardiovascular experiment, several improvements were implemented on this mission. Modified post-surgery animal handling procedures minimised the risk of damaging the transducer implants. Data was sampled and recorded more frequently during the inflight period. Two monkeys with flight-type cardiovascular instrumentation were studied in a ground-based synchronous control experiment; postflight cardiovascular tests were not conducted after Kosmos 1514. Postural tilt tests were conducted during the pre-flight and post-flight periods in several animals to establish a ground-based pool of normal data for this procedure. This data was compared with the similar body fluid shifts thought to occur in flight. Instrument calibration procedures were modified on this mission to ensure that blood pressure measurements would be accurate.
The main objective of American participation in the Kosmos 1667 mission was to measure carotid artery pressure and blood flow during the inflight period. The United States provided all flight and ground support instrumentation for this experiment. Raw analogue data from flight and ground control experiments was transferred to the Cardiovascular Research Laboratory at the NASA Ames Research Center for analysis. Hemodynamic data was to be correlated with concurrently recorded Soviet data. A similar correlative study was performed during the Cosmos 1514 mission, where blood flow velocity was compared to total body cardiac output as determined by impedance cardiography. Two rhesus macaques (Macaca mulatta) named Gordyy and Oomka were flown on board the biosatellite. Each animal weighed approximately . Both were instrumented for Soviet neurophysiology studies. The instruments consisted of bilaterally implanted microelectrodes in the vestibular nuclei, and electro-oculogram and electroencephalogram electrodes. Monkeys were housed in Soviet biosatellite capsules, as for the Kosmos 1514 mission. United States hardware developed for the Kosmos 1514 cardiovascular experiment was used again on this mission. A barometric pressure recorder mounted in the primate capsule was used to correct and normalise the implanted pressure sensor to 760 mm Hg.
They were also taken ten male rats, and ten newts. The newts had part of their front limbs amputated and their crystalline lenses removed to study the possible rate of human recovery from injuries incurred in space. A biocalorimeter monitored energy exchange during the emergence of flies from nymphs; 1500 drosophila flies were carried for this purpose. The payload also included maize seeds, crocuses, and guppies in an aquarium.
The mission was recovered after seven days. on 17 July 1985.
See also
1985 in spaceflight
Animals in space
References
Bibliography
Kozlov, D. I. (1996), Mashnostroenie, ed.; Konstruirovanie avtomaticheskikh kosmicheskikh apparatov, Moscow, ISBN
Melnik, T. G. (1997), Nauka, ed.; Voenno-Kosmicheskiy Sili, Moscow, ISBN
"Bion' nuzhen lyudyam", Novosti Kosmonavtiki, (6): 35, 1996
External links
NASA
Bion satellites
Kosmos satellites
Spacecraft launched in 1985
1985 in spaceflight
1985 in the Soviet Union
Czechoslovakia–Soviet Union relations
Romania–Soviet Union relations
Hungary–Soviet Union relations
Poland–Soviet Union relations
France–Soviet Union relations
Soviet Union–United States relations
East Germany–Soviet Union relations |
4225182 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosmos%20936 | Kosmos 936 | Kosmos 936 or Bion 4 (Бион 4, Космос 936) was a Bion satellite. The mission involved nine countries in a series of biomedical research experiments. The experiments were primarily follow-ups to the Bion 3 (Kosmos 782) flight. Scientists from the Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, France, Hungary, Poland, Romania, the United States and the Soviet Union conducted experiments in physics and biology on the mission.
Spacecraft
The spacecraft was based on the Zenit reconnaissance satellite and launches began in 1973 with primary emphasis on the problems of radiation effects on human beings. Launches in the program included Kosmos 110, 605, 670, 782, plus Nauka modules flown on Zenit-2M reconnaissance satellites. 90 kg of equipment could be contained in the external Nauka module.
Launch
Kosmos 936 was launched on 3 August 1977, at 14:01:00 UTC by a Soyuz-U launch vehicle from Plesetsk Cosmodrome. The mission ended after 19.5 days.
Mission
The mission was to conduct various biological studies, continuing the Bion 3 mission experiments. He had two centrifuges on board to put some specimens in an artificial gravity environment. An attempt was made to differentiate, using rats, between the effects caused by space flight itself from those caused by stress. The effects of flight on muscle and bone, on red cell survival, and on lipid and carbohydrate metabolism were also studied, and an experiment with rats on the effects of space radiation on the retina was conducted.
One of the instruments (without a biological part) studied the physical parameters of the components of space radiation. Fruit flies were used in genetics and aging studies. A group of rats of the Rattus norvegicus species were sent, with an average weight of at launch and 62 days of age. Twenty of the rats experienced microgravity and the other ten were subjected to the artificial gravity of the centrifuge.
See also
1977 in spaceflight
References
Bibliography
Kozlov, D. I. (1996), Mashnostroenie, ed., Konstruirovanie avtomaticheskikh kosmicheskikh apparatov, Moscow, ISBN
Melnik, T. G. (1997), Nauka, ed., Voenno-Kosmicheskiy Sili, Moscow, ISBN
"Bion' nuzhen lyudyam", Novosti Kosmonavtiki, (6): 35, 1996
Bion satellites
Kosmos satellites
Spacecraft launched in 1977
1977 in spaceflight
1977 in the Soviet Union
Czechoslovakia–Soviet Union relations
Romania–Soviet Union relations
Hungary–Soviet Union relations
Poland–Soviet Union relations
France–Soviet Union relations
Soviet Union–United States relations
East Germany–Soviet Union relations |
4225200 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosmos%201129 | Kosmos 1129 | Bion 5, or also Kosmos 1129 (in Russian: Бион 5, Космос-1129) was a Bion satellite. It was a biomedical research mission involving scientists from nine countries, launched on 29 September 1979, at 15:30:00 UTC. Among the experiments was the first attempt to breed mammals in space, which proved unsuccessful. The mission ended after 18.5 days, on 14 October 1979, at 02:24 UTC. The mission had the cooperation of the Bulgaria, Czechoslovakia, East Germany, France, Hungary, Poland, Romania, the United States and the Soviet Union.
Mission
Organisms studied included:
Rattus norvegicus (Wistar rat)
Coturnix coturnix (Japanese quail)
Daucus carota (carrot)
Objectives
Bion 5 mission consisted of various biological studies, including the first mammalian reproduction attempts (rats) in space, which ended up not succeeding. Experiences NASA were designed to study the effects of radiation on mice, quail embryos and some plant specimens.
Studies on the effect of microgravity were also performed on the muscles and bones of rats and avian embryogenesis was studied in space. the effects of microgravity on plant tissues were investigated using carrots and carrot cancerous tissue to study the effects of space flight on the growth and development of plants. As in the previous mission, 30 rats for the species Rattus norvegicus were sent physiological studies; Seven additional rats were used in embryological experiments.
See also
1979 in spaceflight
References
Bibliography
Kozlov, D. I. (1996), Mashnostroenie, ed.; Konstruirovanie avtomaticheskikh kosmicheskikh apparatov, Moscow, ISBN
Melnik, T. G. (1997), Nauka, ed.; Voenno-Kosmicheskiy Sili, Moscow, ISBN
"Bion' nuzhen lyudyam", Novosti Kosmonavtiki, (6): 35, 1996
External links
Cosmos 1129. NASA
Bion satellites
Kosmos satellites
Spacecraft launched in 1979
1979 in spaceflight
1979 in the Soviet Union
Czechoslovakia–Soviet Union relations
Romania–Soviet Union relations
Hungary–Soviet Union relations
Poland–Soviet Union relations
France–Soviet Union relations
Soviet Union–United States relations
East Germany–Soviet Union relations |
4225210 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosmos%201514 | Kosmos 1514 | Kosmos 1514 or Bion 6 (in Russian: Космос 1514, Бион 6) was a biomedical research mission that was launched on 14 December 1983, at 07:00:00 UTC. It was part of the Bion programme.
Mission
The first Soviet Union orbital flight of a non-human primate was accomplished on the Kosmos 1514 mission. Two monkeys flew on the mission, together with several pregnant rats. More than 60 experiments were performed by investigators from Bulgaria, Hungary, the German Democratic Republic, Poland, Romania, Czechoslovakia, France, the Soviet Union and the United States. This was the first time the Soviet space agency flew monkeys in space, coming 34 years after the U.S. first put a monkey into space, and 22 years after the Soviet Union started putting humans into space.
United States scientists conducted three experiments on the primates and another experiment on the rat subjects. The mission differed markedly from earlier Cosmos flights, both in terms of Soviet scientific goals and in the degree of cooperation required between the United States and the Soviet Union. The two countries had to interact at a high level because much of the U.S. experiment hardware had to be integrated with the Soviet spacecraft and instrumentation systems.
Two Rhesus monkeys were flown into orbit implanted with sensors to permit monitoring of carotid artery blood flow. Additionally eighteen pregnant white rats were sent to be used for studies of the effects of microgravity and radiation. The rats subsequently produced normal litters.
Experiments focused on the effect of weightlessness on various physiological parameters. A study of circadian rhythms was concerned with the synchronization of primate motor activity, body temperature and skin temperature rhythms to a fixed light/dark cycle and to each other. Blood pressure and flow were monitored, to evaluate short and long-term changes in these parameters. Changes in calcium metabolism were studied in order to determine the effect of weightlessness on the skeleton. The two rhesus monkeys (Macaca mulatta), Abrek and Bion, flown on board were about three years of age and each weighed approximately 4 kilograms. Height was a constraint in selecting animals for flight. This was because a Soviet vestibular experiment required that the flight restraint couches oscillate vertically within the animal capsules. The monkeys were conditioned to sit in the restraint couches and perform tasks for food rewards. Tasks included pressing a lever with their feet and tracking a moving light with their eyes. Monkeys were also trained to eat and drink from food and juice dispensers. Monkeys in the flight and control groups were implanted with blood pressure and flow cuffs and sensors to measure several physiological parameters.
A neuroontogeny experiment was conducted to investigate space flight effects on the sensory development of rats that spent part of their prenatal gestation period in space. Ten pregnant female Wistar rats (Rattus norvegicus) were flown. Ground control groups contained the same number of rats. At the start of the flight or control experiments, the rats were at gestation day 13 of their 21-day cycle.
The mission ended after five days, on 19 December 1983.
See also
1983 in spaceflight
Animals in space
References
Bibliography
Kozlov, D. I. (1996), Mashnostroenie, ed.; Konstruirovanie avtomaticheskikh kosmicheskikh apparatov, Moscow, ISBN
Melnik, T. G. (1997), Nauka, ed.; Voenno-Kosmicheskiy Sili, Moscow, ISBN
"Bion' nuzhen lyudyam", Novosti Kosmonavtiki, (6): 35, 1996
External links
Cosmos 1514 NASA
Bion satellites
Kosmos satellites
Spacecraft launched in 1983
1983 in spaceflight
1983 in the Soviet Union
Czechoslovakia–Soviet Union relations
Romania–Soviet Union relations
Hungary–Soviet Union relations
Poland–Soviet Union relations
France–Soviet Union relations
Soviet Union–United States relations
East Germany–Soviet Union relations |
4225223 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosmos%201887 | Kosmos 1887 | Bion 8 or Kosmos 1887 (in Russian: Бион 8, Космос 1887) was a Bion satellite.
Mission
Bion 8 carried a payload of biological and radiation physics experiments from nine countries. The landing was several hundred miles from the expected recovery site, which resulted in considerable difficulties. The biological payload on the spacecraft included 2 monkeys, 10 rats, fruit flies, grasshoppers, beetles, guppies, Hynobiidae, Chlorella ciliate, newts and corn. More than 50 NASA-sponsored scientists were involved in conducting the 33 American experiments on board.
One of these experiments, a study of radiation levels in the space environment, did not require the use of any biological subjects. The United States conducted only one experiment on the primates flown on the biosatellite. The remaining American experiments were performed on tissue samples from five of the flight rats. A number of these experiments were extensions of the studies conducted on the Spacelab-3 mission in April 1985. The other countries involved in conducting experiments on the mission were the Soviet Union, Poland, Czechoslovakia, the East Germany, France, Romania, Bulgaria and Hungary. The European Space Agency (ESA) also sponsored some experiments. The United States was responsible for developing flight and ground-based hardware, verifying testing of hardware and experiment procedures, developing rat tissue sampling procedures, and transferring tissues and data from the Soviet Union after the flight. One of the mission's noteworthy features was the rat biospecimen sharing program, which allowed a great number of rat tissue samples to be analysed. The objective of the U.S. experiments was to investigate the effect of microgravity on various body systems.
The primate experiment was designed to study the growth and development of the peripheral skeleton. Rat studies encompassed a broad array of disciplines. The effects of microgravity on cardiac, liver, small intestine and bone tissue, liver function, skeletal growth, hormone levels and metabolism were studied using various approaches. Other studies investigated changes in the immune, nervous and reproductive systems, in muscle and connective tissue and in skeletal and mineral homeostasis. Another experiment was conducted to evaluate radiation exposure during the flight and to measure the shielding effectiveness of the spacecraft. Ten 12-week-old male specific pathogen free Wistar rats were flown in the Rodent-BIOS. Two rhesus macaques(Macaca mulatta) named Drema and Yerosha occupied the Primate-BIOS.
See also
1987 in spaceflight
Animals in space
References
External links
Cosmos 1887: science overview FASEB Journal
NASA
Bion satellites
Kosmos satellites
Spacecraft launched in 1987
1987 in spaceflight
1987 in the Soviet Union
Czechoslovakia–Soviet Union relations
Romania–Soviet Union relations
Hungary–Soviet Union relations
Poland–Soviet Union relations
France–Soviet Union relations
Soviet Union–United States relations
East Germany–Soviet Union relations |
4225242 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosmos%202229 | Kosmos 2229 | Kosmos 2229, or Bion 10 (in Russian: Бион 10, Космос 2229) was a biomedical research mission involving in ten countries plus European Space Agency (ESA). A Russian spacecraft, was launched by a Soyuz-U launch vehicle from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome. It was part of the Bion programme.
Spacecraft
Several of the hardware elements on the biosatellite were improved for Kosmos 2229. The in-flight data recording system was enhanced, making high-quality brain and neuromuscular recordings possible. The monkey feeder system was improved, and a backup juice dispenser was available. The monkey restraint system was modified to allow more arm movement. The neurovestibular data acquisition system was updated through a joint American-Russian development effort, allowing more parameters to be recorded in flight.
Mission
Bion 10 carried two monkeys and several insects, amphibians, plants, and cell cultures. Participating scientists were from ten countries (Canada, France, Germany, Lithuania, Netherlands, China, Russia, Ukraine, United States, and Uzbekistan), plus European Space Agency (ASE). In the planning stages this mission was named Bion '92.
The Kosmos 2229 spacecraft orbited the Earth for almost 12 days. The payload, also designated Bion 10, contained thirteen American life sciences experiments. Studies focused on bone, neuromuscular and vestibular physiology, circadian rhythms, and metabolism. Two rhesus monkeys served as experimental subjects on the mission. As on previous Kosmos biosatellite missions, the monkeys were trained to activate food and juice dispensers. In addition, they were trained to operate a foot pedal so that muscle responses could be studied in flight. For in-flight neurovestibular testing, the monkeys were trained to make hand and head movements in response to visual stimuli.
See also
1992 in spaceflight
Animals in space
References
External links
Kosmos Missions After 1990 NASA
Bion satellites
Kosmos satellites
Spacecraft launched in 1992
1992 in spaceflight
1992 in Russia |
4225247 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosmos%202044 | Kosmos 2044 | Kosmos 2044, or Bion 9 (in Russian: Бион 9, Космос 2044) was a biomedical research mission involving in nine countries plus ESA: United Kingdom, Hungarian People's Republic, East Germany, Polish People's Republic, Czechoslovakia, United States, Canada, Australia, Soviet Union and European Space Agency (ESA). It was part of the Bion program.
Mission
Eighty experiments were conducted in such categories as motion sickness, reproduction and regeneration, immunology, and readaptation to a normal gravity environment. A number of different biological specimens were used, including rodents.
The joint United States/Soviet Union experiments were conducted on 2 rhesus monkeys and 10 male Wistar rats. The biological payload also included cell cultures (Escherichia coli). The prime occupants were two macaque monkeys. The 2.3 m diameter descent sphere was successfully recovered after 14 days, but a failure in the thermal control system resulted in the deaths of some of the specimens.
Scientific experiments
The Bion 9 mission was composed of 80 scientific experiments, but only 30 experiments returned:
Bone Biochemistry and Mineral Distribution in the Femurs of Rats: Determine the biochemical nature of the mineralization defects in the femurs of young rats after spaceflight. The institutions participating in this experiment were NASA Ames Research Center, University of North Carolina, University of Connecticut, University of California, Santa Cruz, University College in London and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP) in Moscow).
Biomechanical and Morphological Alteration of Intramuscular Connective Tissues: The objective of this experiment was to characterize the structural and material properties of cortical and trabecular bone samples, tendons and intervertebral disks; and to correlate the biomechanical properties of these tissues to the type and quality of structural proteins. The institutions participating in this experiment were University of Iowa, West Virginia University, University of Wisconsin-Madison and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Gravity and Skeletal Growth: The objective of this experiment was to study bone cells, bone matrix and mineral characteristics, bone cell kinetics, and bone blood supply. The institutions participating in this experiment were NASA Ames Research Center, Indiana University, Columbia University, Saint Louis University and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Mineral Distribution and Balance in Rats during Space Flight: The objective of this experiment was to determine the abundance and distribution of mineral components and protein (osteocalcin) within a vertebra; and to determine absorption and excretion of manganese, magnesium and zinc and their relationship to calcium balance and bone osteocalcin. The institutions participating in this experiment were University of California, San Francisco and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Morphometric and EM Analyses of Tibial Epiphyseal Plates: The objective of this experiment was to measure the growth plate of the tibia as an index of its longitudinal growth, and to study the ultrastructure and chemical composition of the growth plate. The institutions participating in this experiment were University of Texas Medical Branch and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Metabolic and Morphologic Properties of Muscle Fibers and Motor Neurons: The objective of this experiment was to study microgravity related muscular atrophy effects in various types of muscle and in spinal motor neurons, with emphasis on the metabolic changes. The institutions participating in this experiment were University of California, Los Angeles, University of Alberta in the Canada, University of Kansas, University of Wisconsin–Madison and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Skeletal Muscle Atrophy: The objective of this experiment was to determine the morphological and biochemical responses of various types of muscles to microgravity. The institutions participating in this experiment were the University of Louisville in the Kentucky and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Investigation of Microgrovity Induced Nerve and Muscle Breakdown: This experiment was a morphological, histochemical, immunocytochemical, and biochemical investigation of microgravity induced nerve and muscle breakdown. Its main objective was to study, by light and electron microscopy, the long term effects of microgravity and early readaptation to gravity on the structure of nerve and skeletal muscles; and to study the biochemistry of muscle protein breakdown. The institutions participating in this experiment were San Jose State University, Medical College of Wisconsin, Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP) and University of Sydney, Australia.
Myosin Isoform Expression in Rodent Skeletal Muscle: The objective of this experiment was to study the effect of microgravity and contractile protein expression in antigravity and non-antigravity rodent skeletal muscle. The institutions participating in this experiment were University of California, Irvine and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Messenger RNA Levels in Skeletal and Smooth Muscles: The objective of this experiment was to measure certain messenger RNA levels in various skeletal muscles and intestinal smooth muscle as an index of protein synthesis. Participated in the experiment the University of Texas Medical Branch and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Measurement of Heart Atrial Natriuretic Peptide Concentrations: The objective of this experiment was to measure the cardiac hormone, which plays a role in water and salt balance, in cardiac tissue of rats exposed to spaceflight. Participated in the experiment the Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP) and NASA Ames Research Center.
Morphological and Biochemical Examination of Heart Tissue: The objective of this experiment was to determine microgravity effects on rodent heart tissue (ventricle). Participated in the experiment the University of Chicago, University of California, Irvine, University of Texas Medical Branch, the NASA Ames Research Center, Baylor University, Texas, and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Hepatic Function in Rats After Space Flight: The objective of this experiment was to determine the effect of microgravity on liver and plasma constituents, on the ability of the liver to metabolize food stuffs and foreign substances, and on liver histology. The institutions participating in this experiment were Emory University, University of Louisville and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Erythroid Colony Formation In Vitro and Erythropoietin Determinations: The objective of this experiment was to determine the effect of microgravity on the red blood cell production of rodents. Participated in the experiment the University of Tennessee, the Institute of Developmental Biology (U.S.S.R.), the Institute of Biophysics (Czechoslovakia) and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Rat Testis Morphology and Physiology: The objective of this experiment was to determine the effects of microgravity on rodent testis physiology. The institutions participating in this experiment were Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP), Colorado State University, Columbia University, Pennsylvania State University and Johns Hopkins University.
Structural Changes and Cell Turnover in the Rats Small Intestine: The objective of this experiment was to determine the structural changes and cell turnover in the small intestines of rats as a result of spaceflight. Participated in the experiment the Colorado State University and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Effects of Muscle Atrophy on Motor End Plates: The objective of this experiment was to determine the effects of spaceflight on neurotransmitter receptors of the brain and spinal cord, and on the morphology and histochemistry of nerve-muscle junctions. Specifically, it studied the muscarinic and gaba (benzodiazepine) receptors in the sensory-motor cortex and spinal cord. The institutions participating in this experiment were the NASA Ames Research Center and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Pineal Physiology in Microgravity and Its Relation to Gonadal Function: The objective of this experiment was to determine the effect of microgravity on selected pineal gland neurotransmitters associated with rodent circadian rhythm control and correlate this with testis function. Participated in the experiment the Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP), the San Jose State University and the Florida A&M University.
Pituitary Oxytocin and Vasopressin Content: The objective of this experiment was to determine the effect of microgravity on two pituitary hormones (oxytocin and vasopressin) involved in water balance. Participated in the experiment the NASA Ames Research Center and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Study of the Effect of Microgravity on Enzymes: The objective of this experiment was to study the effect of microgravity on 1) metabolic enzymes of type I, IIA, and IIB muscle fibers; and on 2) metabolic enzymes, neurotransmitter amino acids, and neurotransmitter associated enzymes in selected regions of the central nervous system. Participated in the experiment the Washington University School of Medicine and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Growth Hormone Regulation, Synthesis and Secretion in Microgravity: The objective of this experiment was to study growth hormone physiology in rodents during spaceflight. The institutions participating in this experiment were Pennsylvania State University, Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP), NASA Ames Research Center and Salk Institute of Biological Studies.
Effect of Space Flight on Level and Function of Immune Cells: The objective of this experiment was to determine the effects of spaceflight on various immunological parameters using rat spleen, bone marrow cells and lymphocytes. Participated the NASA Johnson Space Center, Pennsylvania State University, University of Louisville and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Histologic Examination of Lung Tissue: The objective of this experiment was to determine the effect of microgravity on rat lung tissue. Participated the University of California, San Diego and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Rodent Tissue Repair: The objective of this experiment was to determine the effects of microgravity on the repair of skin connective tissue and skeletal muscle. The institutions participating in this experiment were the University of Kansas, Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP), West Virginia University and the University of Wisconsin–Madison.
Adaptation of Optokinetic Nystagmus to Microgravity: The objective of this experiment was to study primate eye movement responses in an upright position and at various angles of tilt, before and after spaceflight. The institutions participating in this experiment were Brooklyn College in New York City, Mount Sinai Medical Center and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Studies of Vestibular Primary Afferents In Normal, Hyper- and Hypogravity: The objective of this experiment was to study the effect of microgravity on a primates vestibular system by measuring brain and eye movement responses to rotational stimuli preflight and postflight. Participated in the experiment University of Texas Medical Branch and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Functional Neuromuscular Adaption to Spaceflight: The objective of this experiment was to study primate electromyographic activity (EMG) and to determine its importance to the maintenance of normal muscle properties. The biochemical and morphological effects of microgravity on muscles was also studied. Participated in the experiment University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP) and Moscow Medical Institute.
Biological Rhythm and Temperature Regulation: The objective of this experiment was to determine the functioning of a primate's circadian rhythm and thermoregulatory systems. Participated in the experiment the University of California, Davis and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Rhesus Monkey Metabolism during Spaceflight: The objective of this experiment was to determine the metabolic rates of primates during spaceflight. Participated in the experiment the University of California, Davis and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
Radiation Dosimetry and Spectrometry - Passive Systems The objective of this experiment was to conduct a set of radiation measurements with passive detectors in order to study high and low energy neutrons, various flux and energy spectra, and the attenuation of space radiation as a function of shielding. The institutions participating in this experiment were the NASA Marshall Space Flight Center, University of San Francisco and Institute for Medical and Biological Problems (IMBP).
See also
1989 in spaceflight
Animals in space
References
External links
NASA
U.S. Experiments Flown on the Soviet Biosatellite Cosmos 2044, NASA
U.S. Experiments Flown on the Soviet Biosatellite Cosmos 2044, NASA
"COSMOS 2044 MISSION", entire issue of which was dedicated to reports of joint U.S./U.S.S.R. research in space biomedicine on this specific 14-day spaceflight, Journal of Applied Physiology 73, 1992
Bion satellites
Kosmos satellites
Spacecraft launched in 1989
1989 in spaceflight
1989 in the Soviet Union
Czechoslovakia–Soviet Union relations
Romania–Soviet Union relations
Hungary–Soviet Union relations
Poland–Soviet Union relations
France–Soviet Union relations
Soviet Union–United States relations
East Germany–Soviet Union relations |
4225483 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kosmos%20110 | Kosmos 110 | Kosmos 110 ( meaning Kosmos 110) was a Soviet spacecraft launched on 22 February 1966 from the Baikonur Cosmodrome aboard a Voskhod rocket. It carried two dogs, Veterok and Ugolyok.
Mission
The launch of Kosmos 110 was conducted using a Voskhod 11A57 s/n R15000-06 carrier rocket, which flew from Site 31/6 at Baikonour. The launch occurred at 20:09:36 GMT on 22 February 1966. Kosmos 110 separated from its launch vehicle into a low Earth orbit with a perigee of , an apogee of , an inclination of 51.9°, and an orbital period of 95.3 minutes.
It incorporated a re-entry body (capsule) for landing scientific instruments and test objects. It was a biological satellite that made a sustained biomedical experiment through the Van Allen radiation belts with the dogs Veterok and Ugolyok. In addition to the two dogs, several species of plants, moisturized prior to launch, were also carried. On 16 March 1966, after 22 days in orbit around the Earth, they landed safely and were recovered by recovery forces at 14:09 GMT.The dogs had orbited the Earth 330 times.
Results from the mission showed that whilst some beans germinated poorly, lettuce grew larger all around with 50% more yield and Chinese cabbage showed greater mass. Those that germinated in space thus became the first seeds to do so.
Overall the mission showed that long duration space flight had definite but variable effects on plants, with some producing better results than on Earth.
The two dogs showed severe dehydration, weight loss, loss of muscle and coordination and took several weeks to fully recover.
This spaceflight of record-breaking duration was not surpassed by humans until Soyuz 11 in June 1971 and still stands as the longest space flight by dogs.
See also
1966 in spaceflight
Animals in space
Russian space dogs
References
Kosmos satellites
1966 in the Soviet Union
1966 in spaceflight
Spacecraft launched in 1966
Life in space |
4225944 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bion%2011 | Bion 11 | Bion 11 was a Russian biological research satellite that was part of the Bion programme. Scientists from France, Russia and United States conducted the experiments. Bion 11 was launched from the Plesetsk Cosmodrome aboard a Soyuz-U launch vehicle. It carried two monkeys named Lalik and Multik. The spacecraft type was based on the Zenit reconnaissance satellite and launches of Bion satellites began in 1973 with primary emphasis on the problems of radiation effects on human beings. Launches in the program included Kosmos 110, 605, 670, 782, plus Nauka modules flown on Zenit-2M reconnaissance satellites. 90 kg of equipment could be contained in the external Nauka module.
Mission
It carried newts, snails, Drosophila flies and other insects, bacteria, and two macaque monkeys (Macaca mulatta), Lapik and Multik. Both monkeys were safe at landing but Multik died of a heart attack during medical tests under general anaesthetic on 8 January 1997.
The Magee-8 scientific equipment was designed to study the basic features of electrostatic modular protection system. Other equipment was used to maintain the temperature and humidity within the specified range, the atmospheric regeneration, physiological parameters of the monkeys were recorded and transferred them to the ground in TV picture.
Bion 12
A similar mission "Bion-12" was scheduled for December 1998 but did not take place due to cessation of participation of the United States.
See also
1996 in spaceflight
Animals in space
References
External links
Bion Experiment Profile, Payload profile: Bion 11
Bion satellites
Kosmos satellites
Spacecraft launched in 1996
1996 in spaceflight
1996 in Russia |
4228754 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/United%20States%20National%20Grid | United States National Grid | The United States National Grid (USNG) is a multi-purpose location system of grid references used in the United States. It provides a nationally consistent "language of location", optimized for local applications, in a compact, user friendly format. It is similar in design to the national grid reference systems used in other countries. The USNG was adopted as a national standard by the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) of the US Government in 2001.
Overview
While latitude and longitude are well suited to describing locations over large areas of the Earth's surface, most practical land navigation situations occur within much smaller, local areas. As such, they are often better served by a local Cartesian coordinate system, in which the coordinates represent actual distance units on the ground, using the same units of measurement from two perpendicular coordinate axes. This can improve human comprehension by providing reference of scale, as well as making actual distance computations more efficient.
Paper maps often are published with overlaid rectangular (as opposed to latitude/longitude) grids to provide a reference to identify locations. However, these grids, if non-standard or proprietary (such as so-called "bingo" grids with references such as "B-4"), are typically not interoperable with each other, nor can they usually be used with GPS.
The goal of the USNG is to provide a uniform, nationally consistent rectangular grid system that is interoperable across maps at different scales, as well as with GPS and other location based systems. It is intended to provide a frame of reference for describing and communicating locations that is easier to use than latitude/longitude for many practical applications, works across jurisdictional boundaries, and is simple to learn, teach, and use. It is also designed to be both flexible and scalable so that location references are as compact and concise as possible.
The USNG is intended to supplement—not to replace—other location systems such as street addresses. It can be applied to printed maps and to computer mapping and other (GIS) applications. It has found increasing acceptance especially in emergency management, search and rescue, and other public safety applications; yet, its utility is by no means limited to those fields.
Description and functioning
The USNG is an alpha-numeric reference system that overlays the UTM coordinate system. A number of brief tutorial references explain the system in detail, with examples. . Briefly, an example of a full USNG spatial address (grid reference) is:18S UJ 23371 06519(This example used by the FGDC is the full one-meter grid reference of the Jefferson Pier in Washington DC.)
This full form (15 characters) uniquely identifies a single one-meter grid square out of the entire surface of the earth. It consists of three parts (each of which follows a "read-right-then-up" paradigm familiar with other "X,Y" coordinates):
Grid Zone Designation (GZD); for a world-wide unique address. This consists of up to 2 digits (6-degree longitude UTM zone) for West to East, followed by a letter (8-degree latitude band) from South to North; in this example, "18S".
100,000-meter (100 km) Square Identification; for regional areas. This consists of two letters, the first West to East, the second South to North; in this example, "UJ".
Grid Coordinates; for local areas. This part consists of an even number of digits, in this example, 23371 06519, and specifies a location within the 100 km grid square, relative to its lower-left corner. Split in half, the first part (here 23371), called the "easting", gives the displacement east of the left edge of the square; the second part (here 06519), called the "northing"), gives a distance north of the bottom edge of the containing square.
Users determine the required precision, so a grid reference is typically truncated to fewer than the full 10 digits when less precision is required. These values represent a point position (southwest corner) for an area of refinement:
Ten digits..... 23371 06519 ..Locating a point within a 1 m square
Eight digits..... 2337 0651 ...Locating a point within a 10 m square
Six digits......... 233 065 .....Locating a point within a 100 m square
Four digits......... 23 06 .......Locating a point within a 1000 m (1 km) square
Two digits........... 2 0 .........Locating a point within a 10000 m (10 km) square
Note that when going from a higher- to a lower-precision grid reference, it is important to truncate rather than round when removing the unneeded digits. Because one is always measuring from the lower-left corner of the 100 km square, this ensures that a lower-precision grid reference is a square that contains all of the higher-precision references contained within it.
In addition to truncating references (on the right) when less precision is required, another powerful feature of USNG is the ability to omit (on the left) the Grid Zone Designation, and possibly even the 100 km Square Identification, when one or both of these are unambiguously understood; that is, when operating within a known regional or local area. For example:
Full USNG: 18S UJ 23371 06519 (world-wide unique reference to 1 meter precision)
Without Grid Zone Designation: UJ 2337 0651 (when regional area is understood; here to 10 meter precision)
Without 100 km Square Identification: 233 065 (when local area is understood; here to 100 meter precision)
Thus in practical usage, USNG references are typically very succinct and compact, making them convenient (and less error prone) for communication.
History
Rectangular, distance-based (Cartesian) coordinate systems have long been recognized for their practical utility for land measurement and geolocation over local areas. In the United States, the Public Land Survey System (PLSS), created in 1785 in order to survey land newly ceded to the nation, introduced a rectangular coordinate system to improve on the earlier metes-and-bounds survey basis used earlier in the original colonies. In the first half of the 20th century, State Plane Coordinate Systems (SPCS) brought the simplicity and convenience of Cartesian coordinates to state-level areas, providing high accuracy (low distortion) survey-grade coordinates for use primarily by state and local governments. (Both of these planar systems remain in use today for specialized purposes.)
Internationally, during the period between World Wars I and II, several European nations mapped their territory with national-scale grid systems optimized for the geography of each country, such as the Ordnance Survey National Grid (British National Grid). Near the end of World War II, the Universal Transverse Mercator (UTM) coordinate system extended this grid concept around the globe, dividing it into 60 zones of 6 degrees longitude each. Circa 1949, the US further refined UTM for ease of use (and combined it with the Universal Polar Stereographic system covering polar areas) to create the Military Grid Reference System (MGRS), which remains the geocoordinate standard used across the militaries of NATO counties.
In the 1990s, a US grass-roots citizen effort led to the Public X-Y Mapping Project, a not-for-profit organization created specifically to promote the acceptance of a national grid for the United States. The Public XY Mapping Project developed the idea, conducting informal tests and surveys to determine which coordinate reference system best met the requirements of national consistency and ease of human use. Based on its findings, a standard based on the MGRS was adopted and brought to the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC) in 1998. After an iterative review process and public comment period, the USNG was adopted by the FGDC as standard FGDC-STD-011-2001 in December 2001.
Since then, the USNG has seen gradual but steadily increasing adoption both in formal standards and in practical use and applications, in public safety and in other fields.
Advantages over latitude/longitude
Users encountering the USNG (or similar grid reference systems) sometimes question why they are used instead of latitude and longitude coordinates, with which they may be more familiar. Proponents note that, in contrast to latitude and longitude coordinates, the USNG provides:
Coordinate units that represent actual distances on the ground
Equal distance units in both east–west and north–south directions
An intuitive sense of scale and distance, across a local area
Simpler distance calculation (by Pythagorean Theorem, rather than spherical trigonometry)
A single unambiguous representation instead of the three (3) formats of latitude and longitude, each in widespread use, and each having punctuation sub-variants:
degrees-minutes-seconds (DMS): N 38°53'23.3", W 077°02'11.6"
degrees-minutes-decimal minutes (DMM or DDM): 38°53.388' N, 077°02.193' W
decimal degrees (DDD or DD): 38.88980°, -077.03654°
This format ambiguity has led to confusion with potentially serious consequences, particularly in emergency situations.
References comprising only alphanumeric characters (letters and positive numbers). (Spaces have no significance but are allowed for readability.)
No negative numbers, hemisphere indicators (+, -, N, S, E, W), decimal points (.), or special symbols (°, ′, ″, :).
A familiar "read right then up" convention of XY Cartesian coordinates.
An explicit convention for shortening references (at two levels) when the local or regional area is already unambiguously known.
A reference to a definite grid square with variable, explicit precision (size), rather than to a point with (usually) unspecified precision implicit in number of decimal places.
All of the above also lead to USNG references being typically very succinct and compact, with flexibility to convey precise location information in a short sequence of characters that is easily relayed in writing or by voice.
Limitations
As with any projection that seeks to represent the curved Earth as a flat surface, distortions and tradeoffs will inevitably occur. The USNG attempts to balance and minimize these, consistent with making the grid as useful as possible for its intended purpose of efficiently communicating practical locations. Since the UTM (the basis for USNG) is not a single projection, but rather a set of 6-degree longitudinal zones, there will necessarily be a local discontinuity along each of the 'seam' meridians between zones. However, every point continues to have a well-defined, unique geoaddress, and there are established conventions to minimize confusion near zone intersections. The six-degree zone width of UTM strikes a balance between the frequency of these discontinuities versus distortion of scale, which would increase unacceptably if the zones were made wider. (UTM further uses a 0.9996 scale factor at the central meridian, growing to 1.0000 at two meridians offset from the center, and increasing toward the zone boundaries, so as to minimize the overall effect of scale distortion across the zone breadth.) The USNG is not intended for surveying, for which a higher-precision (lower-distortion) coordinate system such as SPCS would be more appropriate. Also, since USNG north-south grid lines are (by design) a fixed distance from the zone central meridian, only the central meridian itself will be aligned with "true north". Other grid lines establish a local "grid north", which will differ from true north by a small amount. The amount of this deviation, which is indicated on USGS topographic maps, is typically much less than the magnetic declination (between true north and magnetic north), and is small enough that it can be disregarded in most land navigation situations.
Adoption and current applications
Standards
Since its adoption as a national standard in 2001, the USNG has itself been incorporated into standards and operating procedures of other organizations:
In 2011, the US Government's National Search and Rescue Committee (NSARC) released Version 1.0 of the Land Search and Rescue Addendum to the National Search and Rescue Supplement to the International Aeronautical and Maritime Search and Rescue Manual. This document specifies the US National Grid as the primary standard coordinate reference system to be used for all land-based search and rescue (SAR) activities in the US.
In 2015, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) issued FEMA Directive 092–5, "Use of the United States National Grid (USNG)":
"POLICY STATEMENT: FEMA will use the United States National Grid (USNG) as its standard geographic reference system for land-based operations and will encourage use of the USNG among whole community partners."
A number of state and local Emergency Management agencies have also adopted the USNG for their operations.
Other organizations including the National Fire Protection Association (NFPA) and the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) have incorporated the USNG into specific standards issued by those organizations.
Gridded maps
The utility of almost every large or medium scale map (paper or electronic) can be greatly enhanced by having an overlaid coordinate grid. The USNG provides such a grid that is universal, interoperable, non-proprietary, works across all jurisdictions, and can readily be used with GPS receivers and other location service applications.
In addition to providing a convenient means to identify and communicate specific locations (points and areas), an overlaid USNG grid also provides an orientation, and—because it is distance based—a scale of distance that is present across the map.
USGS topographic maps have for decades been published with 1000-meter UTM tick marks in the map collar, and sometimes with full grid lines across the map. Recent editions of these maps (those referenced to the North American datum of 1983, or NAD83) are compatible with USNG, and current editions also contain a standard USNG information box in the collar which identifies the GZD(s) (Grid Zone Designator(s) and the 100 km Grid Square ID(s) covering the area of the particular map. USNG can now be found on various pre-printed and custom-printed maps available for purchase, or generated from various mapping software packages.
Software applications
A growing number of software applications incorporate or refer to the US National Grid. See the External Links section below for links to some of these, including The National Map (USGS). These applications include conventional mapping applications with overlaid USNG grid and/or coordinate readouts, and several 'you-are-here' mobile applications which give the user's current USNG coordinates, such as USNGapp.org and FindMeSAR.com.
Mission Manager, the most widely used incident management software tool for first responders, integrates the USNG in its functionality.
Search and rescue (SAR)
As noted above under Standards, since 2011 the USNG has been designated by the US Government's National Search and Rescue Committee (NSARC) as the primary coordinate reference system to be used for all land-based search and rescue (SAR) activities in the US. (Latitude and longitude [DMM variant] may be used as the secondary system for land responders; especially when coordinating with air and sea based responders who may use it as their primary system, and USNG as secondary.)
The National Association for Search and Rescue (NASAR) is moving its education and certification testing programming towards USNG. Other organizations such as the National Alliance for Public Safety GIS (NAPSG) also provide USNG SAR training.
FEMA Urban Search and Rescue (USAR) task forces including Florida Task Force 4 (FL-TF4) and Iowa Task Force 1 (IA-TF1) have incorporated the USNG into their training and operations.
Emergency Location Marker (ELM)
Responders are often faced with significant geolocation issues when a responding to an emergency without a street address. This is particularly true in the recreational trail environment:
34% of U.S. response calls go to a location without a street address – recreational trails are a leading category.
Trails with location signs typically employ an approach unique to that park or trail system, and
Locally unique marking systems have no value to responders unless those locations are readily available via dispatch and response systems.
In response to these issues, in 2009, a project funded by the nonprofit SharedGeo and University of Minnesota/Minnesota Department of Transportation Local Operational Research Assistance (OPERA) grant program got underway which had the following objectives:
Develop a standardized Emergency Location Marker (ELM) which can be used anywhere in the nation in a variety of scenarios,
Align the marking system with established federal and state cartographic and signage standards,
Ensure the format leverages GPS instead of requiring constant updating of Computer Aided Dispatch (CAD) systems,
Use a consistent approach which over time will become instantly recognizable by the public, and
Involve multiple stakeholders during development to ensure a "Best Practices" outcome.
After three years of field research and vetting by multiple focus groups of trail users, responders, and geospatial experts, a design based on USNG was adopted.
This format, which can be used anywhere in the United States, was originally offered in three sizes to conform to federal, state and local signage standards:
6" x 9" (15 cm x 23 cm) -- for non-motorized trails
9" x 12" (23 cm x 30 cm) -- for motorized trails
12" x 12" (30 cm x 30 cm) -- for trail heads and huts
In the years since introduction, the USNG ELM program now includes vertical ELM versions for breakaway scenarios (e.g. mountain bike trails), ELM information signs, ELM stickers to retrofit trail posts, and corresponding apps such as USNGapp.org.
USNG ELM implementations can be found in Minnesota, Florida, Georgia, Hawaii, Michigan, and other states.
First responders
The USNG can increase the effectiveness of all types of emergency response, ranging from missing persons searches to off-road medical responses. In Lake County MN, with 900 miles of recreational trails, dispatchers and first responders have been provided the tools and training to use USNG as their primary means of geo-location. The goal of this education for responders and the public is to "Take the 'Search' out of 'Search and Rescue.'"
In addition to ELM signs, notices at trailheads encourage hikers and off-road vehicle operators to "Download this USNG App" on their cell phones. Trail maps including USNG grid lines allow responders to interpolate locations from 911 callers who give their coordinates from ELMs or GPS apps. Cell phones also provide responders the opportunity to counsel lost or injured persons to determine their location by downloading USNG apps on the spot. This saves time and effort for responders and patients alike who are not on roads or addressed locations. When multiple teams of responders are working in close vicinity, such as during woods searches for lost individuals, communicating with USNG allows them to truncate their coordinate string to eight digits, giving their location within 10 meters without the use of decimals, special symbols or unit descriptors, and intuitively estimate the distance and direction between teams for better coordination.
Emergency management
Emergency managers coordinate response to and recovery from all types of natural hazards and man-made threats. In large scale events, where responders may be imported from many jurisdictions, coordination of geo-location formats is mandatory. The USNG is used to reduce confusion and improve efficiency in response to wildfires, floods and hurricanes and other events.
As noted above, In 2015, the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA) issued FEMA Directive 092–5, "Use of the United States National Grid (USNG)":"POLICY STATEMENT: FEMA will use the United States National Grid (USNG) as its standard geographic reference system for land-based operations and will encourage use of the USNG among whole community partners." "Lessons learned from several large-scale disasters within the past three decades highlight the need for a common, geographic reference system in order to anticipate resource requirements, facilitate decision-making, and accurately deploy resources. ... Decision support tools that apply the USNG enable emergency managers to locate positions and identify areas of interest or operations where traditional references (i.e., landmarks or street signs) may be destroyed, damaged, or missing due to the effects of a disaster."The USNG is also seen as a tool for enhancing situational awareness and facilitating a common operating picture in emergency scenarios.
The Department of Defense also has recognized the role of the civil USNG standard for the Armed Forces in support of homeland security and homeland defense.
Asset identification and mapping
Organizations such as public utilities, transportation departments, emergency responders, and others own or rely upon fixed, field-based assets which they need to track, inventory, maintain, and locate efficiently when needed. Examples include fire hydrants, overhead utility poles, storm drains, roadside signs, and many others.
Assigning unique identifiers is a common method for identifying and referencing particular assets. A strategically assigned asset identifier can include location information, thereby assuring both that the name is unique and that the location of the asset is always known. The USNG offers a method to locate any place or any object in the world with a brief alphanumeric code, which can be shortened depending on the known service area, and enhanced with a prefix code to identify the type of asset. Organizations have successfully fielded this type of USNG-based asset naming recently:"The Mohawk Valley Water Authority serves 40,000 customers in the Greater Utica Area in Central New York. We have 700+ miles of pipe, 28 storage tanks, 21 pump stations, and numerous fire hydrants. We communicate hydrant status information internally and with many fire departments. We need to name these items meaningfully. We have tried several naming conventions—both sequential and hierarchical—with confusing and disappointing results. We converted to USNG asset naming and have used this successfully for over 4 years!" -- Elisabetta T. DeGeronimo, Watershed/GIS Coordinator at Mohawk Valley Water Authority, Utica, New York
--
"Hundreds of thousands of roadside assets—culverts, drains, signs on ground mounts, signs on overhead support structures, signs on span wires, and guide rails—are found along the routes maintained by the New York State Department of Transportation. In the past, the existence of these assets was only recorded in construction plans and the minds and memories of dedicated career staff. Our new asset naming convention, based upon the U.S. National Grid, benefits the entire department and particularly the field forces." -- Mary Susan Knauss, Senior Transportation Analyst, Office of Transportation Management, New York State Department of Transportation, Albany, New York These and other contributors at Florida State University and elsewhere have collaborated to produce a manual to guide GIS users and others through the practical steps of naming assets using the USNG.
Recreation and other uses
There has been a concerted outreach to educate the public in the uses and advantages of USNG. Sharing USNG maps and apps with friends and families encourages them to keep each other informed of their locations when traveling off-road (i.e., in wilderness or on the water) for work or recreation. In addition, USNG can be used to mark and communicate locations in busy or remote urban areas, including where to meet friends in a wooded park, locating a car in a mall parking lot, or requesting help inside a large warehouse or business complex. One doesn't even need compass directions.
Scientific research fieldwork can also benefit.
Future direction and initiatives
The USNG has seen steady but gradually increasing adoption and use since the standard was approved in 2001. Formal adoption by other standards bodies has taken place, while practical adoption in actual use has been more uneven in achieving its full potential. In 2018, the USNG Institute (UGNGI) was established "to study and report on USNG implementation efforts taking place across the United States" , as was a USNG Implementation Working Group (USNG IWG) to help assist and coordinate implementation efforts.
Further adoption of USNG for public safety and the Emergency Location Marker (ELM) system may depend in part on greater coordination of USNG adoption at Public Safety Answering Points (PSAPs, or 911 centers), in their procedures and Computer-Aided-Dispatch (CAD) systems. Currently such implementations, being generally under local control, have been more fragmented than some national adoption initiatives.
Proponents of the USNG envision many other ways in which it could play roles in improving safety, convenience, and quality of life.
See also
Cartesian coordinate system
Grid reference
Ordnance Survey National Grid (British National Grid)
Irish national grid reference system
Spatial Reference System
List of National Coordinate Reference Systems
Universal Transverse Mercator coordinate system (UTM)
Military Grid Reference System (MGRS)
Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC)
Public Land Survey System (PLSS)
State Plane Coordinate System (SPCS)
References
Further reading
A Quick Guide to Using USNG Coordinates (MapTools)
How to Read US National Grid (USNG) Coordinates (FGDC/NGA)
How to Read USNG Spatial Addresses (FGDC)
A Quick Guide to the USNG (NAPSG via USNG Center)
United States National Grid Standard (FGDC-STD-011-2001) (FGDC, official standard)
FEMA Directive 092-5: Use of the United States National Grid (USNG) (FEMA policy directive)
Implementation Guide to the USNG (NAPSG)
Emergency Location Marker (ELM) system (USNG Florida on Medium)
Hikers, Know Your Grid! (USNG Florida on Medium)
911 Caller Location Solutions (USNG Florida on Medium)
Why PSAPs Should Be Using The U.S. National Grid To Find 911 Callers (Kova Corp)
An Introduction to Standards-Based GIT and the US National Grid
Instructions for GIS Asset Naming Using the U.S. National Grid (USNG)
External links
General information sites about the USNG:
U.S. National Grid Information Center
USNG home page at the Federal Geographic Data Committee (FGDC)
USNG resources at the NAPSG Foundation
USNG resources at ESRI
USNG Florida
USNG Iowa
USNG resources at Florida Division of Emergency Management
USNG resources at Minnesota Geospatial Information Office
USNG resources at Dakota County (MN)
USNG resources at Clinton County (OH)
Online mapping and coordinate conversion sites:
USNGapp.org and FindMeSAR.com (mobile applications that give the user's current coordinates, e.g., for relay on calls for help)
GISsurfer (a general purpose web map with a USNG overlay and more)
GISsurfer: USNG and MGRS Coordinates (documentation, including "Why are USNG coordinates important?")
NAPSG Situational Awareness Viewer (select Grid Overlay button in toolbar for USNG)
The National Map Viewer (USGS; set coordinate display to USNG)
NOAA/NWS Enhanced Data Display (EDD) (with USNG coordinate display enabled)
Utility to convert latitude and longitude to USNG (NOAA/NGS)
Programmer resource: JavaScript utility for converting between lat/long and MGRS/USNG
Emergency Location Marker (ELM) system brief introductory videos:
Cook & Lake Counties (MN) (49s)
Cobb County (GA):
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4232526 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Solar%20tracker | Solar tracker | A solar tracker is a device that orients a payload toward the Sun. Payloads are usually solar panels, parabolic troughs, Fresnel reflectors, lenses, or the mirrors of a heliostat.
For flat-panel photovoltaic systems, trackers are used to minimize the angle of incidence between the incoming sunlight and a photovoltaic panel, sometimes known as the cosine error. Reducing this angle increases the amount of energy produced from a fixed amount of installed power-generating capacity. In standard photovoltaic applications, it was predicted in 2008–2009 that trackers could be used in at least 85% of commercial installations greater than one megawatt from 2009 to 2012.
As the pricing, reliability, and performance of single-axis trackers have improved, the systems have been installed in an increasing percentage of utility-scale projects. According to data from WoodMackenzie/GTM Research, global solar tracker shipments hit a record 14.5 gigawatts in 2017. This represents growth of 32 percent year-over-year, with similar or greater growth projected as large-scale solar deployment accelerates.
In concentrator photovoltaics (CPV) and concentrated solar power (CSP) applications, trackers are used to enable the optical components in the CPV and CSP systems. The optics in concentrated solar applications accept the direct component of sunlight light and therefore must be oriented appropriately to collect energy. Tracking systems are found in all concentrator applications because such systems collect the sun's energy with maximum efficiency when the optical axis is aligned with incident solar radiation.
Basic concept
Sunlight has two components: the "direct beam" that carries about 90% of the solar energy and the "diffuse sunlight" that carries the remainder – the diffuse portion is the blue sky on a clear day, and is a larger proportion of the total on cloudy days. As the majority of the energy is in the direct beam, maximizing collection requires the Sun to be visible to the panels for as long as possible. However, on cloudier days the ratio of direct vs. diffuse light can be as low as 60:40 or even lower.
The energy contributed by the direct beam drops off with the cosine of the angle between the incoming light and the panel. In addition, the reflectance (averaged across all polarizations) is approximately constant for angles of incidence up to around 50°, beyond which reflectance increases rapidly.
Notes
For example, trackers that have accuracies of ± 5° can capture more than 99.6% of the energy delivered by the direct beam plus 100% of the diffuse light. As a result, high-accuracy tracking is not typically used in non-concentrating PV applications.
The purpose of a tracking mechanism is to follow the Sun as it moves across the sky. In the following sections, in which each of the main factors are described in a little more detail, the complex path of the Sun is simplified by considering its daily east-west motion separately from its yearly north-south variation with the seasons of the year.
Solar energy intercepted
The amount of solar energy available for collection from the direct beam is the amount of light intercepted by the panel. This is given by the area of the panel multiplied by the cosine of the angle of incidence of the direct beam (see illustration above). Put another way, the energy intercepted is equivalent to the area of the shadow cast by the panel onto a surface perpendicular to the direct beam.
This cosine relationship is very closely related to the observation formalized in 1760 by Lambert's cosine law. This describes that the observed brightness of an object is proportional to the cosine of the angle of incidence of the light illuminating it.
Reflective losses
Not all of the intercepted light is transmitted into the panel; some is reflected at its surface. The amount reflected depends on both the refractive index of the surface material and the angle of incidence of the incoming light. The amount reflected also differs depending on the polarization of the incoming light. Incoming sunlight is a mixture of all polarizations, with equal amounts in direct sunlight. Averaged over all polarizations, the reflective losses are approximately constant at angles of incidence up to around 50°, beyond which they increase rapidly. See for example the accompanying graph, appropriate for glass.
Solar panels are often coated with an anti-reflective coating, which is one or more thin layers of substances with refractive indices intermediate between those of silicon and air. This causes destructive interference in the reflected light, diminishing the reflected amount. Photovoltaic manufacturers have been working to decrease reflectance with improved anti-reflective coatings and with textured glass.
Daily east-west motion of the Sun
The Sun travels through 360° east to west per day, but from the perspective of any fixed location, the visible portion is 180° degrees during an average half-day period (more in summer, slightly less in spring and fall, and significantly less in winter). Local horizon effects reduce this somewhat, making the effective motion about 150°. A solar panel in a fixed orientation between the dawn and sunset extremes will see a motion of 75° to either side, and thus, according to the table above, will lose over 75% of the energy in the morning and evening. Rotating the panels to the east and west can help recapture those losses. A tracker that only attempts to compensate for the east-west movement of the Sun is known as a single-axis tracker.
Seasonal north-south motion of the Sun
Due to the tilt of the Earth's axis, the Sun also moves through 46° north and south during a year. The same set of panels set at the midpoint between the two local extremes will thus see the Sun move 23° on either side. Thus according to the above table, an optimally aligned single-axis tracker (see polar aligned tracker below) will only lose 8.3% at the summer and winter seasonal extremes, or around 5% averaged over a year. Conversely a vertically- or horizontally-aligned single-axis tracker will lose considerably more as a result of these seasonal variations in the Sun's path. For example, a vertical tracker at a site at 60° latitude will lose up to 40% of the available energy in summer, while a horizontal tracker located at 25° latitude will lose up to 33% in winter.
A tracker that accounts for both the daily and seasonal motions is known as a dual-axis tracker. Generally speaking, the losses due to seasonal angle changes are complicated by changes in the length of the day, increasing collection in the summer in northern or southern latitudes. This biases collection toward the summer, so if the panels are tilted closer to the average summer angles, the total yearly losses are reduced compared to a system tilted at the spring/fall equinox angle (which is the same as the site's latitude).
There is considerable argument within the industry about whether the small difference in yearly collection between single- and dual-axis trackers makes the added complexity of a two-axis tracker worthwhile. A recent review of actual production statistics from southern Ontario suggested the difference was about 4% in total, which was far less than the added costs of the dual-axis systems. This compares unfavorably with the 24–32% improvement between a fixed-array and single-axis tracker.
Other factors
Clouds
The above models assume uniform likelihood of cloud cover at different times of day or year. In different climate zones cloud cover can vary with seasons, affecting the averaged performance figures described above. Alternatively, for example in an area where cloud cover on average builds up during the day, there can be particular benefits in collecting morning sun.
Atmosphere
The distance that sunlight travels through the atmosphere increases as the sun approaches the horizon, as the sunlight travels diagonally through the atmosphere. As the path length through the atmosphere increases, the solar intensity reaching the collector decreases. This increasing path length is referred to as the air mass (AM) or air mass coefficient, where AM0 is at the top of the atmosphere, AM1 refers to the direct vertical path down to sea-level with Sun overhead, and AM greater than 1 refers to diagonal paths as the Sun approaches the horizon.
Even though the sun may not feel particularly hot in the early mornings or during the winter months, the diagonal path through the atmosphere has a less than expected impact on the solar intensity. Even when the sun is only 15° above the horizon the solar intensity can be around 60% of its maximum value, around 50% at 10° and 25% at only 5° above the horizon. Therefore, if trackers can follow the Sun from horizon to horizon, then their solar panels can collect a significant amount of energy.
Solar cell efficiency
The underlying power conversion efficiency of a photovoltaic cell has a major influence on the end result, regardless of whether tracking is employed.
Temperature
Photovoltaic solar cell efficiency decreases with increasing temperature, at the rate of about 0.4%/°C. For example, there is about 20% higher efficiency at 10 °C in early morning or winter than at 60 °C in the heat of the day or summer. Therefore, trackers can deliver additional benefit by collecting early morning and winter energy when the cells are operating at their highest efficiency.
Summary
Trackers for concentrating collectors must employ high-accuracy tracking so as to keep the collector at the focus point.
Trackers for non-concentrating flat-panel do not need high accuracy tracking:
low power loss: under 10% loss even at 25° misalignment
reflectance consistent even to around 50° misalignment
diffuse sunlight contributes 10% independent of orientation, and a larger proportion on cloudy days.
The benefits of tracking non-concentrating flat-panel collectors flow from the following:
power loss rises rapidly beyond about 30° misalignment
significant power is available even when the Sun is very close to the horizon, e.g. around 60% of full power at 15° above the horizon, around 50% at 10°, and even 25% at only 5° above the horizon – of particular relevance at high latitudes and/or during the winter months
photovoltaic panels are around 20% more efficient in the cool of the early mornings as compared with during the heat of the day; similarly, they are more efficient in winter than summer – and effectively capturing early morning and winter sun requires tracking.
Types of solar collector
Solar collectors may be non-concentrating flat-panels, usually photovoltaic or hot-water, or concentrating systems, of a variety of types.
Solar collector mounting systems may be fixed (manually aligned) or tracking. Different types of solar collector and their location (latitude) require different types of tracking mechanism. Tracking systems may be configured as a fixed collector / moving mirror – a Heliostat – or as a moving collector
Non-tracking fixed mount
Residential and small-capacity commercial or industrial rooftop solar panels and solar water heater panels are usually fixed, often flush-mounted on an appropriately-facing pitched roof. Advantages of fixed mounts over trackers include the following:
Mechanical Advantages: Simple to manufacture, lower installation and maintenance costs.
Wind-loading: it is easier and cheaper to provision a sturdy mount; all mounts other than fixed flush-mounted panels must be carefully designed having regard to wind loading due to greater exposure.
Indirect light: approximately 10% of the incident solar radiation is diffuse light, available at any angle of misalignment with the Sun.
Tolerance to misalignment: effective collection area for a flat panel is relatively insensitive to quite high levels of misalignment with the Sun – see the table and diagram at Basic concept section above – for example even a 25° misalignment reduces the direct solar energy collected by less than 10%.
Fixed mounts are usually used in conjunction with non-concentrating systems; however, an important class of non-tracking concentrating collectors, of particular value in the third world, are portable solar cookers. These use relatively low levels of concentration, typically around 2 to 8 Suns and are manually aligned.
Trackers
Even though a fixed flat panel can be set to collect a high proportion of available noon-time energy, significant power is also available in the early mornings and late afternoons when the misalignment with a fixed panel becomes too excessive to collect a reasonable proportion of the available energy. For example, even when the Sun is only 10° above the horizon, the available energy can be around half the noon-time energy levels (or even greater depending on latitude, season, and atmospheric conditions).
Thus the primary benefit of a tracking system is to collect solar energy for the longest period of the day, and with the most accurate alignment as the Sun's position shifts with the seasons.
In addition, the greater the level of concentration employed, the more important accurate tracking becomes, because the proportion of energy derived from direct radiation is higher, and the region where that concentrated energy is focused becomes smaller.
Fixed collector / moving mirror
Many collectors cannot be moved, such as high-temperature collectors where the energy is recovered as hot liquid or gas (e.g. steam). Other examples include direct heating and lighting of buildings and fixed in-built solar cookers, such as Scheffler reflectors. In such cases it is necessary to employ a moving mirror so that, regardless of where the Sun is positioned in the sky, the Sun's rays are redirected onto the collector.
Due to the complicated motion of the Sun across the sky, and the level of precision required to correctly aim the Sun's rays onto the target, a heliostat mirror generally employs a dual axis tracking system, with at least one axis mechanized. In different applications, mirrors may be flat or concave.
Moving collector
Trackers can be grouped into classes by the number and orientation of the tracker's axes. Compared to a fixed mount, a single-axis tracker increases annual output by approximately 30%, and a dual axis tracker an additional 10–20%.
Photovoltaic trackers can be classified into two types: standard photovoltaic (PV) trackers and concentrated photovoltaic (CPV) trackers. Each of these tracker types can be further categorized by the number and orientation of their axes, their actuation architecture and drive type, their intended applications, their vertical supports, and foundation.
Floating mount
Floating islands of solar panels are being installed on reservoirs and lakes in the Netherlands, China, the UK, and Japan. The sun-tracking system controlling the direction of the panels operates automatically according to the time of year, changing position by means of ropes attached to buoys.
Floating ground mount
Solar trackers can be built using a "floating" foundation, which sits on the ground without the need for invasive concrete foundations. Instead of placing the tracker on concrete foundations, the tracker is placed on a gravel pan that can be filled with a variety of materials, such as sand or gravel, to secure the tracker to the ground. These "floating" trackers can sustain the same wind load as a traditional fixed mounted tracker. The use of floating trackers increases the number of potential sites for commercial solar projects since they can be placed on top of capped landfills or in areas where excavated foundations are not feasible.
Motion-Free Optical Tracking
Solar trackers can be built without the need for mechanical tracking equipment. These are called motion-free optical tracking. Renkube pioneered a glass based design to redirect light using motion-free optical tracking technology.
Non-concentrating photovoltaic (PV) trackers
Photovoltaic panels accept both direct and diffuse light from the sky. The panels on standard photovoltaic trackers gather both the available direct and diffuse light. The tracking functionality in standard photovoltaic trackers is used to minimize the angle of incidence between incoming light and the photovoltaic panel. This increases the amount of energy gathered from the direct component of the incoming sunlight.
The physics behind standard photovoltaic trackers works with all standard photovoltaic module technologies. These include all types of crystalline silicon panels (either mono-Si, or multi-Si) and all types of thin film panels (amorphous silicon, CdTe, CIGS, microcrystalline).
Concentrator photovoltaic (CPV) trackers
The optics in CPV modules accept the direct component of the incoming light and therefore must be oriented appropriately to maximize the energy collected. In low-concentration applications, a portion of the diffuse light from the sky can also be captured. The tracking functionality in CPV modules is used to orient the optics such that the incoming light is focused to a photovoltaic collector.
CPV modules that concentrate in one dimension must be tracked normal to the Sun in one axis. CPV modules that concentrate in two dimensions must be tracked normal to the Sun in two axes.
Accuracy requirements
The physics behind CPV optics requires that tracking accuracy increases as the system's concentration ratio increases. However, for a given concentration, nonimaging optics provide the widest possible acceptance angles, which may be used to reduce tracking accuracy.
In typical high-concentration systems, tracking accuracy must be in the ± 0.1° range to deliver approximately 90% of the rated power output. In low concentration systems, tracking accuracy must be in the ± 2.0° range to deliver 90% of the rated power output. As a result, high-accuracy tracking systems are typical.
Technologies supported
Concentrated photovoltaic trackers are used with refractive and reflective concentrator systems. There are a range of emerging photovoltaic cell technologies used in these systems. These range from conventional, crystalline-silicon-based photovoltaic receivers to germanium-based triple junction receivers.
Single-axis trackers
Single-axis trackers have one degree of freedom that acts as an axis of rotation. The axis of rotation of single-axis trackers is typically aligned along a true North meridian. It is possible to align them in any cardinal direction with advanced tracking algorithms. There are several common implementations of single-axis trackers. These include horizontal single-axis trackers (HSAT), horizontal single-axis tracker with tilted modules (HTSAT), vertical single-axis trackers (VSAT), tilted single-axis trackers (TSAT), and polar-aligned single-axis trackers (PSAT). The orientation of the module with respect to the tracker axis is important when modeling performance.
Horizontal
Horizontal single axis tracker (HSAT)
The axis of rotation for a horizontal single-axis tracker is horizontal with respect to the ground. The posts at either end of the axis of rotation of a horizontal single-axis tracker can be shared between trackers to lower the installation cost. This type of solar tracker is most appropriate for low-latitude regions. Field layouts with horizontal single-axis trackers are very flexible. The simple geometry means that keeping all of the axes of rotation parallel to one another is all that is required for appropriately positioning the trackers with respect to one another. Appropriate spacing can maximize the ratio of energy production to cost, with this being dependent upon local terrain and shading conditions and the time-of-day value of the energy produced. Backtracking is one means of computing the disposition of panels. Horizontal trackers typically have the face of the module oriented parallel to the axis of rotation. As a module tracks, it sweeps a cylinder that is rotationally symmetric around the axis of rotation. In single-axis horizontal trackers, a long horizontal tube is supported on bearings mounted upon pylons or frames. The axis of the tube is on a north-south line. Panels are mounted upon the tube, and the tube will rotate on its axis to track the apparent motion of the Sun through the day.
Horizontal single-axis tracker with tilted modules (HTSAT)
In HSATs, the modules are mounted flat at 0°, while in HTSATs, the modules are installed at a certain tilt. It works on the same principle as HSAT, keeping the axis of tube horizontal in north-south line and rotates the solar modules from east to west throughout the day. These trackers are usually suitable in high-latitude locations but do not take as much land space as vertical single-axis trackers (VSATs). Therefore, it brings the advantages of VSATs in a horizontal tracker and minimizes the overall cost of solar project.
Vertical
Vertical single-axis tracker (VSAT)
The axis of rotation for vertical single-axis trackers is vertical with respect to the ground. These trackers rotate from east to west over the course of the day. Such trackers are more effective at high latitudes than horizontal single-axis trackers are. Field layouts must consider shading to avoid unnecessary energy losses and to optimize land use. Als, optimization for dense packing is limited due to the nature of the shading over the course of a year. Vertical single-axis trackers typically have the face of the module oriented at an angle with respect to the axis of rotation. As a module tracks, it sweeps a cone that is rotationally symmetric around the axis of rotation.
Tilted
Tilted single-axis tracker (TSAT)
All trackers with axes of rotation between horizontal and vertical are considered tilted single-axis trackers. Tracker tilt angles are often limited to reduce the wind profile and decrease the elevated end height. With backtracking, they can be packed without shading perpendicular to their axes of rotation at any density. However, the packing parallel to their axes of rotation is limited by the tilt angle and the latitude. Tilted single-axis trackers typically have the face of the module oriented parallel to the axis of rotation. As a module tracks, it sweeps a cylinder that is rotationally symmetric around the axis of rotation.
Dual-axis trackers
Dual-axis trackers have two degrees of freedom that act as axes of rotation. These axes are typically normal to one another. The axis that is fixed with respect to the ground can be considered a primary axis. The axis that is referenced to the primary axis can be considered a secondary axis. There are several common implementations of dual-axis trackers. They are classified by the orientation of their primary axes with respect to the ground. Two common implementations are tip-tilt dual-axis trackers (TTDAT) and azimuth-altitude dual-axis trackers (AADAT). The orientation of the module with respect to the tracker axis is important when modeling performance. Dual-axis trackers typically have modules oriented parallel to the secondary axis of rotation. Dual-axis trackers allow for optimum solar energy levels due to their ability to follow the Sun vertically and horizontally. No matter where the Sun is in the sky, dual-axis trackers are able to angle themselves to point directly at the Sun.
Tip-tilt
A tip-tilt dual-axis tracker (TTDAT) is so named because the panel array is mounted on the top of a pole. Normally the east-west movement is driven by rotating the array around the top of the pole. On top of the rotating bearing is a T- or H-shaped mechanism that provides vertical rotation of the panels and provides the main mounting points for the array. The posts at either end of the primary axis of rotation of a tip-tilt dual axis tracker can be shared between trackers to lower installation costs.
Other such TTDAT trackers have a horizontal primary axis and a dependent orthogonal axis. The vertical azimuthal axis is fixed. This allows for great flexibility of the payload connection to the ground mounted equipment because there is no twisting of the cabling around the pole.
Field layouts with tip-tilt dual-axis trackers are very flexible. The simple geometry means that keeping the axes of rotation parallel to one another is all that is required for appropriately positioning the trackers with respect to one another. Normally the trackers would have to be positioned at fairly low density to avoid one tracker casting a shadow on others when the Sun is low in the sky. Tip-tilt trackers can make up for this by tilting closer to horizontal to minimize up-Sun shading and therefore maximize the total power being collected.
The axes of rotation of many tip-tilt dual-axis trackers are typically aligned either along a true north meridian or an east-west line of latitude.
Given the unique capabilities of the tip-tilt configuration and the appropriate controller, totally-automatic tracking is possible for use on portable platforms. The orientation of the tracker is of no importance and can be placed as needed.
Azimuth-altitude
An azimuth-altitude (or alt-azimuth) dual axis tracker (AADAT) has its primary axis (the azimuth axis) vertical to the ground. The secondary axis, often called elevation axis, is then typically normal to the primary axis. They are similar to tip-tilt systems in operation, but they differ in the way the array is rotated for daily tracking. Instead of rotating the array around the top of the pole, AADAT systems can use a large ring mounted on the ground with the array mounted on a series of rollers. The main advantage of this arrangement is the weight of the array is distributed over a portion of the ring, as opposed to the single loading point of the pole in the TTDAT. This allows AADAT to support much larger arrays. Unlike the TTDAT, however, the AADAT system cannot be placed closer together than the diameter of the ring, which may reduce the system density, especially considering inter-tracker shading.
Construction and (Self-)Build
As described later, the economic balance between the costs of panels and trackers. The steep drop in cost for solar panels in the early 2010s made it more challenging to find a sensible solution. As can be seen in the attached media files, most constructions use industrial and/or heavy materials unsuitable for small or craft workshops. Even commercial offers may have rather unsuitable solutions (a big rock) for stabilization. For a small (amateur/enthusiast) construction, the criteria that must be met include economy, stability of end product against elemental hazards, ease of handling materials, and joinery.
Tracker type selection
The selection of tracker type is dependent on many factors including installation size, electric rates, government incentives, land constraints, latitude, and local weather.
Horizontal single-axis trackers are typically used for large distributed generation projects and utility scale projects. The combination of energy improvement, lower product cost, and lower installation complexity results in compelling economics in large deployments. In addition, the strong afternoon performance is particularly desirable for large grid-tied photovoltaic systems so that production will match the peak demand time. Horizontal single-axis trackers also add a substantial amount of productivity during the spring and summer seasons when the Sun is high in the sky. The inherent robustness of their supporting structure and the simplicity of the mechanism also result in high reliability which keeps maintenance costs low. Since the panels are horizontal, they can be compactly placed on the axle tube without danger of self-shading and are also readily accessible for cleaning.
A vertical-axis tracker pivots only about a vertical axle, with the panels at a fixed, adjustable, or tracked elevation angle. Such trackers with fixed or (seasonally) adjustable angles are suitable for high latitudes, where the apparent solar path is not especially high, but which leads to long days in summer, with the Sun traveling through a long arc.
Dual-axis trackers are typically used in smaller residential installations and locations with very high government feed in tariffs.
Multi-mirror concentrating PV
This device uses multiple mirrors in a horizontal plane to reflect sunlight upward to a high-temperature system requiring concentrated solar power. Structural problems and expense are greatly reduced since the mirrors are not significantly exposed to wind loads. Through the employment of a patented mechanism, only two drive systems are required for each device. Because of the configuration of the device, it is especially suited for use on flat roofs and at lower latitudes. The units illustrated each produce approximately 200 peak DC watts.
A multiple-mirror reflective system combined with a central power tower was employed at the Sierra SunTower, located in Lancaster, California. This generation plant, operated by eSolar, operated from 2009 to 2014. This system, which used multiple heliostats in a north-south alignment, used pre-fabricated parts and construction as a way of decreasing startup and operating costs.
Drive types
Active tracker
Active trackers use motors and gear trains to perform solar tracking. They can use microprocessors and sensors, date-and-time-based algorithms, or a combination of both to detect the position of the sun. To control and manage the movement of these massive structures, special slewing drives are designed and rigorously tested. The technologies used to direct the tracker are constantly evolving and recent developments at Google and Eternegy have included the use of wire-ropes and winches to replace some of the more costly and more fragile components.
Counter-rotating slewing drives sandwiching a fixed-angle support can be applied to create a "multi-axis" tracking method which eliminates rotation relative to longitudinal alignment. This method, if placed on a column or pillar, will generate more electricity than fixed PV, and its PV array will never rotate into a parking lot drive lane. It will also allow for maximum solar generation in virtually any parking lot lane/row orientation, including circular or curvilinear.
Active two-axis trackers are also used to orient heliostats – movable mirrors that reflect sunlight toward the absorber of a central power station. As each mirror in a large field will have an individual orientation, these are controlled programmatically through a central computer system, which also allows the system to be shut down when necessary.
Light-sensing trackers typically have two or more photosensors, such as photodiodes, configured differentially so that they output a null when receiving the same light flux. Mechanically, they should be omnidirectional (i.e. flat) and are aimed 90 degrees apart. This will cause the steepest part of their cosine transfer functions to balance at the steepest part, which translates into maximum sensitivity. For more information about controllers, see active daylighting.
Since the motors consume energy, one wants to use them only as necessary. So instead of a continuous motion, the heliostat is moved in discrete steps. Also, if the light is below some threshold, there would not be enough power generated to warrant reorientation. This is also true when there is not enough difference in light level from one direction to another, such as when clouds are passing overhead. Consideration must be made to keep the tracker from wasting energy during cloudy periods.
Passive tracker
The most common Passive trackers use a low-boiling-point compressed gas that is driven to one side or the other (by solar heat creating gas pressure) to cause the tracker to move in response to an imbalance. As this is an imprecise orientation, it is unsuitable for certain types of concentrating photovoltaic collectors but works fine for common PV panel types. These will have viscous dampers to prevent excessive motion in response to wind gusts. Shader/reflectors are used to reflect early morning sunlight to "wake up" the panel and tilt it toward the Sun, which can take some hours, depending on shading conditions. The time to do this can be greatly reduced by adding a self-releasing tiedown that positions the panel slightly past the zenith (so that the fluid does not have to overcome gravity) and using the tiedown in the evening. (A slack-pulling spring will prevent release in windy overnight conditions.)
A newly emerging type of passive tracker for photovoltaic solar panels uses a hologram behind stripes of photovoltaic cells so that sunlight passes through the transparent part of the module and reflects on the hologram. This allows sunlight to hit the cell from behind, thereby increasing the module's efficiency. Also, the panel does not have to move since the hologram always reflects sunlight from the correct angle towards the cells.
Manual tracking
In some developing nations, drives have been replaced by operators who adjust the trackers. This has the benefits of robustness, having staff available for maintenance, and creating employment for the population in the vicinity of the site.
Rotating buildings
In Freiburg im Breisgau, Germany, Rolf Disch built the Heliotrop in 1996, a residential building that is rotating with the sun and has an additional dual-axis photovoltaic sail on the roof. It produces four times the amount of energy the building consumes.
The Gemini house is a unique example of a vertical axis tracker. This cylindrical house in Austria (latitude above 45 degrees north) rotates in its entirety to track the Sun, with vertical solar panels mounted on one side of the building, rotating independently, allowing control of the natural heating from the Sun.
ReVolt House is a rotating, floating house designed by TU Delft students for the Solar Decathlon Europe competition in Madrid. The house was completed in September 2012. An opaque façade turns itself towards the Sun in summer to prevent the interior from heating up. In winter, a glass façade faces the Sun for passive solar heating of the house. Since the house is floating frictionlessly on water, rotating it does not require much energy.
Disadvantages
Trackers add cost and maintenance to the system – if they add 25% to the cost, and improve the output by 25%, then the same performance can be obtained by making the system 25% larger, eliminating the additional maintenance. Tracking was very cost effective in the past when photovoltaic modules were expensive compared to today. Because they were expensive, it was important to use tracking to minimize the number of panels used in a system with a given power output. But as panels get cheaper, the cost effectiveness of tracking vs using a greater number of panels decreases. However, in off-grid installations where batteries store power for overnight use, a tracking system reduces the hours that stored energy is used, thus requiring less battery capacity. As the batteries themselves are expensive (either traditional lead acid stationary cells or newer lithium ion batteries), their cost needs to be included in the cost analysis.
Tracking is also not suitable for typical residential rooftop photovoltaic installations. Since tracking requires that panels tilt or otherwise move, provisions must be made to allow this. This requires that panels be offset a significant distance from the roof, which requires expensive racking and increases wind load. Also, such a setup would not make for an aesthetically pleasing install on residential rooftops. Because of this (and the high cost of such a system), tracking is not used on residential rooftop installations, and is unlikely to ever be used in such installations. This is especially true as the cost of photovoltaic modules continues to decrease, which makes increasing the number of modules for more power the more cost-effective option. Tracking can (and sometimes is) used for residential ground mount installations, where greater freedom of movement is possible.
Tracking can also cause shading problems. As the panels move during the course of the day, it is possible that, if the panels are located too close to one another, they may shade one another due to profile angle effects. As an example, if one has several panels in a row from east to west, there will be no shading during solar noon, but in the afternoon, panels could be shaded by their west neighboring panel if they are sufficiently close. This means that panels must be spaced sufficiently far to prevent shading in systems with tracking, which can reduce the available power from a given area during the peak Sun hours. This is not a big problem if there is sufficient land area to widely space the panels. But it will reduce output during certain hours of the day (i.e. around solar noon) compared to a fixed array. Optimizing this problem with math is called backtracking.
Further, single-axis tracking systems are prone to becoming unstable at relatively modest wind speeds (galloping). This is due to the torsional instability of single-axis solar tracking systems. Anti-galloping measures such as automatic stowing and external dampers must be implemented.
See also
Air mass coefficient
Heliostat
Solar energy
Sun path
References
Solar energy
Tracking
Photovoltaics |
4235559 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/1991%20BA | 1991 BA | 1991 BA is a sub-kilometer asteroid, classified as near-Earth object of the Apollo group that was first observed by Spacewatch on 18 January 1991, and passed within 160,000 km (100,000 mi) of Earth. This is a little less than half the distance to the Moon. With a 5-hour observation arc the asteroid has a poorly constrained orbit and is considered lost. It could be a member of the Beta Taurids.
Description
1991 BA is approximately 5 to 10 meters (15 to 30 ft) in diameter and is listed on the Sentry Risk Table. It follows a highly eccentric (0.68), low-inclination (2.0°) orbit of 3.3 years duration, ranging between 0.71 and 3.7 AU from the Sun. 1991 BA was, at the time of its discovery, the smallest and closest confirmed asteroid outside of Earth's atmosphere. 1991 BA is too faint to be observed except during close approaches to Earth and is considered lost.
Possible impact
The asteroid has a very short 5-hour observation arc that makes future predictions of its position unreliable. Virtual clones of the asteroid that fit the uncertainty region in the known trajectory use to show a 1 in 290,000 chance that the asteroid could impact Earth on 2023 January 18. It is estimated that an impact would produce an upper atmosphere air burst equivalent to 16 kt TNT, roughly equal to Nagasaki's Fat Man. The asteroid would appear as a bright fireball and fragment in the air burst into smaller pieces that would hit the ground at terminal velocity producing a meteorite strewn field. Impacts of objects this size are estimated to occur approximately once a year. Asteroid was an object of similar size that was discovered less than a day before its impact on Earth on October 7, 2008 and produced a fireball and meteorite strewn field in the Sudan. The 18 January 2023 virtual impactor did not occur.
There is a 1 in a million chance of impacting Earth on 19 January 2114.
References
External links
IAUC 5172: 1991 BA; 4U 0115+63; 1990c – (Central Bureau for Astronomical Telegrams 1991 January 21)
Minor planet object articles (unnumbered)
19910118
Lost minor planets
Potential impact events caused by near-Earth objects
19910118 |
4237868 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Winged%20sun | Winged sun | The winged sun is a solar symbol associated with divinity, royalty, and power in the Ancient Near East (Egypt, Mesopotamia, Anatolia, and Persia).
Ancient Egypt
In ancient Egypt, the symbol is attested from the Old Kingdom (Sneferu, 26th century BC ), often flanked on either side with a uraeus.
Behdety
In early Egyptian religion, the symbol Behdety represented Horus of Edfu, later identified with Ra-Horakhty. It is sometimes depicted on the neck of Apis, the bull of Ptah. As time passed (according to interpretation) all of the subordinated gods of Egypt were considered to be aspects of the sun god, including Khepri. The name "Behdety" means the inhabitant of Behdet.
He was the sky god of the region called Behdet in the Nile basin.
His image was first found in the inscription on a comb's body, as a winged solar panel. The period of the comb is about 3000 BC. Such winged solar panels were later found in the funeral picture of Pharaoh Sahure of the fifth dynasty. Behdety is seen as the protector of Pharaoh. On both sides of his picture are seen the Uraeus, which a symbol for the cobra headed goddess Wadjet.
He resisted the intense heat of Egyptian sun with his two wings.
Mesopotamia
From roughly 2000 BCE, the symbol also appears in Mesopotamia. It appears in reliefs with Assyrian rulers as a symbol for royalty, transcribed into Latin as (literally, "his own self, the Sun", i.e. "His Majesty").
Iran
In Zoroastrian Persia, the symbol of the winged sun became part of the iconography of the Faravahar, the symbol of the divine power and royal glory in Persian culture.
Israel and Judah
From around the 8th century BC, the winged solar disk appears on Hebrew seals connected to the royal house of the Kingdom of Judah. Many of these are seals and jar handles from Hezekiah's reign, together with the inscription l'melekh ("belonging to the king"). Typically, Hezekiah's royal seals feature two downward-pointing wings and six rays emanating from the central sun disk, and some are flanked on either side with the Egyptian ankh ("key of life") symbol. Prior to this, there are examples from the seals of servants of king Ahaz and of king Uzziah.
Compare also Malachi 4:2, referring to a winged "Sun of righteousness",
Greece
The winged sun is conventionally depicted as the knob of the caduceus, the staff of Hermes.
Modern use
Various groups such as Freemasonry, Rosicrucianism, Thelema, Theosophy, and Unity Church have also used it. The symbol was used on the cover of Charles Taze Russell's textbook series Studies in the Scriptures beginning with the 1911 editions.
The winged sun symbol is also cited by proponents of the pseudoscientific Nibiru cataclysm.
Secular use
A winged sun is used in the heraldry of the North America Trade Directory.
Variations of the symbol are used as a trademark logo on vehicles produced by the Chrysler Corporation, Mini, Bentley Motors, Lagonda (Aston Martin) and Harley Davidson.
Since WW2, military aircraft of the United States have carried the insignia of a circle with stripes extending from each side like wings. Whether this is coincidental or some symbolic resemblance was intended is unknown. A five-pointed star is inscribed within the circle.
Regarding its video game usage, the symbol has become a common motif in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, most notably featured on title screens displaying the main character, as well as a stylized version appearing as a symbol for religious mechanics and buildings in Civilization VI, among others.
See also
Winged genie
References
Bibliography
R. Mayer, Opificius, Die geflügelte Sonne, Himmels- und Regendarstellungen im Alten Vorderasien, UF 16 (1984) 189-236.
D. Parayre, Carchemish entre Anatolie et Syrie à travers l'image du disque solaire ailé (ca. 1800-717 av. J.-C.), Hethitica 8 (1987) 319-360.
D. Parayre, Les cachets ouest-sémitiques à travers l'image du disque solaire ailé, Syria 67 (1990) 269-314.
External links
Relief Depicting Gilgamesh Between Two Bull-Men Supporting a Winged Sun Disk, Kapara palace, Tell Halaf.
Ancient Egyptian symbols
Egyptian hieroglyphs
Heraldic charges
Middle Eastern mythology
Religious symbols
Sun myths
Symbols |
4240766 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Upland%20and%20lowland | Upland and lowland | Upland and lowland are conditional descriptions of a plain based on elevation above sea level. In studies of the ecology of freshwater rivers, habitats are classified as upland or lowland.
Definitions
Upland and lowland are portions of plain that are conditionally categorized by their elevation above the sea level. Lowlands are usually no higher than , while uplands are somewhere around to . On unusual occasions, certain lowlands such as the Caspian Depression lie below sea level.
Upland habitats are cold, clear and rocky whose rivers are fast-flowing in mountainous areas; lowland habitats are warm with slow-flowing rivers found in relatively flat lowland areas, with water that is frequently colored by sediment and organic matter.
These classifications overlap with the geological definitions of "upland" and "lowland". In geology an "upland" is generally considered to be land that is at a higher elevation than the alluvial plain or stream terrace, which are considered to be "lowlands". The term "bottomland" refers to low-lying alluvial land near a river.
Much freshwater fish and invertebrate communities around the world show a pattern of specialization into upland or lowland river habitats. Classifying rivers and streams as upland or lowland is important in freshwater ecology, as the two types of river habitat are very different, and usually support very different populations of fish and invertebrate species.
Uplands
In freshwater ecology, upland rivers and streams are the fast-flowing rivers and streams that drain elevated or mountainous country, often onto broad alluvial plains (where they become lowland rivers). However, elevation is not the sole determinant of whether a river is upland or lowland. Arguably the most important determinants are those of stream power and stream gradient. Rivers with a course that drops rapidly in elevation will have faster water flow and higher stream power or "force of water". This in turn produces the other characteristics of an upland river—an incised course, a river bed dominated by bedrock and coarse sediments, a riffle and pool structure and cooler water temperatures. Rivers with a course that drops in elevation very slowly will have slower water flow and lower force. This in turn produces the other characteristics of a lowland river—a meandering course lacking rapids, a river bed dominated by fine sediments and higher water temperatures. Lowland rivers tend to carry more suspended sediment and organic matter as well, but some lowland rivers have periods of high water clarity in seasonal low-flow periods.
The generally clear, cool, fast-flowing waters and bedrock and coarse sediment beds of upland rivers encourage fish species with limited temperature tolerances, high oxygen needs, strong swimming ability and specialised reproductive strategies to prevent eggs or larvae being swept away. These characteristics also encourage invertebrate species with limited temperature tolerances, high oxygen needs and ecologies revolving around coarse sediments and interstices or "gaps" between those coarse sediments.
The term "upland" is also used in wetland ecology, where "upland" plants indicate an area that is not a wetland.
Lowlands
The generally more turbid, warm, slow-flowing waters and fine sediment beds of lowland rivers encourage fish species with broad temperature tolerances and greater tolerances to low oxygen levels, and life history and breeding strategies adapted to these and other traits of lowland rivers. These characteristics also encourage invertebrate species with broad temperature tolerances and greater tolerances to low oxygen levels and ecologies revolving around fine sediments or alternative habitats such as submerged woody debris ("snags") or submergent macrophytes ("water weed").
Lowland alluvial plains
American Bottom—flood plain of the Mississippi River in Southern Illinois
Bois Brule Bottom
Bottomland hardwood forest—deciduous hardwood forest found in broad lowland floodplains of the United States
See also
Freshwater biology
Highland
Mountain river
River reclamation
Riparian zone
References
Freshwater ecology
Water and the environment
Riparian zone
Rivers |
4241261 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SolarWorld | SolarWorld | SolarWorld is a German company dedicated to the manufacture and marketing photovoltaic products worldwide by integrating all components of the solar value chain, from feedstock (polysilicon) to module production, from trade with solar panels to the promotion and construction of turn-key solar power systems. The group controls the development of solar power technologies at all levels in-house.
SolarWorld AG is listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange, the Photovoltaik Global 30 Index and the ÖkoDAX.
In May 2017, wholly owned subsidiary SolarWorld Americas, based in Oregon, US, joined fellow American solar panel manufacturer Suniva in its Section 201 trade action to request relief from what it claimed are unfair practices from solar panel importers to the United States. The requested remedy was a tariff on imported solar panels. FirstSolar, the largest US solar panel manufacturer, joined the action on October 10, 2017, while the Solar Energy Industry Association (the major American solar trade association) was leading the opposition to the tariff requests.
The company filed for insolvency of its German subsidiaries alone in May 2017. While subsidiary SolarWorld America was not itself insolvent, it subsequently was put up for sale or other action to help resolve the debts of the German parent company. In the beginning of August 2017, leaving all liabilities behind, all the assets alone were acquired by the original Founder of SolarWorld Ag, Frank Asbeck along with Qatar Solar Technologies (QSTec) to form SolarWorld Industries GmbH, thus becoming completely debt-free and the only Solar Manufacturer in the world with zero-debt and zero liability. According to the Press Release issued by SolarWorld Industries GmbH, it will now have just 500 employees, drastically down from earlier, thus cutting costs. According to the company, the company will continue its transition to mono PERC-only cells production. The new entity, SolarWorld Industries GmbH takes over the production facilities and distribution businesses in Europe, Asia and Africa. "We plan to start with a production capacity of 700 MW, which can also be boosted to the previous capacity of more than 1GW. At launch, the company will have 515 employees. Of these, more than 12% are employed in research and more than 5% are trainees,” he said adding that the new company had already signed a 25MW order, without giving further details.
The newly founded SolarWorld Industries GmbH filed for insolvency again in March 2018. In June 2018 the regional public TV station MDR reported, that most of SolarWorlds production workers have been transferred into other forms of employment and production will be closed by end of September.
More than two years after the insolvency, the Solarworld factory in Freiberg gets a new opportunity. The buildings are sold for around twelve million euros to the new owner. The Swiss company Meyer Burger wants to produce solar cells in Freiberg and Bitterfeld-Wolfen. The production is expected to start in the first half of 2021.
History
SolarWorld was founded in 1988 as individual company by engineer and chief executive officer Frank Asbeck, and engaged in projects to produce renewable energy. In 1998, these activities were transferred to the newly founded SolarWorld AG, which went public on 11 August 1999.
In 2006 Shell divested its crystalline silicon solar business activities to SolarWorld.
SolarWorld has received German Sustainability Award in the category of "Germany’s Most Sustainable Production 2008".
Since 2010 the company has a joint venture with Qatar Solar Technologies (QSTec). Due to a financial crisis, Solarworld was restructured and QSTec became the largest shareholder in 2013.
In 2012, Washington, D.C. based law firm, Wiley Rein, was hacked. According to Bloomberg News, the hackers wanted information about the German manufacturer SolarWorld. SolarWorld's computers were hacked about the same time.
In 2016, SolarWorld started ‘gradually’ migrating cell production to PERC and five busbar technology. At the core of SolarWorld's high-tech strategy is migrating all solar cell production to PERC (Passivated Emitter Rear Cell) technology and moving from three busbars to five in order to boost conversion efficiencies and limit capital expenditures at the same time as these changes are relatively simple and low-risk ramps, compared to entire new cell concepts such as heterojunction, according to Neuhaus at PV CellTech. SolarWorld's PV CellTech presentation also revealed that average efficiencies of PERC cells in high-volume production had achieved 21.4%, resulting in PV module power distribution average of 303.3W. SolarWorld has also developed a bi-facial version of its current PERC cell that has entered production and more capacity is expected to be allocated to bi-facial cells and modules.
On May 10, 2017, SolarWorld AG filed for insolvency citing “ongoing price distortions” and “no longer a positive forecast for the future”. According to Mr. Piepenburg, the administrator, it is now of major importance to maintain business operations as smoothly as possible. In May 2016, a lawsuit brought by U.S. silicon supplier Hemlock was reported as "threatening the continued existence of the company" with damage claims up to $770 million.
The German facilities of SolarWorld were purchased by its founder Frank Asbeck in conjunction with Qatar Solar Technologies. Three days later, an appeals court upheld the verdict in the Hemlock case, resulting in SolarWorld AG being responsible to pay the damage claims.
SolarWorld Americas, the largest U.S. crystalline-silicon solar manufacturer for more than 42 years, is continuing to implement efficiencies and working with external partners to position the company for stabilization and a continued competitive position in the marketplace. Solarworld USA spokesman Ben Santarris said the company is sticking with the assumption of continuing normal operations, and continued to work with suppliers and customers to determine what the right size of the company should be going forward.
On August 18, 2017, however, news came that the German administrator of SolarWorld AG's bankruptcy had put SolarWorld Americas up for sale, though no potential buyers had been identified at that time. The US-based subsidiary, which reportedly produced half of "SolarWorld" branded modules worldwide, was put "in something of a limbo" by the bankruptcy and a spokesperson stated the company had entered an "open ended" mergers and acquisitions process.
Facilities
Within the SolarWorld Group many specialized workers were employed in the enterprise's units located in Bonn (headquarters), Freiberg, and Hillsboro, Oregon (US headquarters).
The business also had a manufacturing facility in Hillsboro, Oregon, purchased in 2007 from Japan's Komatsu Group.
In 2008, it was the largest solar cell manufacturing facility in North America. That factory was taken over by SunPower in October 2018, as part of SunPower's acquisition of SolarWorld Americas.
In 2013 SolarWorld took over production from Bosch Solar Energy in Arnstadt and continued to employ about 800 workers.
SolarWorld AG has sales offices in Germany, Spain, US, South Africa, UK and Singapore.
Grid parity
In 2010, SolarWorld called for lowering Germany's lucrative solar feed-in tariffs and its CEO, Frank Asbeck, supported a 10 percent to 15 percent drop for the incentives. In 2011, utility-scale solar power stations achieved grid parity for domestic consumers as guaranteed tariffs fell below retail electricity prices. Feed-in tariffs continued to drop well below the gross domestic electricity price. Since the beginning of 2012, newly installed, small rooftop PV system also have achieved grid parity. The current policy is to revise tariffs on a monthly basis reducing them by 1 percent unless actual deployment does not meet agreed upon targets. As of spring 2015, tariffs ranged from 8 to 12 euro-cents per kilowatt-hour depending on the PV system's size.
Vehicles
SolarWorld is the main sponsor of the SolarWorld No. 1 solar car developed by the FH Bochum SolarCar Team.
On 19 November 2008, SolarWorld AG announced a bid to buy German automaker Opel from General Motors. The bid was for 1 billion Euro, 250 million being paid in cash and 750 million being paid in bank credits. SolarWorld specified conditions such as Opel should be split from General Motors. Solarworld announced that it intends to create the first electric automotive OEM. However, GM rejected the bid saying "Opel is not for sale".
References
Further reading
European consortium mulls mega solar factory to outshine Chinese, Deutsche Welle website, May 20, 2014.
External links
SolarWorld USA website
Solar energy in Germany
Photovoltaics manufacturers
Manufacturing companies of Germany
Manufacturing companies established in 1988
Companies based in Bonn
German brands
Companies listed on the Frankfurt Stock Exchange |
4242030 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Freedom%20of%20navigation | Freedom of navigation | Freedom of navigation (FON) is a principle of law of the sea that ships flying the flag of any sovereign state shall not suffer interference from other states, apart from the exceptions provided for in international law. In the realm of international law, it has been defined as “freedom of movement for vessels, freedom to enter ports and to make use of plant and docks, to load and unload goods and to transport goods and passengers". This right is now also codified as Article 87(1)a of the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea.
History
Development as a legal concept
Freedom of navigation as a legal and normative concept has developed only relatively recently. Until the early modern period, international maritime law was governed by customs that differed across countries’ legal systems and were only sometimes codified, as for example in the 14th-century Crown of Aragon Consulate of the Sea (; ; also known in English as the Customs of the Sea). These customs were developed and employed in local jurisprudence, often cases in prize courts regarding the capture of goods on the high seas by privateers. Under the Consolato customs (and other contemporary codes), "enemy goods can be captured on neutral ships and neutral goods are free on board enemy's ships." This established a framework under which neutral shipping was not inviolable in time of war, meaning navies were free to attack ships of any nation on the open seas, however the goods belonging to neutral countries on those ships, even if they were enemy ships, were not to be taken. This legal custom, which hereafter will be referred to as the consolato rule, was long observed by England (later Great Britain), France, and Spain, as major naval powers.
New theories about how to run the maritime world, however, started to emerge as time went on and maritime trade, travel, and conquest by the great European naval forces began to stretch beyond of European waterways.Two main schools of thought emerged in the 17th century. The first, championed most famously by John Selden, promoted the concept of mare clausum, which held that states could limit or even close off seas or maritime areas to access by any or all foreign ships, just as areas of land could be owned by a state, limiting foreign activity there. Other notable supporters of this idea included John Burroughs and William Welwod. In the larger geopolitical context, mare clausum was backed by the major naval and colonial powers of the day, including Spain and Portugal. As these powers extended their reach to the New World and across Africa and Asia, they wished to consolidate control over their new empires and access to trade and resources there by denying other countries access to the sea routes leading to these areas. By quite literally closing off access to the seas using their naval muscle, these states would profit handsomely from the growing maritime trade routes and foreign colonies.
Meanwhile, the Dutch Republic, the dominant European trade carrier, championed a different rule, known as mare liberum (free seas), summarized as "a free ship [makes] free goods." This meant that even enemy goods, always excepting contraband, were inviolate in neutral bottoms (i.e. hulls), making neutral ships off-limits for attack on the high seas. For the Dutch Republic, this was essential in order to secure the safety and viability of their extensive trade network. This concept was coined by Hugo Grotius, a Dutch jurist and a founding father of international law. Grotius advocated for a shift in maritime norms that would make the high seas free for transport and shipping, regardless of the country of origin of the ship. This would represent not only a change in law, but also a fundamental shift in the perception of the maritime realm as something not to be owned, as land is, but rather as a shared resource. Behind this concept is a liberal view of sovereign equality, in which all states have equal access to the high seas, and a view of an interdependent world connected by the sea.
As the dominant naval powers of Spain and Portugal weakened, and international trade increased, Grotius’ mare liberum concept would come to be the accepted custom governing sovereignty at sea.
From concept to custom to law
Freedom of navigation came to be embodied in bilateral treaties to become part of what would today be called international law. The earliest example of such a treaty is one concluded between King Henry IV of France and the Ottoman Porte in 1609, followed in 1612 by one between the Porte and the Dutch Republic. Once the Eighty Years' War between Spain and the Dutch Republic had ended during which Spain defended their claim of sovereignty over the oceans against the Dutch claim of "freedom of the high seas," as developed in Hugo Grotius' Mare Liberum, the two concluded a treaty of commerce in which "free ship, free goods" was enshrined. The Dutch Republic subsequently concluded bilateral treaties with most other European countries, containing the "free ship, free goods" principle, sometimes resorting to the use of force to obtain that concession, as against England in the Treaty of Breda (1667) and again in the Treaty of Westminster (1674). England, however, also held fast to the consolato rule in relations with other countries, as did France, until in 1744 it relented and extended the privilege to the neutral Dutch.
The Dutch eventually established a web of bilateral treaties that extended the privilege of "freedom of navigation" to their ships through much of Europe. During the many 18th-century European wars they remained neutral, serving all belligerents with their shipping services. Great Britain, in particular, chafed under the arrangement, as it was the dominant naval power in the 18th century, and the Dutch privilege undermined the effectiveness of its naval blockades. Matters came to a head during the War of the American Revolution, when the Dutch, shielded by the 1674 Anglo-Dutch treaty, supplied both the Americans and the French. The British made extensive use of their "right of search" of Dutch ships, which led to the Affair of Fielding and Bylandt by which a British naval squadron, in peacetime, arrested a Dutch convoy despite the objections of its Dutch naval escort.
Soon afterward, the British abrogated the 1674 treaty, which might have meant the death of the "free ship, free goods" doctrine, but Empress Catherine II of Russia had taken up the torch around the same time. In March 1780, she published a manifesto in which (among other things) she claimed the "free ship, free goods" principle, as a fundamental right of neutral states. To defend that principle, she formed the First League of Armed Neutrality to which the Dutch adhered at the end of the year (which sparked the Fourth Anglo-Dutch War). The principles from her manifesto were soon adhered to by the members of the League and by France, Spain and the new American Republic also (even if, as belligerents, they could not become members of the League).
Nevertheless, as a principle of international law (apart from treaty law) "free ship, free goods" was soon again overturned by the practice of both sides in the French Revolutionary Wars of the turn of the 19th century. For instance, in the jurisprudence of the American courts of the early 19th-century, the consolato principle was universally applied in cases not covered by treaties. On the other hand, the US government made it a steadfast practice to enshrine the "free ship, free goods" principle in the treaties of amity and commerce it concluded with other countries (starting with the 1778 one with France and the 1782 one with the Dutch Republic).
In other words, the American view (following the British practice) was that at that time consolato was customary international law, which, however, could be superseded by treaty law on a bilateral basis. The US, however, earnestly strove for the substitution of consolato by "free ship" in customary law also.
That state of affairs came about when Britain finally gave up its resistance to the principles, first formulated by Empress Catherine in 1780, and acquiesced in the 1856 Paris Declaration Respecting Maritime Law, which enshrined "free ship makes free goods" and rejecting "enemy ship makes enemy goods." The Declaration was signed by the major powers (except the US) and it was soon adhered to by most other powers. The new rule (a combination of the "best" parts of Consolato and "free ship") became that a "neutral flag covers enemy's goods (except contraband); neutral goods are not liable to seizure under the enemy's flag."
While the concept as a whole became accepted international custom and law, the practice and implementation of freedom of navigation would during these years be developed through local jurisprudence and political decision-making. While local jurisprudence differed, usually a consensus view emerged over time. A key example is the issue of territorial waters. While there was agreement that a certain expanse of the seas from a state's shorelines would be under stricter state control than the high seas, the exact distance this control would extend from the shoreline was debated. However, over time through local governance and jurisprudence a general agreement emerged that territorial waters would extend three leagues or three miles from the shoreline. This norm- and custom-formation continued for centuries within the frame of mare liberum.
The UNCLOS and the modern understanding of freedom of navigation in international law
This culminated in 1982, when freedom of navigation became part of the broader body of laws of the sea currently embodied in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS). Article 87 of this convention explicitly codifies this concept, stating “The high seas are open to all States, whether coastal or land-locked” and lists “freedom of navigation” as the first of several rights for all states on the high seas. The drafting of UNCLOS clearly was in line with Grotius’ ideas of sovereign equality and international interdependence. All states were given a voice in the drafting of the convention, and the convention only came into effect with the consent and ratification of the party states. Implementation of UNCLOS connects the party states together across the shared space of the high seas.
Freedom of navigation as formulated in the UNCLOS, was a trade-off between the developed and the developing world. Where the developed world had an interest in maximizing their freedom to sail and explore the seas, the developing world wanted to protect their offshore resources and their independence. In other words, it was a conflict between understanding the seas through the principle of mare liberum that asserts the oceans to be open to all nations or mare clausum that advocates that the seas should be under the sovereignty of a state. The UNCLOS upheld freedom of navigation on the high seas but also invented different zones of sovereignty that limited the rules of foreign ships in these waters with concepts like internal waters and exclusive economic zones (EEZ). Additionally, navigation rights of warships were guaranteed on the high seas with complete immunity from the jurisdiction of any state other than the flag state.
The UNCLOS introduced a number of legal concepts that allowed freedom of navigation within and outside of the maritime jurisdictions of countries. These are right of innocent passage, right of transit passage, right of archipelagic sea lanes passage and freedom of the high seas. The right of innocent passage allows ships to travel in other countries' territorial seas if it is not prejudicial to the peace, good order or security of the coastal state. However, some countries like China requires warships to attain prior authorization before they enter Chinese national waters. Transit passage refers to passage through straits used for international navigation between one part of the high seas or an EEZ and another with more relaxed criteria for passage. The passage must be continuous and expeditious transit of the strait. With archipelagic sea lanes passage archipelagic states may provide sea-lanes and air-routes passage though their waters where ships can enjoy freedom of navigation.
American adherence to freedom of navigation
As previously noted, American advocacy for freedom of navigation extends as far back as a 1778 treaty with France, enshrining freedom of navigation as a legal custom on a bilateral level. In the 20th century, Woodrow Wilson advocated for freedom of navigation, making it Point 2 of his Fourteen Points (see Freedom of the seas). The US has not ratified the 1982 UNCLOS treaty, but it is a party to the preceding 1958 Convention on the High Seas. Despite its failure to formally ratify UNCLOS, the US now considers UNCLOS to be part of customary international law, and has committed to adhering to and enforcing the law.
Freedom of Navigation Operations (FONOPs)
Freedom of Navigation Operations (FONOPs) are closely linked to the concept of freedom of navigation, and in particular to the enforcement of relevant international law and customs regarding freedom of navigation. The drafting of UNCLOS was driven in part by states' concerns that strong national maritime interests could lead to excessive maritime claims over coastal seas, which could threaten freedom of navigation. FONOPs are a method of enforcing UNCLOS and avoiding these negative outcomes by reinforcing freedom of navigation through practice, using ships to sail through all areas of the sea permitted under UNCLOS, and in particular those areas that states have attempted to close off to free navigation as defined under UNCLOS and international law and custom.
FONOPs are a modern operational reinforcement of a norm that has been strengthening for nearly four hundred years. Freedom of navigation has been thoroughly practiced and refined, and ultimately codified and accepted as international law under UNCLOS, in a legal process that was inclusive and consent-based. FONOPs are outgrowths of this development of international law, based on sovereign equality and international interdependence.
United States Freedom of Navigation Program
The US Department of Defense defines FONOPs as "operational challenges against excessive maritime claims" through which "the United States demonstrates its resistance to excessive maritime claims". The United States has an institutionalized FONOPs program called the Freedom of Navigation Program, which undertakes many FONOPs around the world every year. The program publishes annual reports chronicling each year's FONOPs, and a listing of relevant foreign maritime claims.
The United States Freedom of Navigation (FON) Program was formally established under President Jimmy Carter in 1979. The program was reaffirmed by the administration of Ronald Reagan in 1983 in its Ocean Policy Statement. The Program has continued under all successive administrations since.
The FON Program challenges what the U.S. considers to be excessive territorial claims on the world's oceans and airspace. The position of the United States is that all nations must obey the international law of the sea, as codified in the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea. The U.S. Department of State writes:
U.S. armed forces have conducted FONOPs in areas claimed by other countries but considered by the U.S. to be international waters, such as naval operations in the Gulf of Sidra in the 1980s; as well as in strategically important straits (such as Gibraltar, Hormuz, and Malacca).
One of the notable operations conducted as innocent passage and part of Freedom of Navigation program was performed by , during which, on February 12, 1988, she was "nudged" by the Soviet frigate Bezzavetnyy in an attempt to divert the vessel out of Soviet territorial waters.
Freedom of navigation and warships
A particular characteristic of many FONOPs, and in particular American FONOPs, is that they are undertaken by vessels of a national navy. This brings to the fore a hot debate over whether freedom of navigation extends to military vessels. Most notably, Chinese legal scholars and government policymakers argue that the right of freedom of navigation given to civilian vessels in foreign waters does not apply to military vessels. Because of this, some countries including China require warships to attain prior authorization before they enter their national waters. Given such understandings of freedom of navigation, US and other country's FONOPs undertaken with military vessels could be viewed as provocative or even bellicose. Other scholars have pointed out that the UNCLOS does not specifically mention freedom of navigation for warships outside of the high seas but that it has been practice between states to accept military activities at least within the EEZ.
Innocent passage versus FONOPs
The concept of innocent passage in international law and under UNCLOS refers as noted earlier to the right of a vessel to pass through the territorial waters of a foreign state under certain conditions. While related to FONOPs in that both innocent passages and FONOPs involve vessels traversing seas claimed by a foreign state, they differ in that if a vessel claims it is traversing under innocent passage terms, it implies a concession that the vessel is in fact traveling through territorial waters of another state. Both innocent passage and FONOPs challenge a state's imposed limitations on freedom of navigation in a maritime area, but innocent passage accepts that the area is within a state's waters, while a FONOP can be used to challenge a state's territorial claim to an area.
Criticism
There are many critics of FONOPs, with a wide breadth of criticisms regarding the efficacy, bellicosity, and legality of FONOPs. One group of critics argues that FONOPs are unnecessarily risky and lead to escalation. Chinese government responses to American FONOPs in the South China Sea fall under this category of criticism. A second group of critics argue that FONOPs are unnecessary, and that states should focus on the protection of their own ships rather than using ship operations to check other states' maritime claims. Still other critics argue that FONOPs are ineffective at their goal of limiting other states' maritime claims.
FONOPs in the South China Sea
According to BBC correspondents, the Spratly Islands in the South China Sea could potentially be a major geopolitical flashpoint. China has used land reclamation to expand disputed islands, and has built runways on them.
U.S. FONOPS in the South China Sea
In 2013 and 2014, the US conducted FONOPs in areas claimed by China, Taiwan, Malaysia, the Philippines, and Vietnam. During the presidency of the Obama administration there was an increase in attention on China and Asia in general leading to the pivot to Asia from 2012. This also was reflected in an increased number of FONOPs in the South China Sea. In 2015 the Obama administration authorized two FONOPs and three FONOPs were authorized in 2016. Several of the FONOPs that got most media coverage were the missions conducted by the guided-missile destroyers in 2015; and and in 2016.
Beginning in October 2015, as part of the U.S. FON Operations (FONOP) program, U.S. Navy ships have patrolled near the artificial islands China has created in the disputed Spratly and Paracel archipelagos to underscore the U.S.'s position that the artificial islands constructed by China are located in international waters. The sailed within 12 nautical miles of reclaimed-land islands (the so-called "Great Wall of Sand") in October 2015. The USS Curtis Wilbur sailed within of Triton Island in the Paracel Islands in January 2016, and the came within 12 nautical miles of Fiery Cross Reef in the Spratly Islands in May 2016.
In spring 2017, the Trump administration stopped FONOPs in the South China Sea hoping China might increase its pressure on North Korea over its missile launch tests. In summer 2017, it restarted FONOPs. After restarting the FONOPs in the South China Sea the Trump administration increased the number of FONOPs authorized. Trump authorized six FONOPs in 2017 and five operations in 2018. 2019 saw a record high number of U.S. FONOPs in South China Sea with a total of nine operations conducted.
May 2018 also saw the first FONOP with the participation of two U.S. warships. On May 27, 2018, a US Navy , , and a , , sailed within 12 nautical miles of the Paracel Islands, which are controlled by China. The FONOP came shortly after the Pentagon announced that it would disinvite the Chinese navy for its Rim of the Pacific (RIMPAC) exercise off Hawaii the same summer, which is a US flagship naval exercise. The FONOP was called a "serious infringement on China’s sovereignty" by China's defense ministry.
On September 30, 2018, the was undertaking a FONOP near the Gaven and Johnson Reefs in the Spratly Islands when the , approached to within of the Decatur, in what the US Navy termed "a series of increasingly aggressive maneuvers" This forced the Decatur to maneuver to avoid a collision.
In December 2018 China deployed naval forces to warn off the while it made a FONOP around the Paracel Islands without approval of the Chinese government. "The Southern Theatre Command organized navy and air forces to monitor the US vessel, and gave warning for it to leave", a statement by the Southern Theatre Command said in response to the U.S. FONOP. The Statement also called for the U.S. to properly manage its navy and air fleet to avoid miscalculations.
The U.S. FONOPs continued into 2020. The U.S. Navy conducted its first FONOP in 2020 on January 25 by sending the littoral combat ship past Chinese claims in the Spratly Islands. During the FONOP China sent two fighter-bombers scrambling overhead to intimidate the Montgomery, according to Chinese state media. The January 25 patrol was officially aimed at China, Taiwan, and Vietnam. Specifically, the Navy challenged the notion that innocent passage through claimed territorial waters requires previous notification.
On April 28, 2020, the Japan-based guided-missile destroyer conducted a freedom of navigation operation in the vicinity of Paracel Island chain off Vietnam. The PLA's Southern Theatre Command claimed its forces forced the USS Barry out of disputed Spratly Islands waters; a US Navy spokesman denied that Barry had been ejected by the PLA and stated "all interactions that occurred were in accordance with maritime norms". The operation was carried out during the COVID-19 pandemic which have seen accusation from both Beijing and Washington accusing each other of trying to take more military control over the South China Sea during the pandemic. The operation done by the USS Barry was followed up the next day on April 29 with a FONOP around the Spratly Islands done by . This was the first time the U.S. conducted two FONOPs within two days. The back-to-back missions has been seen by some as a new U.S. strategy under the Pentagon slogan "strategic predictability, operation unpredictability." After the FONOP by USS Bunker Hill a spokesperson from the United States Seventh Fleet responsible for carrying out the operations said: "The United States will fly, sail, and operate wherever international law allows—regardless of the location of excessive maritime claims and regardless of current events."
FONOPs done by non-U.S actors in South China Sea
In 2015 Australia confirmed that it had been conducting "routine" FONOP flights over disputed territory in the South China Sea.
In May 2017, Japan sent an and two destroyers on a three-month tour of the South China Sea, where they conducted exercises with an . This was Japan's biggest foray into the region since the Second World War.
In April 2018, three Australian naval vessels transited the South China Sea towards Vietnam and, along the way, met a 'robust' challenge from the Chinese navy.
At the June 2018 Shangri-La Dialogue, ministers from France and the UK jointly announced that their ships would sail through the South China Sea to continue to uphold the collective right to freedom of navigation. The announcement came after the UK and France announced separately in July 2017 and May 2018 respectively that they would increase their involvement in the South China Sea.
The Royal Navy also conducted what is believed to be a FONOP with , a 22,000-ton amphibious transport dock, in late August 2018 in the waters near the Paracel Islands. The FONOP conducted by Albion was unlike many U.S. FONOPs a traditional assertion of freedom of navigation on the high seas. Beijing denounced Albion mission because it sailed within its territorial waters around the Paracels without seeking prior approval. A spokesperson from the Royal Navy said that "HMS Albion exercised her rights for freedom of navigation in full compliance with international law and norms." The British FONOP has been seen by commentators as a signal that the Royal Navy is likely to be a regular party patrolling the South China Sea.
Chinese view of FONOPs in South China Sea
China views FONOPs in the South China Sea, and particularly those undertaken with military vessels, as provocative, as they assert that freedom of navigation does not apply to military vessels within foreign EEZ's and territorial waters. China also claims that FONOPs violate Chinese law, including the "Law of the People's Republic of China on the Territorial Sea and the Contiguous Zone" and the "Declaration of the Government of the People's Republic of China on the Baselines of the Territorial Sea". The Chinese Navy and Coast Guard often shadow foreign vessels on FONOPs.
See also
Innocent passage
Code for Unplanned Encounters at Sea
Danube River Conference of 1948
FONOPs during the Obama Administration
Freedoms of the air
Notes
1.The exception of contraband implies that the inviolability of neutral ships was never absolute, as the principle still admitted the right of visit and search by belligerents.
References
Sources
External links
Maritime Security: Freedom of Navigation (FON) Operations
Freedom of Navigation
Law of the sea |
4243069 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/10199%20Chariklo | 10199 Chariklo | 10199 Chariklo is the largest confirmed centaur (small body of the outer Solar System). It orbits the Sun between Saturn and Uranus, grazing the orbit of Uranus. On 26 March 2014, astronomers announced the discovery of two rings (nicknamed Oiapoque and Chuí after the rivers that define Brazil's borders) around Chariklo by observing a stellar occultation, making it the first minor planet known to have rings.
A photometric study in 2001 was unable to find a definite period of rotation. Infrared observations of Chariklo indicate the presence of water ice, which may in fact be located in its rings. It is possibly a dwarf planet.
Discovery and naming
Chariklo was discovered by James V. Scotti of the Spacewatch program on February 15, 1997. Chariklo is named after the nymph Chariclo (), the wife of Chiron and the daughter of Apollo.
A symbol derived from that for 2060 Chiron, , was devised in the late 1990s by German astrologer Robert von Heeren. It replaces Chiron's K with a C for Chariklo.
Size and shape
Chariklo is currently the largest known centaur, with a volume-equivalent diameter of about 250 km. Its shape is probably elongated with dimensions 287.6 × 270.4 × 198.2 km. is likely to be the second largest with and 2060 Chiron is likely to be the third largest with .
Orbit
Centaurs originated in the Kuiper belt and are in dynamically unstable orbits that will lead to ejection from the Solar System, an impact with a planet or the Sun, or transition into a short-period comet.
The orbit of Chariklo is more stable than those of Nessus, Chiron, and Pholus. Chariklo lies within 0.09 AU of the 4:3 resonance of Uranus and is estimated to have a relatively long orbital half-life of about 10.3 Myr. Orbital simulations of twenty clones of Chariklo suggest that Chariklo will not start to regularly come within 3 AU (450 Gm) of Uranus for about thirty thousand years.
During the perihelic oppositions of 2003–04, Chariklo had an apparent magnitude of +17.7. , Chariklo was 14.8 AU from the Sun.
Rings
A stellar occultation in 2013 revealed that Chariklo has two rings with radii 386 and 400 km and widths of about 6.9 km and 0.12 km respectively. The rings are approximately 14 km apart. This makes Chariklo the smallest known object to have rings. These rings are consistent with an edge-on orientation in 2008, which can explain Chariklo's dimming before 2008 and brightening since. Nonetheless, the elongated shape of Chariklo explains most of the brightness variability resulting in darker rings than previously determined. Furthermore, the rings can explain the gradual disappearance of the water-ice features in Chariklo's spectrum before 2008 and their reappearance thereafter if the water ice is in Chariklo's rings.
The existence of a ring system around a minor planet was unexpected because it had been thought that rings could only be stable around much more massive bodies. Ring systems around minor bodies had not previously been discovered despite the search for them through direct imaging and stellar occultation techniques. Chariklo's rings should disperse over a period of at most a few million years, so either they are very young, or they are actively contained by shepherd moons with a mass comparable to that of the rings. However, other research suggests that Chariklo's elongated shape combined with its fast rotation can clear material in an equatorial disk through Lindblad resonances and explain the survival and location of the rings, a mechanism valid also for the ring of Haumea.
The team nicknamed the rings Oiapoque (the inner, more substantial ring) and Chuí (the outer ring), after the two rivers that form the northern and southern coastal borders of Brazil. A request for formal names will be submitted to the IAU at a later date.
It has been speculated that 2060 Chiron may have a similar pair of rings.
Exploration
Camilla is a mission concept published in June 2018 that would launch a robotic probe to perform a single flyby of Chariklo and drop off a impactor made of tungsten to excavate a crater approximately deep for remote compositional analysis during the flyby. The mission would be designed to fit under the cost cap of NASA New Frontiers program, although it has not been formally proposed to compete for funding. The spacecraft would be launched in September 2026, using one gravity assist from Venus in February 2027 and Earth in December 2027 and 2029 to accelerate it out toward Jupiter.
See also
References
External links
37th DPS: Albedos, Diameters (and a Density) of Kuiper Belt and Centaur Objects
Chariklo Photo (February 1999)
Chariklo's orbit between Saturn and Uranus.
Demonstration of how centaur 10199 Chariklo is currently controlled by Uranus (Solex 10)
Centaurs (small Solar System bodies)
Discoveries by James V. Scotti
010199
Named minor planets
010199
010199
19970215 |
4243482 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space%20Technology%205 | Space Technology 5 | Space Technology 5 (ST5) of the NASA New Millennium program was a test of ten new technologies aboard a group of microsatellites. Developed by NASA Goddard Space Flight Center, the three individual small spacecraft were launched together from the belly of a Lockheed L-1011 aboard the Pegasus XL rocket, on 22 March 2006. One technology involved antennas that were designed by computers using an evolutionary AI system developed at NASA Ames Research Center. The ST5 on-board flight computer, the C&DH (Command & Data Handling) system, was based on a Mongoose-V radiation-hardened microprocessor.
On 30 June 2006 the satellites making up ST5 were shut down after successfully completing their technology validation mission.
Mission objectives
ST5's objective was to demonstrate and flight qualify several innovative technologies and concepts for application to future space missions.
Communications Components for Small Spacecraft The X-Band Transponder Communications System was provided by AeroAstro. The transponder system is a miniaturized digital communications transponder. It provides coherent uplink-to-downlink operation that provides a ground-to-space command capability, space-to-ground telemetry capability, and a radio frequency tracking capability. The X-Band weighs approximately 1/12 as much and is 1/9 the volume of communications systems used in other missions.
Evolved antenna A supercomputer using an artificial evolution algorithm designed a very tiny, highly unlikely looking, but highly promising communication antenna for the ST5 spacecraft. The radiator was designed by NASA Ames and the antenna itself was implemented by the Physical Science Laboratory at New Mexico State University. (As a note, each spacecraft has two X-band antennas: an evolved (the solid black painted unit) and a quadrifilar helix antenna (the two-toned, black and white unit). The quadrifilar helix antennas were also developed at the NMSU Physical Science Laboratory.)
Lithium-Ion Power System for Small Satellites The Low-Voltage Power System uses a low-weight Li-Ion battery that can store up to four times as much energy as a Ni-Cad battery, charged by triple junction solar cells. The Li-Ion rechargeable battery has a longer life and exhibits no memory effect.
Ultra Low-Power Demonstration The CULPRiT is a new type of microelectronic device that allows circuits to operate at 0.5 Volts. The technology will greatly reduce power consumption while achieving a radiation tolerance of ~100 kRad total dose and latch-up immunity.
Variable Emittance Coatings for Thermal Control The Variable Emittance Coatings, provided by Sensortex, Inc. and the Applied Physics Laboratory (APL), are used for thermal control and consist of an electrically tunable coating that can change properties, from absorbing heat when cool to reflecting or emitting heat when in the Sun. The Microelectromechanical System (MEMS) chip is part of this technology.
Propulsion Systems Components A miniature microthruster that provides fine attitude adjustments on the spacecraft. The Cold Gas Microthruster (CGMT) is a tiny electromechanical system designed by Marotta Scientific Controls, Inc. to provide fine attitude adjustments on each of the micro-sats. It uses 1/8 the power and weighs only half as much as attitude control systems being used in other missions.
Miniature magnetometer
Miniature spinning sun sensor
Spacecraft deployment mechanism
Magnetometer deployment boom
Nutation dampe
See also
List of spaceflights (2006)
References
External links
Space Technology 5 JPL NMP page
Space Technology 5 NASA page
Earth observation satellites of the United States
New Millennium Program
NASA satellites
Spacecraft launched in 2006
Spacecraft launched by Pegasus rockets |
4247900 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Koronis%20family | Koronis family | The Koronis or Koronian family (), also known as the Lacrimosa family, is a very large asteroid family of stony asteroids, located in the outer region of the asteroid belt. They are thought to have been formed at least two billion years ago in a catastrophic collision between two larger bodies. The family is named after 158 Koronis, and the largest known member (208 Lacrimosa) is about in diameter. The Koronis family travels in a cluster along the same orbit. It has 5949 members.
This family has two subfamilies. The Karin family () was formed remarkably recently in a catastrophic collision (destroying the parent body), with an estimated age of 5.72 million years. The Koronis(2) family () with 246 members is the other. It formed 15 million years ago by a non-catastrophic collision with 158 Koronis.
On August 28, 1993, the Galileo spacecraft visited a member of this family, 243 Ida. A photo of Ida (and its tiny moon Dactyl) is part of the composite image at right (numbered 243).
Large members
References
External links
Astronomical studies of the Koronis Family
Spins on Koronis family
Koronis |
4248143 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave%20Lavery | Dave Lavery | Dave Lavery (born May 28, 1959) is an American scientist and roboticist who is the Program Executive for Solar System Exploration at NASA Headquarters. He also is a member of the FIRST Executive Advisory Board, and is well-known among participants of the FIRST Robotics Competition as a mentor of Team 116.
Early life and education
From an early age, Lavery was obsessed with space exploration. With his eyesight being too poor to become an astronaut, he set about to use machines as his proxy for exploring the solar system. He attended Virginia Tech, where he obtained a bachelor's degree in Computer Science.
Career
Lavery led NASA's Telerobotics Technology Development Program, responsible for the direction and oversight of robotics and planetary exploration within the organization. He and the program was responsible for the likes of the Mars Sojourner rover, which was the first rover he worked on, and the National Robotics Engineering Consortium.
Lavery currently works at the NASA Headquarters in Washington, D.C., as the program executive for solar system explorations. He oversees and is heavily involved with the Mars Exploration Rovers. Notably, he oversaw the mission of the Curiosity rover in 2012.
Lavery is also the project manager for NASAs' Robotics Alliance Project, a position he shared with fellow NASA scientist and FIRST Robotics participant Mark Leon.
FIRST Robotics
Lavery is very active within the FIRST Robotics Competition, and currently sits on the Executive Advisory Board of FIRST. He is responsible for NASA's vast involvement in the competitions, having brought the organization to the attention of NASA in 1995. NASA now sponsors over 300 teams, and hosts teams at each of its research centers in the United States. He is a mentor for FRC Team 116 (Epsilon Delta (εΔ) "From small changes come big differences", from Herndon High School in Herndon, Virginia. He was also a member of the FRC Game Design Committee until January 2011.
Dave is also known for his work in creating the original game animations for the FIRST Robotics Competition. The Competition's Dave Lavery Animation Award for Excellence in Animation is named in honor of him.
References
External links
Dave Lavery at NASA.gov
NASA people
Living people
For Inspiration and Recognition of Science and Technology
1959 births
American computer scientists
American roboticists
Mars Exploration Rover mission |
4248882 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lucas%20Watzenrode | Lucas Watzenrode | Lucas Watzenrode the Younger (sometimes Watzelrode and Waisselrod; ; ; 30 October 1447 – 29 March 1512) was Prince-Bishop of Warmia (Ermland) and patron to his nephew, astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus.
Early life
The family and its name stemmed from the Silesian village of Weizenrodau, now Pszenno. Watzenrode was born in Thorn (Toruń), son of the merchant Lucas Watzenrode the Elder (1400–62). He studied at Jagiellonian University, and at the universities of Cologne and Bologna.
After his sister Barbara and her husband Niklas Koppernigk died circa 1483, Lucas cared for their four children, Katharina, Barbara, Andreas and Nicolaus, the last of whom would become known as astronomer Nicolaus Copernicus.
Historic background
The Bishopric of Warmia, previously part of the Monastic State of the Teutonic Knights, had, with the Second Peace of Thorn (1466), come under the protection of the King of Poland. Based on that treaty, the Polish King had the right to appoint the Bishop. Neither the Warmia chapter, however, nor their newly elected bishop, Nicolaus von Tüngen (1467–89), acknowledged the King's right to do so.
Poland contested von Tüngen's election, and this led to the War of the Priests (1467–79) and the First Treaty of Piotrków Trybunalski (1479), by which the chapter was obliged to seek consensus with the Polish king. The Bishopric of Warmia was made suffragan to the Archbishopric of Riga, then headed by Archbishop Michael Hildebrand.
Bishop
This agreement was somewhat vague, as shown in the 1489 election of the next bishop, Lucas Watzenrode, who was mitred by Pope Innocent VIII against the explicit wishes of King Casimir IV Jagiellon, who would have preferred that one of his sons, Frederic, become Bishop of Warmia. Watzenrode resisted, and when Casimir died in 1492 and was succeeded by John I Albert, Watzenrode could finally establish the exemption of the Bishopric from Riga. With the Second Treaty of Piotrków Trybunalski (1512), later bishops accepted a limited influence of the Polish King on elections. The Holy See considered the Bishopric exempt until 1992, when it was made an archbishopric, which by its nature is exempt.
Watzenrode, a successful organizer of his territory's internal affairs, resided at Heilsber, now Lidzbark. He reorganized the cathedral school and planned to found a university at Elbing, now Elbląg. He argued that the Teutonic Order had fulfilled its mission in the Baltic region, by then converted to Christianity, and proposed sending the Order to more heathen regions. The Ottoman Empire was an ongoing threat and had taken over large parts of Europe, and the Bishop suggested that the Order "do battle with the Turks."
The Bishopric was exposed to repeated armed attacks by the Teutonic Order, which attempted to regain the territory. Poland sought to rescind the Prince-Bishopric's autonomy, hoping to force the surrender of its prerogatives to the Polish crown. In this area of conflict, Watzenrode guarded the interests of Warmia and maintained friendly relations with Poland. He was a long-time opponent of the Teutonic Knights, and shortly after his death it was rumored that he had been poisoned by them.
Family
Watzenrode looked after his orphaned two nephews and two nieces. Katharina married businessman and city councilor Barthel Gertner, while Barbara became a Benedictine nun. Watzenrode sent the brothers Nicolaus (Copernicus) and Andreas to study at the Kraków Academy and in Italy (Bologna, Padua, Ferrara). After his studies, Copernicus assisted his uncle in administrative matters and was his closest advisor as well as his personal physician.
Watzenrode also took care of his son Philipp Teschner, whose mother was the daughter of the rector of the Johannes school in Thorn. When Watzenrode became bishop he arranged for Philipp Teschner to become mayor of Braunsberg (now Braniewo).
Lucas Watzenrode the Younger died in Thorn (Toruń) during his return from an official journey.
Notes
References
Bücherei Danzig, J. Kretzmer, Liber de episcopatu et episcopi Varmiensis ex vetusto Chronico Bibliotheca Heilsbergensis, 1593
Christoph Hartknoch, Preußische Kirchen-Historia, Frankfurt a.M., 1668
M.G. Centner, Geehrte und Gelehrte Thorner, Thorn 1763
A. Semrau, "Katalog der Geschlechter der Schöffenbank und des Ratsstuhles in der Altstadt Thorn 1233-1602", in: Mitteilungen des Copernicus-Vereins für Wissenschaft und Kunst zu Thorn 46 (1938)
Poczet biskupów warmińskich, Olsztyn 1998
Jürgen Hamel: Nicolaus Copernicus. - Spektrum Verlag: Heidelberg, 1994.
Further reading
Górski Karol, Łukasz Watzenrode : życie i działalność polityczna (1447-1512), Wrocław 1973.
1447 births
1512 deaths
15th-century Roman Catholic bishops in Poland
Jagiellonian University alumni
Bishops of Warmia
Nicolaus Copernicus
People from Toruń
People from the State of the Teutonic Order
Canons of Warmia
Canons of Włocławek
University of Bologna alumni |
4256633 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trimble%20Inc. | Trimble Inc. | Trimble Inc. is an American software, hardware, and services technology company. Trimble supports global industries in building & construction, agriculture, geospatial, natural resources and utilities, governments, transportation and others. Trimble also does hardware development of global navigation satellite system (GNSS) receivers, scanners, laser rangefinders, unmanned aerial vehicles (UAVs), inertial navigation systems and software processing tools.
History
Trimble Navigation was founded in November 1978 by Charles Trimble and two partners from Hewlett-Packard. It initially operated above a movie theatre in Los Altos, California.
By the end of 2016, the company had 8,388 employees, with more than half of employees in locations outside the United States.
The company's acquisitions include Telog Instruments, Pocket Mobile AB, @Road, Cengea Solutions Inc., Datacom Software Research, Spectra Precision Group, Tripod Data Systems, Advanced Public Safety, Inc., ALK Technologies, Apache Technologies, Acutest Engineering Solutions Ltd, Applanix, Géo-3D, INPHO, Gatewing, Gehry Technologies, MENSI, Meridian Systems, NTech Industries, Pacific Crest, Quantm, Accubid Systems, SketchUp, QuickPen International, SECO Mfg. Co., Inc., Visual Statement, Stabiplan, XYZ Solutions, Inc, Tekla, Vianova Systems, ThingMagic, Spime Inc., Punch Telematix NV, TMW Systems, Kuebix, and TopoSys Gmbh.
In 2002, Caterpillar and Trimble formed a joint venture Caterpillar Trimble Control Technologies (CTCT), to develop machine control products for improved customer productivity and lower costs on earthmoving projects.
Their role in building information modeling (BIM), architecture and construction has been growing. Trimble acquired the 3D modeling software package SketchUp from Google in 2012.
As of 2014, they also own Tekla (BIM modelling), Vico Office (BIM data handling) and Gehry Technologies' GTeam (project coordination).
In 2016, Trimble acquired Sefaira (sustainability analysis software including energy modeling and daylight visualization).
On April 23, 2018, Trimble agreed to acquire privately held Viewpoint from investment firm Bain Capital in an all-cash transaction of US$1.2bn, with an expected completion in Q3 of 2018.
On February 12, 2019, a new division called Trimble MAPS (Maps and Applications for Professional Solutions) was launched, bringing together Trimble's former ALK Technologies and TMW Appian Final Mile businesses.
On October 3, 2019, Trimble acquired Cityworks to expand its GIS-centric digital asset and infrastructure management solutions.
On October 30, 2019, Trimble announced that its board of directors has unanimously elected Robert G. Painter to succeed Steven W. Berglund as president and CEO of Trimble, effective January 4, 2020, the first day of Trimble's 2020 fiscal year. Painter joined the Trimble Board of Directors on January 4, 2020 as well.
On May 28, 2020, Trimble and Kuebix launched next-generation Community Load Match capabilities to simplify finding and filling truckload capacity. A solution that facilitates collaboration between shippers and carriers to optimize how freight moves throughout the supply chain.
On October 6, 2022, Trimble announced its headquarters had relocated to Westminster, Colorado from Sunnyvale, California.
On September 28, 2023, AGCO announced that it would acquire an 85% stake in Trimble's agriculture business as a part of a new Joint Venture.
Name change
The company changed its name from Trimble Navigation Limited to Trimble Inc.; the name change and change in legal domicile became effective October 1, 2016. Trimble Inc. continued to operate without change or material impacts to stakeholders. The corporate headquarters remained in California until October 2022, when it relocated to Westminster, Colorado.
Industries
Trimble sells products and services into the following industries: land survey, construction, agriculture, transportation, telecommunications, asset tracking, mapping, railways, utilities, mobile resource management, and government.
References
External links
1978 establishments in California
Companies based in Sunnyvale, California
Companies listed on the Nasdaq
Electronics companies established in 1978
Geographic data and information equipment companies
Navigation system companies
Radio-frequency identification companies |
4269289 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jules%20Alfred%20Pierrot%20Deseilligny | Jules Alfred Pierrot Deseilligny | Jules Alfred Pierrot Deseilligny (1868–1918) was a French selenographer.
The crater Deseilligny on the Moon is named after him.
1868 births
1918 deaths
20th-century French astronomers
Selenographers
19th-century French astronomers |
4278905 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jupiter%20in%20fiction | Jupiter in fiction | Jupiter, the largest planet in the Solar System, has appeared in works of fiction across several centuries. The way the planet has been depicted has evolved as more has become known about its composition; it was initially portrayed as being entirely solid, later as having a high-pressure atmosphere with a solid surface underneath, and finally as being entirely gaseous. It was a popular setting during the pulp era of science fiction. Life on the planet has variously been depicted as identical to humans, larger versions of humans, and non-human. Non-human life on Jupiter has been portrayed as primitive in some works and more advanced than humans in others.
The moons of Jupiter have also been featured in a large number of stories, especially the four Galilean moons—Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto. Common themes include terraforming and colonizing these worlds.
Jupiter
Early depictions
Jupiter was long believed, incorrectly, to be a solid planet onto which it would be possible to make a landing. It has made appearances in fiction since at least the 1752 novel Micromégas by Voltaire, wherein an alien from Sirius and another from Saturn pass Jupiter's satellites and land on the planet itself. In the 1800s, writers typically assumed that Jupiter was not only solid but also an Earth-like world and depicted it accordingly. In the 1886 novel Aleriel, or A Voyage to Other Worlds by W. S. Lach-Szyrma, the planet is covered in an ocean with a few islands and primitive aquatic humanoids living there. Jupiter resembles prehistoric Earth with a rich fauna full of lifeforms such as dinosaurs and mastodons in the 1894 novel A Journey in Other Worlds by John Jacob Astor IV. A few utopian works of fiction of the early 1900s are set on Jupiter, including the anonymously published 1908 novel To Jupiter Via Hell and the 1922 novel The Perfect World by Ella Scrymsour.
Jovians
Most writers portrayed the inhabitants of Jupiter as being human, including Marie Corelli in the 1886 novel A Romance of Two Worlds and Cornelius Shea in the 1905 novel Mystic Island; Or, the Tale of a Hidden Treasure. In the anonymously published 1873 novel A Narrative of the Travels and Adventures of Paul Aermont among the Planets, the human inhabitants of Jupiter have heavier-than-air aircraft. Some portrayed Jovians as giant humans, including Albert Waldo Howard in the novel The Milltillionaire and William Shuler Harris in the 1905 novel Life in a Thousand Worlds. In the satirical 1886 novel A Fortnight in Heaven by Harold A. Brydges, an Earthling who visits Jupiter finds a futuristic version of America and discovers that the planet is populated by giant counterparts of Earth persons. Others took different approaches to portraying the natives, such as Fred H. Brown in the 1893 short story "A Message from the Stars", where the planet is inhabited by the spirits of the dead, and Homer Eon Flint in the 1918 short story "The King of Conserve Island", where Jovians are winged.
Pulp era
Jupiter made appearances in several pulp science fiction stories, including the final John Carter story by Edgar Rice Burroughs, the 1943 short story "Skeleton Men of Jupiter". The 1932 short story "A Conquest of Two Worlds" by Edmond Hamilton depicts a human invasion of a peaceable civilization on Jupiter, which leads an Earthling to rebel against the humans and side with the Jovians. In the 1933 short story "The Essence of Life" by Festus Pragnell, a social scientist is visited by human-looking beings from Jupiter who reveal that they have a kind of elixir of life that they are willing to share, but also that they are ruled by octopus-like beings who keep them as pets. Jupiter's Great Red Spot is imagined as a landmass of shifting solidity which is mined for radioactive deposits in the 1936 short story "Red Storm on Jupiter" by Frank Belknap Long, and it leaves Jupiter entirely in the 1937 short story "Life Disinherited" by Eando Binder.
Surface
As the conditions of Jupiter became better understood in the 1930s and onward, several stories emerged where the planet was portrayed as having a solid surface underneath a high-pressure atmosphere. Some writers proposed that native lifeforms would have adaptations to the expected high surface gravity in the form of a low stature as in the 1939 short story "Heavy Planet" by Milton A. Rothman or a large number of legs to distribute their weight on as in the 1931 novel Spacehounds of IPC by E. E. Smith. Similarly, James Blish posited in The Seedling Stars (a 1957 collection of earlier short stories) that human survival on Jupiter would necessitate pantropy, i.e. modifying the humans to adapt them to the alien environment. In the 1944 short story "Desertion" by Clifford D. Simak (later included in the 1952 fix-up novel City), humans who have been thus transformed find Jupiter a preferable place to live and refuse to leave. Other writers resolved the issue of the presumed-harsh conditions of Jupiter by only having robots go there; in the 1942 short story "Victory Unintentional" by Isaac Asimov such robots encounter hostile aliens who mistake them for living beings, and in the 1957 short story "Call Me Joe" by Poul Anderson, a remotely controlled artificial creature explores the Jovian surface.
Atmosphere
By the late 1950s, it was generally accepted that the atmosphere of Jupiter was for all practical purposes bottomless and the idea of a solid surface beneath it fell into disuse. Some works portray alien lifeforms living in the atmosphere, including the 1971 short story "A Meeting with Medusa" by Arthur C. Clarke. In the 2002 novel Manta's Gift by Timothy Zahn, humanity makes contact with intelligent life in the Jovian atmosphere, and in the 2000 novel Wheelers by Ian Stewart and Jack Cohen, it is discovered that there are entire floating cities there. Descents into the atmosphere are commonplace, seen in such works as the 1960 short story "The Way to Amalthea" by Soviet science fiction authors Arkady and Boris Strugatsky, the 1972 novel As on a Darkling Plain by Ben Bova, and the 1977 novel If the Stars are Gods by Gregory Benford and Gordon Eklund. The Jovian atmosphere also becomes a location for racing in the 1996 short story "Primrose and Thorn" by Bud Sparhawk.
Modern depictions
Jupiter is the destination of an expedition in the 1968 film 2001: A Space Odyssey, whereas the book version by Arthur C. Clarke from the same year instead uses Saturn. The planet is transformed into a star in the 1982 sequel novel 2010: Odyssey Two by Clarke and the 1984 film adaptation 2010: The Year We Make Contact as well as the 1982 novel Sayonara Jupiter by Sakyo Komatsu and its 1984 film adaptation Bye-Bye Jupiter, an idea that was later reused by other authors such as Charles L. Harness in the 1991 novel Lunar Justice and John C. Wright in the 2002 novel The Golden Age. The 2015 film Jupiter Ascending is a space opera set partially on the planet.
Moons
Once it was understood that Jupiter itself is a gaseous planet, its moons became more popular settings for stories featuring human or alien life. Occasionally, the entire satellite system has been the focus collectively, such as in the 1984 short story "Promises to Keep" by Jack McDevitt. The four Galilean moons—Io, Europa, Ganymede, and Callisto—have all been colonized in the 1956 novel The Stars My Destination by Alfred Bester.
Io
Io has a tropical climate in the 1935 short story "The Mad Moon" by Stanley G. Weinbaum. The satellite is mined for resources in the 1981 film Outland, a science-fiction version of the 1952 Western High Noon. In the 1998 short story "The Very Pulse of the Machine" by Michael Swanwick, Io is implied to be sentient. The 2019 film Io depicts the satellite as humanity's refuge after Earth has become near-uninhabitable due to pollution.
Europa
Europa is depicted as having a breathable atmosphere and native lifeforms on the side of the planet tidally locked towards Jupiter in the 1936 short story "Redemption Cairn" by Stanley G. Weinbaum. The 1992 novel Cold as Ice by Charles Sheffield focuses on a conflict about whether or not Europa should be terraformed. Since scientists started hypothesizing that Europa may have water oceans that could harbour life under its surface of ice, several stories have explored the idea, including the 2008 novel The Quiet War by Paul J. McAuley, the 2013 film Europa Report, and the 2016 novel Europa's Lost Expedition: A Scientific Novel by Michael Carroll.
Ganymede
Ganymede has domed cities in the 1901 novel A Honeymoon in Space by George Griffith. It is terraformed in the 1950 novel Farmer in the Sky by Robert A. Heinlein. The 1950 short story "The Dancing Girl of Ganymede" by Leigh Brackett is another early work set on the satellite. The colonization of Ganymede has been depicted in numerous works, including the 1964 novel Three Worlds to Conquer by Poul Anderson, the 1975 novel Jupiter Project by Gregory Benford, and the 1997 short story "The Flag in Gorbachev Crater" by Charles L. Harness.
Callisto
Callisto is colonized in the 1950 short story "U-Turn" by Eric Frank Russell. The 1970s Callisto series by Lin Carter, starting with the 1972 novel Jandar of Callisto, is a planetary romance set on the satellite and an homage to the works of Edgar Rice Burroughs.
Other moons
Amalthea is a derelict extraterrestrial spaceship in the 1953 short story "Jupiter Five" by Arthur C. Clarke. The 1957 novel Lucky Starr and the Moons of Jupiter by Isaac Asimov takes place on another minor moon of Jupiter, variously referred to as Jupiter IX and Adrastea.
See also
Sun in fiction
References
Further reading
Jupiter
Fiction set on Jupiter's moons
Fiction about gas giants |
4283995 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harpina | Harpina | In Greek mythology, Harpina (; Ancient Greek: Άρπινα) was a Naiad nymph and daughter of Phliasian Asopus and of Metope.
Mythology
According to the tradition of the Eleans and Phliasians, Ares mated with Harpina in the city of Pisa (located in the ancient Greek region of Elis). The couple were the parents of Oenomaus, the king of Pisa. The latter founded and named after his mother the city of Harpina, not far from the river Harpinates, near Olympia. Pausanias mentions Harpina in his description of a group sculpture, donated by the Phliasians, of the daughters of Asopus, which included Nemea, Zeus seizing Aegina, Harpina, Corcyra, Thebe and Asopus. The sculpture was located in the sanctuary of Hippodamia at Olympia.
Notes
References
Diodorus Siculus, The Library of History translated by Charles Henry Oldfather. Twelve volumes. Loeb Classical Library. Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press; London: William Heinemann, Ltd. 1989. Vol. 3. Books 4.59–8. Online version at Bill Thayer's Web Site
Diodorus Siculus, Bibliotheca Historica. Vol 1-2. Immanel Bekker. Ludwig Dindorf. Friedrich Vogel. in aedibus B. G. Teubneri. Leipzig. 1888-1890. Greek text available at the Perseus Digital Library.
Pausanias, Description of Greece with an English Translation by W.H.S. Jones, Litt.D., and H.A. Ormerod, M.A., in 4 Volumes. Cambridge, MA, Harvard University Press; London, William Heinemann Ltd. 1918. . Online version at the Perseus Digital Library
Pausanias, Graeciae Descriptio. 3 vols. Leipzig, Teubner. 1903. Greek text available at the Perseus Digital Library.
Smith, William, Dictionary of Greek and Roman Geography, 1854. "Harpina".
Naiads
Nymphs
Children of Asopus
Women of Ares
el:Άρπινα (αρχαία πόλη) |
4291021 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Great%20White%20Spot | Great White Spot | The Great White Spot, also known as Great White Oval, on Saturn, named by analogy to Jupiter's Great Red Spot, are periodic storms that are large enough to be visible from Earth by telescope by their characteristic white appearance. The spots can be several thousands of kilometers wide.
The Cassini orbiter was able to track the 2010–11 instance of the storm, also known as the Northern Electrostatic Disturbance, because of an increase in radio and plasma interference, or the Great Springtime Storm.
Cassini data has revealed a loss of acetylene in the white clouds, an increase of phosphine, and an unusual temperature drop in the center of the storm. After the visible aspects of the storm subsided, in 2012, a "belch" of heat and ethylene was emitted from two hotspots that merged.
Occurrence
The phenomenon is somewhat periodic at 28.5-year intervals, when Saturn's northern hemisphere tilts most toward the Sun. The following is a list of recorded sightings.
1876 – Observed by Asaph Hall. He used the white spots to determine the planet's period of rotation.
1903 – Observed by Edward Barnard.
1933 – Observed by Will Hay, comic actor and amateur astronomer. Until recent times the most celebrated observation.
1960 – Observed by JH Botham (South Africa).
1990 – Observed by Stuart Wilber, from 24 September through November.
1994 – Studied by ground-based observers and the Hubble Space Telescope.
2006 – Observed by Erick Bondoux and Jean-Luc Dauvergne.
2010 – First observed by Anthony Wesley, photographed by Cassini space probe 2010–11.
That none were recorded before 1876 is a mystery, in some ways akin to the long observational gap of the Great Red Spot in the 18th and early 19th centuries; the 1876 Great White Spot (GWS) was extremely prominent, being visible in apertures as small as 60 mm. It is not known if the earlier record was simply poor, or if the 1876 GWS was truly a first for the telescopic era. Some believe that neither scenario is likely.
In 1992, Mark Kidger described three significant GWS patterns:
The GWSs alternate in latitude, with one apparition being limited to the North Temperate Zone (NTZ) or higher, and the following being limited to the Equatorial Zone (EZ). For instance, the 1960 GWS was high-latitude, and the 1990 GWS was equatorial.
The high-latitude GWSs recur at a slightly shorter interval than the equatorial GWSs (~27 versus ~30 years).
The high-latitude GWSs tend to be much less prominent than their equatorial counterparts.
Based on these apparent regularities, in 1992 Kidger forecasted (incorrectly, given the 2010–2011 storm) that the next GWS would occur in the North Temperate Zone in 2016, and would probably be less spectacular than the 1990 GWS.
Characteristics and causes
The Great White Spot typically begins as discrete "spots", but then rapidly expands in longitude, as the 1933 and 1990 GWSs did; in fact, the latter eventually lengthened enough to encircle the planet.
Though computer modeling had by the early 1990s suggested these massive atmospheric upwellings were caused by thermal instability, in 2015 two Caltech planetary scientists proposed a more detailed mechanism. The theory is that as Saturn's upper atmosphere undergoes seasonal cooling, it first gets less dense as the heavier water rains out, passes a density minimum, and then gets more dense as the remaining hydrogen and helium continue to cool. Low-density upper-layer gases tend to suppress convection, but high-density upper layers are unstable and cause a thunderstorm when they break into lower layers. The theory is that storms are significantly delayed from the winter solstice due to the time it takes for the very large atmosphere to cool. The team proposes that similar storms are not seen on Jupiter because that planet has less water vapor in its upper atmosphere.
Saturn's rings block the view of the northern hemisphere from Earth during the winter solstice, so historical data on the GWS is unavailable during this season, but the Cassini space probe has been able to observe the whole planet since it arrived shortly after the winter solstice in 2004.
See also
Great Dark Spot
Great Red Spot
Dragon Storm
Extraterrestrial cyclone
Kármán vortex street
References
Notes
Article on Saturn's Northern Electrostatic Disturbance on Sky and Telescope
1990/1 Hubble Space Telescope image
2006: observed with a 12" telescope by amateurs near Paris.
Volunteers Help NASA Track Return of the Dragon
External links
The Great White Spot at ESA/Hubble
Christopher Go's Saturn Website Pictures of Saturn's Northern Electrostatic Disturbance (2011)
Saturn
Planetary spots
Storms
1876 in science |
4295508 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Scottish%20Adjacent%20Waters%20Boundaries%20Order%201999 | Scottish Adjacent Waters Boundaries Order 1999 | The Scottish Adjacent Waters Boundaries Order 1999 is a statutory instrument of the United Kingdom government, defining the boundaries of internal waters, territorial sea, and British Fishing Limits adjacent to Scotland. It was introduced in accordance with the Scotland Act 1998, which established the devolved Scottish Parliament.
Defining jurisdictions
The territorial waters defined come under the jurisdiction of Scots law, and are also used for defining the area of operation of the Scottish Government (including Marine Scotland), SEPA, and other Scottish Government agencies and public bodies.
The territorial waters defined as not being Scottish waters come under the jurisdiction of either English law or Northern Ireland law. Because the order defines the territorial limits of the three separate jurisdictions, it comprises a piece of constitutional law in the constitution of the United Kingdom.
Scottish waters
Scottish waters is a colloquial term which can refer to different sea areas, including:
Internal waters and territorial sea adjacent to Scotland. ("Scotland" as defined in the Scotland Act 1998)
British Fishing Limits adjacent to Scotland. ("The Scottish Zone" as defined in the Scotland Act 1998)
The UK continental shelf limits adjacent to Scotland. (Part of the "Scottish offshore marine region" as defined in the Marine and Coastal Access Act 2009)
Differences with existing boundaries
The maritime boundary adopted by the order is an equidistant boundary. This differed from the boundary established by the Civil Jurisdiction (Offshore Activities) Act 1987 which defined a straight line border between Scotland and England in the North Sea along the latitude of 55° 50' 00"N.
No oil fields were affected by this change as the new boundary only applied to fishing and had no impact on reserved matters. Professor Alex Kemp of the University of Aberdeen argued that the movement of the line did not make much difference from an economic perspective, "because [these] are just a handful of fields, and [no longer] very important ones".
Potential implications for Scottish independence
The Scottish National Party opposed the order and the methods used to calculate the boundary in the North Sea.
In 2015, the Scottish Cabinet Secretary for Rural Affairs and Environment, Richard Lochhead, wrote to the UK Government requesting a review of the order.
In 2001, Mahdi Zahraa of Glasgow Caledonian University, published a discussion paper in the European Journal of International Law detailing different methods of establishing an Anglo-Scottish marine boundary. The author notes that whilst the median line principle would apply as a starting point, a perpendicular boundary, derived from a new straight baseline on the east coast of Scotland and England, combined with an area of shared jurisdiction, would be an alternative equitable solution.
Supporters of Scottish independence such as Craig Murray have also argued for a perpendicular boundary based on a straight baseline.
See also
Anglo-Scottish border
References
External links
The Scottish Adjacent Waters Boundaries Order 1999
Map of the boundary defined in the Scottish Adjacent Waters Boundaries Order 1999
26 April 2000 - Official Report of debate regarding the Order in the Scottish Parliament
Scottish Executive - press release, 9 Dec 1999
Scottish Ministers' proposals for the designation of marine boundaries in coastal and transitional waters
Law of the sea
Constitutional laws of Scotland
Economy of Scotland
Fishing in Scotland
Statutory Instruments of the United Kingdom
1999 in British law
1999 in Scotland
Borders of Scotland
Admiralty law in the United Kingdom
North Sea
Shipping in Scotland
Water transport in Scotland
Scottish coast
Territorial evolution |
4297266 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Padimate%20O | Padimate O | Padimate O is an organic compound related to the water-soluble compound PABA (4-aminobenzoic acid) that is used as an ingredient in some sunscreens. This yellowish water-insoluble oily liquid is an ester formed by the condensation of 2-ethylhexanol with dimethylaminobenzoic acid. Other names for padimate O include 2-ethylhexyl 4-dimethylaminobenzoate, Escalol 507, octyldimethyl PABA, and OD-PABA.
Photobiology
Padimate O absorbs ultraviolet rays, thereby preventing direct DNA damage by UV-B. However, the thus-excited padimate O molecule may then react with DNA to produce indirect DNA damage, similar to the effects of ionizing radiation. An in vitro yeast study conducted in 1993 demonstrated the sunlight-induced mutagenicity of padimate O. The photobiological properties of padimate O resemble those of Michler's ketone, which is considered photocarcinogenic in rats and mice. These findings suggest that padimate O might also be photocarcinogenic.
However, multiple in vivo studies conducted in hairless mice following topical application of padimate O have demonstrated no carcinogenic effects and that padimate O reduces the number of and delays the appearance of UV-induced skin tumors.
See also
Padimate A, a related sunscreen ingredient
Sunscreen controversy.
References
4-Aminobenzoate esters
Sunscreening agents |
4297269 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Padimate%20A | Padimate A | Padimate A is an organic compound that is an ingredient in some sunscreens. It is an ester derivative of PABA. This aromatic chemical absorbs ultraviolet rays thereby preventing sunburn. However, its chemical structure and behaviour is similar to an industrial free radical generator. In Europe this chemical was withdrawn in 1989 for unstated reasons.
In the US it was never approved for use in sunscreens.
Photobiology
The photobiological properties of padimate O and padimate A resemble that of Michler's ketone. These compounds have been shown to increase the lethal effects of UV-radiation on cells. This photochemistry is relevant to the sunscreen controversy.
See also
Padimate O, a related sunscreen ingredient
References
4-Aminobenzoate esters
Sunscreening agents |
4297956 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Clockwork%20universe | Clockwork universe | In the history of science, the clockwork universe compares the universe to a mechanical clock. It continues ticking along, as a perfect machine, with its gears governed by the laws of physics, making every aspect of the machine predictable.
History
This idea was very popular among deists during the Enlightenment, when Isaac Newton derived his laws of motion, and showed that alongside the law of universal gravitation, they could predict the behaviour of both terrestrial objects and the Solar System.
A similar concept goes back, to John of Sacrobosco's early 13th-century introduction to astronomy: On the Sphere of the World. In this widely popular medieval text, Sacrobosco spoke of the universe as the machina mundi, the machine of the world, suggesting that the reported eclipse of the Sun at the crucifixion of Jesus was a disturbance of the order of that machine.
Responding to Gottfried Leibniz, a prominent supporter of the theory, in the Leibniz–Clarke correspondence, Samuel Clarke wrote:
"The Notion of the World's being a great Machine, going on without the Interposition of God, as a Clock continues to go without the Assistance of a Clockmaker; is the Notion of Materialism and Fate, and tends, (under pretence of making God a Supra-mundane Intelligence,) to exclude Providence and God's Government in reality out of the World."
In 2009, artist Tim Wetherell created a large wall piece for Questacon (The National Science and Technology centre in Canberra, Australia) representing the concept of the clockwork universe. This steel artwork contains moving gears, a working clock, and a movie of the lunar terminator.
See also
Mechanical philosophy
Determinism
Eternalism (philosophy of time)
Orrery
Philosophy of space and time
Superdeterminism
References
Further reading
E. J. Dijksterhuis (1961) The Mechanization of the World Picture, Oxford University Press
Dolnick, Edward (2011) The Clockwork Universe: Isaac Newton, the Royal Society, and the Birth of the Modern World, HarperCollins.
David Brewster (1850) "A Short Scheme of the True Religion", manuscript quoted in Memoirs of the Life, Writings and Discoveries of Sir Isaac Newton, cited in Dolnick, page 65.
Anneliese Maier (1938) Die Mechanisierung des Weltbildes im 17. Jahrhundert
Webb, R.K. ed. Knud Haakonssen (1996) "The Emergence of Rational Dissent." Enlightenment and Religion: Rational Dissent in Eighteenth-Century Britain, Cambridge University Press page 19.
Westfall, Richard S. Science and Religion in Seventeenth-Century England. p. 201.
Riskins, Jessica (2016) The Restless Clock: A History of the Centuries-Long Argument over What Makes Living Things Tick, University of Chicago Press.
External links
"The Clockwork Universe". The Physical World. Ed. John Bolton, Alan Durrant, Robert Lambourne, Joy Manners, Andrew Norton.
History of physics
Isaac Newton
Astronomical hypotheses
Anthropic principle
Physical cosmology
Determinism |
4302745 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List%20of%20Sports%20Illustrated%20Swimsuit%20Issue%20models | List of Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue models | This is a list of models who have appeared in the annual Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Issue.
A
Nina Agdal
Adaora Akubilo
Lily Aldridge
Karen Alexander
Kim Alexis
Carol Alt
Michelle Alves
May Andersen
Anitta
Alex Aust
B
Melissa Baker
Bianca Balti
Tyra Banks
Natasha Barnard
Ana Beatriz Barros
Michaela Bercu
Kylie Bax
Jamee Becker
Michelle Behennah
Monica Bellucci
Elsa Benítez
Rose Bertram
Simone Biles
Sue Bird
Kate Bock
Caprice Bourret
Christie Brinkley
C
Carla Campbell
Naomi Campbell
Laetitia Casta
Jeisa Chiminazzo
Ciara
Hailey Clauson
Kim Cloutier
Te'a Cooper
Natalie Coughlin
Cindy Crawford
Olivia Culpo
Ehrinn Cummings
D
Sonia Dara
Hannah Davis
Anne de Paula
Jenna de Rosnay
Brooklyn Decker
Yamila Diaz
Cintia Dicker
Skyler Diggins
Lucia Dvorská
Emily DiDonato
Crystal Dunn
Olivia Dunne
Lorena Durán
E
Selita Ebanks
Angie Everhart
Kelly Emberg
F
Hannah Ferguson
Luján Fernández
Calle Fetzer
Jennie Finch
Isabeli Fontana
Louise Forsling
Kenza Fourati
Megan Fox
G
Yasmeen Ghauri
Esti Ginzburg
Jessica Gomes
Ekaterina Gordeeva
Izabel Goulart
Ashley Graham
Erin Gray
H
Gigi Hadid
Ella Halikas
Alicia Hall
Bridget Hall
Melissa Haro
Jessica Hart
Erin Heatherton
Bregje Heinen
Julie Henderson
Danielle Herrington
Eva Herzigová
Kristy Hinze
Samantha Hoopes
Marloes Horst
Rachel Hunter
I
Chanel Iman
Kathy Ireland
J
Julia Blake
Kate James
Maria João
Olivia Jordan
K
Haley Kalil
Mia Kang
Kim Kardashian
Melissa Keller
Vendela Kirsebom
Heidi Klum
Beyoncé Knowles
Camille Kostek
L
Padma Lakshmi
Robyn Lawley
Shakara Ledard
Estelle Lefebure
Kim Lemanton
Noémie Lenoir
Damaris Lewis
Angela Lindvall
Roberta Little
Kathy Loghry
Michelle Lombardo
Vanessa Lorenzo
M
Shirley Mallmann
Josie Maran
Babette March
Jarah Mariano
Natalie Mariduena
Juliana Martins
Judit Mascó
Valeria Mazza
Turia Mau
Elle Macpherson
Lauren Mellor
Ariel Meredith
Kelsey Merritt
Alyssa Miller
Marisa Miller
Barbara Minty
Coco Mitchell
Jolie Mitnick Salter
Alex Morgan
Solveig Mørk Hansen
Genevieve Morton
Fernanda Motta
Carolyn Murphy
Maye Musk
N
Brooks Nader
Aline Nakashima
Petra Nemcova
Navia Nguyen
Chandra North
Yumi Nu
O
Lana Ogilvie
Nneka Ogwumike
Raica Oliveira
Oluchi Onweagba
Julie Ordon
Naomi Osaka
Carré Otis
P
Irina Pantaeva
Danica Patrick
Jessica Perez
Daniela Pestova
Ann Peterson
Kim Petras
Paulina Porizkova
Tori Praver
Danica Patrick
Barbara Palvin
Q
Audrey Quock
R
Aly Raisman
Megan Rapinoe
Emily Ratajkowski
Frankie Rayder
Gabrielle Reece
Angel Reese
Bar Refaeli
Crystal Renn
Sofia Resing
Hilary Rhoda
DiDi Richards
Ashley Richardson
Rachel Roberts
Rebecca Romijn
Kelly Rohrbach
Pania Rose
Ronda Rousey
S
Sara Sampaio
Daniella Sarahyba
Stephanie Seymour
Ingrid Seynhaeve
Maria Sharapova
Irina Shayk
Josephine Skriver
Renée Simonsen
Molly Sims
Amber Smith
Ashley Smith
Mallory Snyder
Tamara Spoelder
Sloane Stephens
Breanna Stewart
Martha Stewart
Yvette Sylvander
Yvonne Sylvander
T
Fernanda Tavares
Niki Taylor
Chrissy Teigen
Hannah Teter
Megan Thee Stallion
Duckie Thot
Cheryl Tiegs
Tinashe
Yésica Toscanini
U
Kate Upton
Cris Urena
V
Valerie van der Graaf
Jessica Van Der Steen
Apollonia van Ravenstein
Veronika Vařeková
Michelle Vawer
Patricia Velásquez
Manon Von Gerkan
Lindsey Vonn
Anne Vyalitsyna
W
Akure Wall
Katherine Webb
Amy Wesson
Caroline Wozniacki
Jessica White
Roshumba Williams
Serena Williams
Stacey Williams
Y
Kara Young
References
Sports Illustrated Swimsuit Edition
models |
4305442 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sukhumi | Sukhumi | Sukhumi (see also other names below) is a city in a wide bay on the Black Sea's eastern coast. It is both the capital and largest city of the Republic of Abkhazia, a partially recognised state widely recognized as a part of Georgia. The city has been controlled by Abkhazia since the Abkhazian war in 1992–93. The city, which has an airport, is a port, major rail junction and a holiday resort because of its beaches, sanatoriums, mineral-water spas and semitropical climate. It is also a member of the International Black Sea Club.
Sukhumi's history can be traced to the 6th century BC, when it was settled by Greeks, who named it Dioscurias. During this time and the subsequent Roman period, much of the city disappeared under the Black Sea. The city was named Tskhumi when it became part of the Kingdom of Abkhazia and then the Kingdom of Georgia. Contested by local princes, it became part of the Ottoman Empire in the 1570s, where it remained until it was conquered by the Russian Empire in 1810. After a period of conflict during the Russian Civil War, it became part of the independent Georgia, which included Abkhazia, in 1918. In 1921, the Democratic Republic of Georgia was occupied by Soviet Bolshevik forces from Russia. Within the Soviet Union, it was regarded as a holiday resort. As the Soviet Union broke up in the early 1990s, the city suffered significant damage during the Abkhaz–Georgian conflict. The present-day population of 60,000 is only half of the population living there toward the end of Soviet rule.
Toponym
In Georgian, the city is known as Sokhumi (სოხუმი), amongst Samurzakans in Megrelian the city is sometimes referred to as Aqujikha (აყუჯიხა), and in Russian as Сухум (Sukhum) or Сухуми (Sukhumi). The toponym Sokhumi derives from the Georgian word Tskhomi/Tskhumi (ცხომი/ცხუმი), which in turn is supposed to be derived from Svan tskhum (ცხუმ) meaning "hornbeam tree". In Abkhaz, the city is known as Aqwa (Аҟәа) which is believed to derive from a-qwara (а-ҟәара), meaning "stony seashore". According to Abkhaz tradition Aqwa (Аҟәа) signifies water.
Medieval Georgian sources knew the town as Tskhumi (ცხუმი). Later, under Ottoman control, the town was known in Turkish as Suhum-Kale, which was derived from the earlier Georgian form Tskhumi or read to mean "Tskhumi fortress".
The ending -i in the above forms represents the Georgian nominative suffix. The town was officially called Сухум (Sukhum) in Russian until 16 August 1936, when this was changed to Sukhumi (Сухуми). This remained so until 4 December 1992, when the Supreme Council of Abkhazia restored the previous version. Russia also readopted its official spelling in 2008, though Сухуми is also still being used.
In English, the most common form today is Sukhumi, although Sokhumi is increasing in usage and has been adopted by sources including United Nations, Encyclopædia Britannica, MSN Encarta, Esri and Google Maps.
History
The history of the city began in the mid-6th century BC when an earlier settlement of the second and early first millennia BC, frequented by local Colchian tribes, was replaced by the Milesian Greek colony of Dioscurias (). The city is said to have been founded and named by the Dioscuri, the twins Castor and Pollux of classical mythology. According to another legend it was founded by Amphitus and Cercius of Sparta, the charioteers of the Dioscuri. The Greek pottery found in Eshera, further north along the coast, predates findings in the area of Sukhumi bay by a century suggesting that the centre of the original Greek settlement could have been there.
It became busily engaged in the commerce between Greece and the indigenous tribes, importing salt and wares from many parts of Greece, and exporting local timber, linen, and hemp. It was also a prime center of slave trade in Colchis. The city and its surroundings were remarkable for the multitude of languages spoken in its bazaars.
Although the sea made serious inroads upon the territory of Dioscurias, it continued to flourish and became one of the key cities in the realm of Mithridates VI of Pontus in the 2nd century BC and supported his cause until the end. Dioscurias issued bronze coinage around 100 BC featuring the symbols of the Dioskuri and Dionysus. Under the Roman emperor Augustus the city assumed the name of Sebastopolis (). But its prosperity was past, and in the 1st century Pliny the Elder described the place as virtually deserted though the town still continued to exist during the times of Arrian in the 130s. The remains of towers and walls of Sebastopolis have been found underwater; on land the lowest levels so far reached by archaeologists are of the 1st and 2nd centuries AD. According to Gregory of Nyssa there were Christians in the city in the late 4th century. In 542 the Romans evacuated the town and demolished its citadel to prevent it from being captured by Sasanian Empire. In 565, however, the emperor Justinian I restored the fort and Sebastopolis continued to remain one of the Byzantine strongholds in Colchis until being sacked by the Arab conqueror Marwan II in 736.
Afterwards, the town came to be known as Tskhumi. Restored by the kings of Abkhazia from the Arab devastation, it particularly flourished during the Georgian Golden Age in the 12th–13th centuries, when Tskhumi became a center of traffic with the European maritime powers, particularly with the Republic of Genoa. The Genoese established their trading port in Tskhumi in the end of 13th century and a Catholic bishopric existed there which is now a titular see. A Genoese consulate was established in 1354 with the consul dispatched from Caffa. In spite of occasional conflicts with the locals, the consulate functioned until 1456. The city of Tskhumi became the summer residence of the Georgian kings. According to Russian scholar V. Sizov, it became an important "cultural and administrative center of the Georgian state. A Later Tskhumi served as capital of the Odishi — Megrelian rulers, it was in this city that Vamek I ( 1384–1396), the most influential Dadiani, minted his coins. Documents of the 15th century clearly distinguished Tskhumi from Principality of Abkhazia. The Ottoman navy occupied the town in 1451, but for a short time. Later contested between the princes of Abkhazia and Mingrelia, Tskhumi finally fell to the Turks in the 1570s. The new masters heavily fortified the town and called it Sohumkale, with kale meaning "fort" but the first part of the name of disputed origin. It may represent Turkish su, "water", and kum, "sand", but is more likely to be an alteration of its earlier Georgian name.
At the request of the pro-Russian Abkhazian prince, the town was stormed by the Russian Marines in 1810 and turned, subsequently, into a major outpost in the North West Caucasus. (See Russian conquest of the Caucasus). Sukhumi was declared the seaport in 1847 and was directly annexed to the Russian Empire after the ruling Shervashidze princely dynasty was ousted by the Russian authorities in 1864. During the Russo-Turkish War, 1877–1878, the town was temporarily controlled by the Ottoman forces and Abkhaz-Adyghe rebels. After its annexation, Sukhumi became the administrative center of the Sukhumi Okrug of the Kutais Governorate.
Following the Russian Revolution of 1917, the town and Abkhazia in general were engulfed in the chaos of the Russian Civil War. A short-lived Bolshevik government was suppressed in May 1918 and Sukhumi was incorporated into the Democratic Republic of Georgia as a residence of the autonomous People's Council of Abkhazia and the headquarters of the Georgian governor-general. The Red Army and the local revolutionaries took the city from the Georgian forces on 4 March 1921, and declared Soviet rule. Sukhumi functioned as the capital of the "Union treaty" Abkhaz Soviet Socialist Republic associated with the Georgian SSR from 1921 until 1931, when it became the capital of the Abkhazian Autonomous Soviet Socialist Republic within the Georgian SSR. By 1989, Sukhumi had 120,000 inhabitants and was one of the most prosperous cities of Georgia. Many holiday dachas for Soviet leaders were situated there.
Beginning with the 1989 riots, Sukhumi was a centre of the Georgian-Abkhaz conflict, and the city was severely damaged during the 1992–1993 War. During the war, the city and its environs suffered almost daily air strikes and artillery shelling, with heavy civilian casualties. On 27 September 1993 the battle for Sukhumi was concluded by a full-scale campaign of ethnic cleansing against its majority Georgian population (see Sukhumi Massacre), including members of the pro-Georgian Abkhazian government (Zhiuli Shartava, Raul Eshba and others) and mayor of Sukhumi Guram Gabiskiria.
Although the city has been relatively peaceful and partially rebuilt, it is still suffering the after-effects of the war, and it has not regained its earlier ethnic diversity. A relatively large infrastructure reconstruction program was launched in 2019–2020 focusing on the renovation of the waterfront, rebuilding city roads and cleaning city parks. Its population in 2017 was 65,716, compared to about 120,000 in 1989. During summer holidays season its population usually doubles and triples with a large inflow of international tourists.
In 2021, there was unrest in the city.
Population
Demographics
Historic population figures for Sukhumi, split out by ethnicity, based on population censuses:
The Abkhazians were deemed "guilty" from 1877, but officially it was by an order of the tsar of 31 May 1880 that their "guilt" was recognised. Abkhazians were forbidden to settle near the coast (except for the upper classes), or live in Sukhum. The devastated central part of Abkhazia between the rivers Psyrtskha and Kodor became a colonised land-fund of the imperial administration. There was established here a kind of buffer-zone between the Gudauta and Ochamchira Abkhazians. Abkhazians had no right to settle in this part of their own country. Meanwhile, thousands of Armenians, Mingrelians, Greeks, Russians, Estonians, Germans, Moldovans and others who were resettled began from 1879 to take root here in today's Sukhum and Gulripsh districts.
Religion
Most of the inhabitants belong to the Orthodox and Armenian Apostolic Churches, Islam and the Abkhaz traditional religion.
Culture
Main sights
Sukhumi theatres which offer classical and modern performances, with the theatre season lasting from September to June. Several galleries and museums exhibit modern and historical Abkhaz visual art. Sukhumi Botanical Garden was established in 1840 and is one of the oldest botanical gardens in the Caucasus.
Sukhumi houses a number of historical monuments, notably the Besleti Bridge built during the reign of queen Tamar of Georgia in the 12th century. It also retains visible vestiges of the defunct monuments, including the Roman walls, the medieval Castle of Bagrat, several towers of the Kelasuri Wall, also known as Great Abkhazian Wall, constructed between 1628 and 1653 by Levan II Dadiani to protect his fiefdom from the Abkhaz tribes; the 14th-century Genoese fort and the 18th-century Ottoman fortress. The 11th century Kamani Monastery ( from Sukhumi) is erected, according to tradition, over the tomb of Saint John Chrysostom. Some from Sukhumi lies New Athos with the ruins of the medieval city of Anacopia. The Neo-Byzantine New Athos Monastery was constructed here in the 1880s on behest of Tsar Alexander III of Russia.
Northward in the mountains is the Krubera Cave, one of the deepest in the world, with a depth of 2,140 meters.
Education
The city hosts a number of research and educational institutions, including the Abkhazian State University, the Sukhumi Open Institute and about a half a dozen of vocational education colleges. From 1945 to 1954 the city's electron physics laboratory was involved in the Soviet program to develop nuclear weapons. Additionally, the Abkhaz State Archive is located in the city.
Until 19th century young people from Abkhazia usually received their education mainly at religious schools (Muslims at Madrasas and Christians at Seminaries), although a small number of children from wealthy families had opportunity to travel to foreign countries for education.
The first modern educational institutions (both schools and colleges) were established in the late 19th-early 20th century and rapidly grew until the second half of the 20th century. For example, the number of college students grew from few dozens in the 1920s to several thousands in the 1980s.
According to the official statistical data, Abkhazia has 12 TVET colleges (as of 2019, est.) providing education and vocational training to youth mostly in the capital city, though there are several colleges in all major district centers. Independent international assessments suggest that these colleges train in about 20 different specialties attracting between 1200 and 1500 young people annually (aged between 16 and 29) (as of 2019, est.). The largest colleges are as follows:
Abkhaz Multiindustrial College (1959) (from 1959 to 1999 – Sukhumi Trade and Culinary School),
Sukhumi State College (1904) (from 1904 to 1921 – Sukhumi Real School; from 1921 to 1999 – Sukhumi Industrial Technical School),
Sukhumi Art College (1934) (from 1934 to 1966 – Sukhimi Art Studio). This college is also a home for a relatively large collection of local paintings and sculptures accumulated mainly during past 60 years.
Sukhum Medical College (1931)
Higher education in Sukhumi currently is represented by one university, Abkhazian State University, which has a special status in the education system in Abkhazia and it manages its own budget.
Abkhaz State University (1979), has its own campus which is a home for 42 departments organized into 8 faculties providing education to about 3300 students (as of 2019, est.).
Climate
Sukhumi has a humid subtropical climate (Köppen Cfa), that is almost cool enough in summer to be an oceanic climate (Cfb).
Administration
On 2 February 2000, President Ardzinba dismissed temporary Mayor Leonid Osia and appointed Leonid Lolua in his stead. Lolua was reappointed on 10 May 2001 following the March 2001 local elections.
On 5 November 2004, in the heated aftermath of the 2004 presidential election, president Vladislav Ardzinba appointed head of the Gulripshi District assembly Adgur Kharazia as acting mayor. During his first speech he called upon the two leading candidates, Sergei Bagapsh and Raul Khadjimba, to both withdraw.
On 16 February 2005, after his election as president, Bagapsh replaced Kharazia with Astamur Adleiba, who had been Minister for Youth, Sports, Resorts and Tourism until December 2004. In the 11 February 2007 local elections, Adleiba successfully defended his seat in the Sukhumi city assembly and was thereupon reappointed mayor by Bagapsh on 20 March.
In April 2007, while President Bagapsh was in Moscow for medical treatment, the results of an investigation into corruption within the Sukhumi city administration were made public. The investigation found that large sums had been embezzled and upon his return, on 2 May, Bagapsh fired Adleiba along with his deputy Boris Achba, the head of the Sukhumi's finance department Konstantin Tuzhba and the head of the housing department David Jinjolia. On 4 June Adleiba paid back to the municipal budget 200,000 rubels. and on 23 July, he resigned from the Sukhumi city council, citing health reasons and the need to travel abroad for medical treatment.
On 15 May 2007, president Bagapsh released Alias Labakhua as First Deputy Chairman of the State Customs Committee and appointed him acting Mayor of Sukhumi, a post temporarily fulfilled by former Vice-Mayor Anzor Kortua. On 27 May Labakhua appointed Vadim Cherkezia as Deputy Chief of staff. On 2 September, Labakhua won the by-election in constituency No. 21, which had become necessary after Adleiba relinquished his seat. Adleiba was the only candidate and voter turnout was 34%, higher than the 25% required. Since Adleiba was now a member of the city assembly, president Bagapsh could permanently appoint him Mayor of Sukhumi on 18 September.
Following the May 2014 Revolution and the election of Raul Khajimba as president, he on 22 October dismissed Labakhua and again appointed (as acting Mayor) Adgur Kharazia, who at that point was Vice Speaker of the People's Assembly. Kharazia won the 4 April 2015 by-election to the City Council in constituency no. 3 unopposed, and was confirmed as mayor by Khajimba on 4 May. The 6th convocation of the Sukhumi City Council was elected 13 April 2016.
List of mayors
Transport
Sukhumi is served by the Sukhumi Trolleybus, consisting of 3 Lines.
There is a railway station in Sukhumi, that has a daily train to Moscow via Sochi.
Babushara Airport now handles only local flights due to the disputed status of Abkhazia.
Notable people
Notable people who are from or have resided in Sukhumi:
Anton Alikhanov (1986–present), Russian politician, governor of Kaliningrad Oblast
Alexander Ankvab (1952–present), Abkhaz politician and businessman, Prime Minister of Abkhazia.
Beslan Ajinjal (1974–present), is a former Russian footballer.
Ruslan Ajinjal (1974–present), is a former Russian-Abkhazian footballer.
Otari Arshba (1955–present), Russian politician and member of the State Duma of the Russian Federation.
Hadzhera Avidzba (1917–1997), Abkhazia's first professional pianist.
Meri Avidzba (1917–1986), Abkhaz female pilot who fought during the Great Patriotic War of 1942–1945.
Verdicenan Achba (1825–1889), seventh wife of Sultan Abdulmejid I of the Ottoman Empire.
Sergei Bagapsh (1949–2011), Second President of the Republic of Abkhazia
Guram Gabiskiria (1947–1993), Mayor of Sukhumi and National Hero of Georgia.
Demna Gvasalia (1981–present), Georgian fashion designer.
Fazil Iskander (1929–2016), Russian writer and poet.
Sergey Kiriyenko (1962–present), Russian politician, First Deputy Chief of Staff of the Presidential Administration of Russia.
Vera Kobalia (1981–present), Georgian politician.
Daur Kove (1979–present), current Minister for Foreign Affairs of Abkhazia.
Kokkai Futoshi (1981–present), former professional sumo wrestler.
Siranush Gasparyan, Armenian opera singer born in Sukhum.
International relations
Twin towns — Sister cities
Sukhumi is twinned with the following cities:
Ufa, Russia
Krasnodar, Russia
Tiraspol, Transnistria, Moldova
Cherkessk, Russia
Podolsk, Russia
Volgograd, Russia
Grozny, Russia
Stepanakert, Artsakh/Azerbaijan (disputed)
Arkhangelsk, Russia
Nizhny Novgorod, Russia
Sant'Antioco, Italy
Side, Turkey
Managua, Nicaragua
See also
Sukhumi District
List of twin towns and sister cities in Georgia
Notes
References
Sources and external links
GigaCatholic for the titular see, linking to incumbent biographies
UNOMIG photo gallery of Sukhumi
Milesian Pontic colonies
Capitals in Asia
Capitals in Europe
Port cities in Asia
Port cities in Europe
Port cities of the Black Sea
Greek colonies in Colchis
Georgian Black Sea coast
Sukhum Okrug
Populated places in Abkhazia
Populated places established in the 6th century BC |
4305902 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/McCool%20Hill | McCool Hill | McCool Hill is the tallest of the Columbia Hills in Gusev crater, Mars. It was named in honor of William C. McCool, an astronaut of the Space Shuttle Columbia during its final mission where it disintegrated during atmospheric reentry (see Space Shuttle Columbia disaster).
The hill was to be Spirit rover's next target. She was expected to reach significant north-facing slopes on the hill in mid-April 2006, and spend her second winter on Mars there. However, on the way to the slopes on "McCool Hill" between outcrops nicknamed "Oberth" and "Korolev," Spirit ran into an impassable sandy area. To increase solar power output, Spirits handlers redirected the rover to a closer north-facing slope in an area known as "Low Ridge" or "Low Ridge Haven," about 20 meters away from the rover's position on sol 802 (April 5, 2006). Spirit spent the rest of the Martian winter here, operating from a fixed position for long periods of time, attempting to observe very small changes that would not be noticeable otherwise because the rover was moving much more often. Mission directors were undecided on where to go in the spring, either to re-attempt the climb of McCool Hill, go back to Home Plate, or elsewhere. In the end they decided to go to Low Ridge Haven.
Husband Hill was originally thought to be the highest of the Columbia Hills as seen from Columbia Memorial Station until surveying by Spirit updated elevation levels, placing McCool as the highest.
See also
Husband Hill
Geography of Mars
External links
Spirit Discovers "New" Highest Peak in "Columbia Hills" (2006-Mar-02)
Official Mars Rovers site
Hills on Mars
Aeolis quadrangle |
4306736 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hans%20Schindler%20Bellamy | Hans Schindler Bellamy | Hans Schindler (19 March 1901 – Vienna, 12 December 1982), authornames H.S. Bellamy and Hans Schindler Bellamy, was an English professor in Vienna and an author on pseudoarchaeology. His books investigate the work of Austrian engineer Hanns Hörbiger and German selenographer Philipp Fauth and the now-defunct Cosmic Ice (Glacial Cosmogony) Theory.
Hans Schindler was an English teacher at the Folk High School in the Vienna district of Margareten. Between 1930 and 1938 he published several English textbook as well as two booklet on English folksongs and on the history of the English language. As Jews and social-democrats he and his wife Rosie were fierce opponents of the Nazi-party. After the Anschluss of 1938 both fled to Britain, where he became a BBC-surveillor of German radio broadcasts. In 1946 he returned to Vienna and continued his work for the Folk High Schools. He died in 1982 and was buried in Kfar Menahem (Israel), where his son lived; his wife then also settled in Israel, where she died in 2015 at the age of 102.
In 1936 his first book on the Cosmic Ice Theory (Moons, Myths and Man) was published under the pen-name H.S. Bellamy by the London Publisher Faber & Faber Ltd. The book describes Hörbiger's theory in detail, as well as its application to world myths. In 1945 he published a study on Book of Genesis; his subsequent books develop the World Ice Theory in light of other Bible books, the Atlantis myth, and the Tiwanaku archaeological site in Bolivia. The books he wrote with Peter Allen were awarded by the Sociedad Arqueológica de Bolivia in 1958.
In 1971 he finished a book by the deceased right-wing author Rudolf Elmayer von Vestenbrugg (1881-1970) Eingriffe aus den Kosmos (Interventions from Outer Space).
In 1975 Schindler delivered a lecture at the 2nd World Congress of the Ancient Astronaut Society in Zürich.
Citations
"... considers the Moon to be a metallo-mineral body covered with a sphere of ice... captured out of transterrestrial space where, probably not so very long ago, it existed as an independent planet ...".
"... Hydrogen and oxygen exist in the universe in their natural combination H2O, water, in its cosmic form: ice".
"When a block of this 'Cosmic Ice' plunges into a glowing star the impact generates heat. The ice turns into steam. Thermo-chemical decomposition splits the steam into its constituents. Most of the oxygen is bound to the stellar matter, producing more heat. Practically all the hydrogen is exhaled into space. The star-matter-bound oxygen and the 'spatial' hydrogen form the vast stores out of which the Cosmic Ice is generated and its supplies repleted". (Moons, Myths and Man, 1936)
Works
Moons, Myths and Man: A Reinterpretation. Faber & Faber: London, 1936, also 1949 revised
The Book of Revelation is History.Faber & Faber: London, 1942
Built before the Flood. The problem of the Tiahuanaco ruins. Faber & Faber: London, 1943
In the Beginning God. A new scientific vindication of cosmogonic myths in the Book of Genesis. Faber & Faber: London, 1945
The Atlantis Myth. Faber & Faber: London, 1948. 8o.
Life History of our Earth. Based on the geological application of Hoerbiger's Theory. Faber & Faber: London, 1951
The Calendar of Tiahuanaco. A disquisition on the time measuring system of the oldest civilization in the world. Faber & Faber: London, 1956, with Peter Allan
The Great Idol of Tiahuanaco. An interpretation in the light of the Hoerbiger theory of satellites of the glyphs carved on its surface. Faber & Faber: London, 1959, with Peter Allan
References
1901 births
1982 deaths
Atlantis proponents
Catastrophism
Pseudohistorians
Religious cosmologies
Austrian science writers
Austrian people of Jewish descent |
4310977 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/165P/LINEAR | 165P/LINEAR | 165P/LINEAR is a periodic comet in the Solar System. 165P/LINEAR has a perihelion distance of 6.8 AU, and is a Chiron-type comet with (TJupiter smaller than 3 and a semi-major axis larger than Jupiter's).
References
External links
Orbital simulation from JPL (Java) / Horizons Ephemeris
165P on Seiichi Yoshida's comet list
Periodic comets
Chiron-type comets
0165 |
4311114 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/167P/CINEOS | 167P/CINEOS | 167P/CINEOS () is a large periodic comet and active, grey centaur, approximately in diameter, orbiting the Sun outside the orbit of Saturn. It was discovered on August 10, 2004, by astronomers with the CINEOS survey at Gran Sasso in Italy. It is one of only a handful known Chiron-type comets.
The comet nucleus (~66 km) is roughly half the size of (Bernardinelli–Bernstein) and it has a similar perihelion point just outside the orbit of Saturn.
Description
Due to its high Jupiter tisserand of 3.5, and a semi-major axis larger than that of Jupiter, 167P/CINEOS is classified as a Chiron-type comet, named after the groups namesake, 2060 Chiron or 95P/Chiron, designated as both minor planet and comet.
167P/CINEOS was first reported as a minor planet, designated , but was found to have a very faint asymmetric cometary coma. Contrary to Chiron, which is the prototype object for the dynamical group of centaurs, 167P/CINEOS has no "dual status" as comet and minor planet, and demonstrates the inconsistencies in applying the current rules for designating small Solar System bodies. 167P/CINEOS not only has orbital parameters similar to those of Chiron, but also a low B–R magnitude of , which places it into the group grey centaurs.
In June 2039, 167P/CINEOS will pass 1.64 AU from Uranus.
References
External links
167P on Seiichi Yoshida's comet list
Chiron-type comets
Periodic comets
0167
20040810 |
4311177 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/168P/Hergenrother | 168P/Hergenrother | 168P/Hergenrother is a periodic comet in the Solar System. The comet originally named P/1998 W2 returned in 2005 and got the temporary name P/2005 N2. The comet was last observed in January 2020, and may have continued fragmenting after the 2012 outburst.
2012 outburst
The comet came to perihelion on October 1, 2012, and was expected to reach about apparent magnitude 15.2, but due to an outburst the comet reached apparent magnitude 8. As a result of the outburst of gas and dust, the comet was briefly more than 500 times brighter than it would have been without the outburst. On October 19, 2012, images by the Virtual Telescope Project showed a dust cloud trailing the nucleus. Images by the Faulkes Telescope North on October 26, 2012, confirm a fragmentation event. The secondary fragment was about magnitude 17. Further observations by the Gemini telescope show that the comet fragmented into at least four parts.
2019
168P came to perihelion on August 5, 2019, when it was 76 degrees from the Sun. It then made a closest approach to Earth on 6 November 6, 2019, when it was from Earth with a solar elongation of about 110 degrees. It was not recovered until January 3, 2020, when it was 141 degrees from the Sun, but only two observations on a single night were reported.
References
External links
168P on Seiichi Yoshida's comet list
Elements and Ephemeris for 168P/Hergenrother – Minor Planet Center
168P at Kronk's Cometography
Comet 168P Hergenrother in outburst (Google+ chat archive Oct 12, 2012)
Comet Hergenrother in Outburst (Carl Hergenrother : 20 Oct 2012)
Comet 168P and fragment as seen by Kitt Peak WIYN on 30 Oct 2012
Scientists Monitor Comet Breakup (168P-Hergenrother was imaged by the NOAO/Gemini telescope Nov. 2, 2012)
Temporal Correlation Between Outbursts and Fragmentation Events of Comet 168P/Hergenrother (arXiv:1409.7641 : 26 Sep 2014)
Periodic comets
0168
Comets in 2019
Split comets |
4311252 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/169P/NEAT | 169P/NEAT | 169/NEAT is a periodic comet in the Solar System. It is the parent body of the alpha Capricornids meteor shower in Late July. 169/NEAT may be related to comet P/2003 T12 (SOHO). It comes to perihelion (closest approach to the Sun) on 9 July 2022. On 13 July 2022 passed from Venus. On 11 August 2026 it will pass from Earth and then come to perihelion on 21 September 2026.
169P is a low activity comet roughly a few kilometers in diameter. 169P and the smaller body P/2003 T12 likely fragmented from a parent body roughly 2900 years ago.
References
External links
Orbital simulation from JPL (Java) / Horizons Ephemeris
169P on Seiichi Yoshida's comet list
Periodic comets
169P
0169
Meteor shower progenitors
Comets in 2022 |
4311325 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/170P/Christensen | 170P/Christensen | 170P/Christensen is a periodic comet in the Solar System. It came to perihelion in September 2014 at about apparent magnitude 18.
References
External links
Orbital simulation from JPL (Java) / Horizons Ephemeris
170P on Seiichi Yoshida's comet list
Elements and Ephemeris for 170P/Christensen – Minor Planet Center
Periodic comets
0170
170P
20050617 |
4318261 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Badr-1 | Badr-1 | Badr-A (, meaning Full Moon-A) was the first artificial and the first digital communications satellite launched by Pakistan's national space authority — the SUPARCO — in 1990. The Badr-A was Pakistan's first indigenously developed and manufactured digital communications and an experimental artificial satellite which was launched into low Earth orbit by Pakistan on 16 July 1990, through a Chinese carrier rocket. The launch ushered new military, technological, and scientific developments in Pakistan and also provided data on radio-signal distribution in the ionosphere. Originally planned to be launched from the United States in 1986, the Challenger disaster further delayed the launch of the satellite which changed the plan. After the People's Republic of China offered Pakistan to use its facility, the Badr-A was finally launched from Xichang Satellite Launch Center in 1990 on Long March 2E. Badr-A travelled at , taking 96.3 minutes to complete an orbit, and emitted radio signals at the 145 to 435 MHz bands which were operated by Pakistan Amateur Radio Society (PARS). The Badr-A successfully completed its designed life, and a new satellite was proposed to be developed.
Before the launch
The history of the Badr-A project dated back to 1979, when Indian Space Research Organisation (ISRO) successfully launched their first satellite, Aryabhata, in 1975. After four years, on 13 December 1979, Munir Ahmad Khan managed a cabinet-level meeting with Chief Martial Law Administrator General Muhammad Zia-ul-Haq and gained Suparco's status as an executive authority. In 1981, Salim Mehmud addressed Munir Ahmad Khan proposing the development of an Earth-orbiting artificial satellite, the task previously achieved by India. Munir Ahmad Khan took the matter to General Zia-ul-Haq who gave approval of this project. As part of the development of this project, Suparco sent a number of its engineers to University of Surrey to participate in the development of UO-11 which was launched in 1984. After participating in various projects with University of Surrey, the team returned to Pakistan in 1986. Munir Ahmad Khan then returned to General Zia-ul-Haq and obtained his approval to begin practical work on Badr-1. The project was started by Suparco's Dr. Salim Mehmud as director of the project and was supported by the members of Pakistan Amateur Radio Society. The Suparco began building the satellite at the Instrumentation Laboratories (IL), with Dr. Muhammad Riaz Suddle serving as its project manager. This project was called "Project Badr" and the Project Badr was initially funded financially by Ministry of Telecommunications and the Ministry of Science. In short span of time, the Project Badr was completed, and the first satellite was named Badr-1.
Design
The technical director of Badr-1 was dr. Salim Mehmud, Director of SUPARCO and the project was overseen by Dr. Muhammad Riaz Suddle, who served as its project manager. The satellite was slightly bigger than Soviet Sputnik 1 satellite in size. The Badr-1 was an indigenously built and developed satellite of Pakistan. The major contractor was Instrumentation Laboratories and the Pakistan Amateur Radio Society, supported by Ministry of Science and the Ministry of Telecommunications. The satellite shaped as a polyhedron with 26 surfaces or facets, was about 20 inches in diameter. The polyhedrons, covered with highly polished heat shield, made of aluminium-magnesium-titanium. The satellite carried two antennas designed by Instrumentation Laboratories. The power supply, with a mass of 52 kg. The satellite was powered with solar power panels with a 12.5 W electricity. The satellite was designed in SUPARCO's Satellite Research and Development Center in Lahore. The satellite had one radio channel for digital store-and-forward communications.
A transponder uplink was near 435 MHz, and the downlink was near 145 MHz. The telemetry beacon was near 145 MHz. Data from 32 telemetry channels, including information from 9 temperature sensors, 16 current sensors, and 5 voltage sensors, was stored in an 8k memory bank and transmitted at 1200, 600, 300 and 150 baud.<reference doesn't contain this info>Originally designed for a circular orbit at 250–300 miles' altitude, Badr-1 actually was inserted by the Long March rocket into an elliptical orbit of 127–615 miles. The cost of development and preparation of satellite was no more than Rs. 1.2 million.<reference doesn't contain this information >
Launch vehicle preparation and launch site selection
The SUPARCO negotiated with the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) for the launch of the satellite and approval required from the United States Government for the launch of the Badr-1. The Air Force Strategic Command decided to fly the satellite by using one of its C-130 aircraft in 1986 to Florida, United States. The Delta 3000 was selected by NASA's administration as its launch vehicle. Preparation was made and its crew and satellite was stored at the aircraft, however, it was delayed due to unknown reasons. The Badr-1 was never shipped to United States and its launch was delayed for until next four years. As aftermath of the Challenger disaster in 1986, the United States Government and NASA had halt all the flights of the rockets carrying spacecraft and satellite payloads until the investigations were thoroughly completed. The satellite was stored at the Instrumentation Laboratories (IL) and SUPARCO began to negotiate with other space powers. In 1990, representatives of Chinese government offered Government of Pakistan to launch the satellite on one of its Long March Rockets and its facility. SUPARCO did not want to wait any longer, therefore, the Air Force Strategic Command flew the satellite, in sub-assembly form, to People's Republic of China. The satellite was re-assembled by Air Force Strategic Command and Suparco's official who visited the Xichang Satellite Launch Center. The satellite was load at the Launch Area 2 and final preparations were made. The Chinese Government used Long March 2E, a three-stage orbital carrier rocket designed to commercial communications satellites, to launch the Badr-1 who also took its first maiden flight with the launch of Badr-1 on 16 July 1990.
Launch and mission
On 16 July 1990, the Badr-1 was launched as a secondary payload on a Long March 2E rocket from Area No. 2 at XSLC. Badr-1, a low-Earth orbit satellite, circled the Earth's orbit every 96 minutes, passing over Pakistan for 15 minutes three to four times a day. Scientists, engineers, technicians, and designers who developed the satellite watched the launch from range. They waited about 93 minutes to ensure that the satellite had made one orbit and was transmitting, before dr. M. Shafi Ahmad called Prime minister Benazir Bhutto. The downlink telemetry included data on temperatures inside and on the surface of the sphere. The satellite itself, a small but highly polished polyhedron, was barely visible at sixth magnitude, and thus more difficult to follow optically. The satellite completed its designated life successfully. On the first orbit, the Suparco globally announced the launch of the satellite, and the Science ministry confirmed the launch of the satellite. As the satellite completed its life, a new project was launched, more ambitious, advanced, and difficult than Badr-1. However, even after the Badr-1I was completed, the satellite could not be able to launch until 2001.
Achievement
With the successful development and launch of the Badr-1, Pakistan became the first Muslim country, and second South Asian country after India, to place a satellite in orbit. The satellite gave Pakistani scientists an academic, scientific, and an amateur community experience in telemetry, tracking, control and data communications as the satellite successfully completed store and dump message tests for 5 weeks.
Despite the international success gained, the Pakistans' accomplishments were kept quiet in the homeland to prevent any exploitation of their failures or loss of secrets, which undermined the propaganda opportunity. The Pakistan Television, a state-controlled media authority, announced the first launch in televisions never made a headline, and only fewer details were projected. The Badr-1 crushed the global perception that the country had not space program, and the space program was only dedicated to its military applications. The launch of the satellite united the people of Pakistan, and scientists who were involved in this project, were bestowed with national honours in public, and increased the pride of Pakistan.
The satellite formed the derivatives and the basis of the Badr-B satellite. The Badr-B was more sophisticated than Badr-l, with a CCD camera for pictures of Earth and a system that allowed ground stations to change the satellite's direction in space.
Mission goals
acquiring know-how for indigenous development of satellites
creating an infrastructure for future satellite development activities
testing the performance of indigenously developed satellite subsystems in space environment
performing experiments in real-time voice and data communications between two user ground stations
demonstrating store-and-forward type message communication
educating the country's academic, scientific and amateur community in the tracking and use of low-earth-orbiting satellites
Technical configuration
See also
Badr-B
Badr (satellite)
Space and Upper Atmosphere Research Commission
References
External links
Official SUPARCO site
Space Today writeup
ARRL site
Satellites formerly orbiting Earth
Badr satellites
Space programme of Pakistan
History of science and technology in Pakistan
First artificial satellites of a country
Government of Benazir Bhutto
China–Pakistan relations
Spacecraft launched in 1990 |
4319113 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Hubble%20Heritage%20Project | Hubble Heritage Project | The Hubble Heritage Project was founded in 1998 by Keith Noll, Howard Bond, Forrest Hamilton, Anne Kinney, and Zoltan Levay at the Space Telescope Science Institute. Until its end in 2016, the Hubble Heritage Project released, on an almost monthly basis, pictures of celestial objects like planets, stars, galaxies and galaxy clusters.
Description
The team of astronomers and image processing specialists selected images from the Hubble Space Telescope's public data archive and planned new observations with the goal of producing aesthetically impactful, full color images that preserved the scientific integrity of the data.
The Project was recognized for its contribution to public inspiration. Achievements for the team include the Astronomical Society of the Pacific 2003 Klumpke-Roberts Award for "outstanding contributions to the public understanding and appreciation of astronomy." In 2002, two Heritage images were selected in the Rochester Institute of Technology's "Images From Science" traveling gallery exhibit. Several images have been selected by the US and UK postal systems. In 2000, a first-class US postage stamp showing the Ring Nebula was one of five Hubble images selected to be part of a commemorative series of stamps honoring astronomer Edwin P. Hubble.
The website of the project contained information about the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope and the images are now preserved on the Hubble Space Telescope's outreach website, Hubblesite (see link below).
See also
List of astronomical societies
References
External links
The Hubble Space Telescope outreach website
The Hubble Space Telescope imaging blog
The European Homepage for the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope
Space Telescope European Coordinating Facility
European Space Agency
Astronomy organizations
Hubble Space Telescope
Scientific organizations established in 1998 |
4319780 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pistoia%20Mountains%20Astronomical%20Observatory | Pistoia Mountains Astronomical Observatory | The Pistoia Mountains Astronomical Observatory (; obs. code: 104), also known as the San Marcello Observatory and the Pian dei Termini Observatory (), is an astronomical observatory in San Marcello Piteglio, Tuscany, central Italy.
The observatory uses a 0.4- and 0.6-meter Newton-Cassegrain telescope and is the home of the Gruppo Astrofili Montagna Pistoiese, a group of amateur astronomers known for its members Luciano Tesi (founder), Silvano Casulli, Paolo Bacci, Vasco Cecchini and late Vittorio Goretti.
List of discovered minor planets
See also
List of asteroid-discovering observatories
List of astronomical observatories
References
External links
Gruppo Astrofili Montagna Pistoiese
A review of the observatory
An old page about the observatory
Astronomical observatories in Italy
Buildings and structures in Tuscany
Minor-planet discovering observatories
San Marcello Piteglio |
4320110 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Only%20an%20Excuse%3F | Only an Excuse? | Only an Excuse? is an annual Scottish comedy sketch show that was broadcast on BBC One Scotland on Hogmanay from 1993 to 2020.
It starred the actor and comedian Jonathan Watson and featured impressions of some of Scottish football's great characters such as Denis Law, Tommy Burns, Barry Ferguson, Sir Alex Ferguson, Frank McAvennie, Walter Smith and Graeme Souness, as well as caricatures of the "stereotypical" Old Firm fan.
History
Only an Excuse? was first broadcast as a one-off special on BBC Radio Scotland, prior to the 1987 Scottish Cup Final. It was a parody of the five-part BBC Scotland television documentary Only a Game?, which had aired in Scotland prior to the 1986 World Cup Finals and comprehensively documented the history of Scottish football. The documentary was narrated by Scottish novelist William McIlvanney, whose distinctive voice was expertly mimicked by Jonathan Watson for the radio spoof.
After further occasional radio specials including Only Another Excuse?, A Tale of Two Seasons and Only a World Cup Excuse, all of which were released on cassette by BBC Scotland, the show switched to television in 1993, retaining its original double act of Rangers fan Watson and Celtic fan Tony Roper. The first episode replaced Rikki Fulton's long-running annual comedy sketch show Scotch and Wry in the Hogmanay television schedules.
The show has also been performed at the theatre, with the most recent performance of Only An Excuse? taking place at the Glasgow Royal Concert Hall in September 2004. The scripts of the early theatre shows, written by Philip Differ, were published in the book Only an Excuse?: The Scripts by Mainstream Publishing in 1995.
In December 2020, it was confirmed that the 2020 episode would be an hour long programme and that Watson and Differ would not be making any further episodes.
Spin-offs
Jonathan Watson appeared in a spin-off called Only a Wee Excuse on Tam Cowan's weekly Offside programme. Up until the last series, Watson's slot was a scaled-down version of the full show, but from the last series onward saw Watson appearing in the studio without costume to perform his impersonations (as in his theatre performances). Another noticeable difference is that Watson starts each segment in his own voice and sets the context and then ends again in his own voice saying, "And that Tam was the week that wisnae."
Watson appeared in a sketch in the BBC's Children in Need 2008 telethon as Alex Ferguson being interviewed by Adrian Chiles.
Regular cast
Jonathan Watson (1993–2020)
Tony Roper (1993–1994)
Ross Stenhouse (1993)
Grant Smeaton (1993-1994, 1997, 1999-2010)
Juliette Gilmour (1993-1994)
Alistair McGowan (1995–1998)
Greg Hemphill (1995-1996)
Lewis MacLeod (1995)
Gordon Kennedy (1995-1996)
Susan Nisbet (1997-1998)
Laurie Ventry (1998)
Geoff Boyz (1999)
Iain Davidson (1999-2000)
June Brogan (1999)
Fiona Henderson (1999)
Paul Reid (2000–2001)
Gabriel Quigley (2001)
Tom Urie (2002–2005)
Elaine M. Ellis (2003–2005)
Marj Hogarth (2005)
Matt Costello (2006-2010)
Jordan Young (2006)
Julie Austin (2006-2010, 2012-2013)
Gerard Kelly (2006)
Clare Waugh (2007, 2011, 2015)
Paul-James Corrigan (2007, 2009-2010)
Johnny Austin (2008)
Heather Reid (2009)
Adam Smith (2011)
Scott Fletcher (2011)
Gerry McLaughlin (2011–2014)
Amanda Marment (2011–2014)
Chris Forbes (2012, 2014, 2018)
Robert Yates (2012)
Josh York (2013)
Sally Reid (2014, 2016)
Charlene Boyd (2014)
Ryan Fletcher (2015–2018)
Louise McCarthy (2015–2019)
James Young (2015)
Moyo Akandé (2017)
Fiona Wood (2018)
Mark Cox (2019)
Joy McAvoy (2019-2020)
Alex Norton (2019)
Guests
Figures from Scottish entertainment regularly appeared, as themselves. These included Hazel Irvine, Kelly Dalglish, Gordon Brewer, Catriona Shearer, Reevel Alderson, Jackie Bird, Cathy MacDonald, Chris Hoy, Kirsty Wark, Judy Murray, Muriel Gray, Michelle McManus and Judith Ralston.
References
External links
1990s Scottish television series
2000s Scottish television series
2010s Scottish television series
2020s Scottish television series
1993 Scottish television series debuts
2020 Scottish television series endings
BBC Scotland television sketch shows
Cultural depictions of association football players
Football mass media in Scotland
Hogmanay
New Year's television specials
Scots-language mass media
Scottish Premiership on television
Sports television in Scotland
Television series by Banijay |
4321150 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dibenzylideneacetone | Dibenzylideneacetone | 'DibenzylideneacetoneDibenzylideneacetone or dibenzalacetone, often abbreviated dba''', is an organic compound with the formula C17H14O. It is a pale-yellow solid insoluble in water, but soluble in ethanol.
It was first prepared in 1881 by the German chemist Rainer Ludwig Claisen (1851–1930) and the Swiss chemist Charles-Claude-Alexandre Claparède (14 April 1858 – 1 November 1913).Claisen wrote that the German chemist Adolf Baeyer might have synthesized dibenzylideneacetone as early as 1866, although the evidence wasn't clear.
(Claisen & Claparède, 1881), p. 350: "Die Einwirkung wasserentziehender Mittel auf ein solches Gemenge ist schon von Baeyer1) flüchtig untersucht worden. Nach ihm entsteht als Endprodukt ein gelbes, in Alkohol unlösliches Harz, als Zwischenprodukt ein ölförmiger, unzersetzt siedender und cumarinartig riechender Körper, der, wie er meint, das Methylketon der Zimmtsäure darstellt." (The effect of a dehydrating agent on such a mixture has already been briefly investigated by Baeyer1). According to him, a yellow resin [that's] insoluble in alcohol arises as a final product, [and] as an intermediate, [there arises] an oily substance [which] boils without decomposing and smells like coumarin [and] which, he thinks, represents the methyl ketone of cinnamic acid.)
; see p. 82. From p. 82: "Um für diese Ansicht noch einen weiteren Beweis beizubringen, habe ich ein Gemenge von Bittermandelöl und Aceton mit wasserentziehenden Mitteln, Salzsäure, Schwefelsäure, Kali behandelt. Die Condensation erfolgt ausserordentlich schnell, schon nach wenigen Minuten, und nach einiger Zeit verharzt die ganze Masse. Das Endproduct ist ein gelbes Harz, das in Aether löslich und durch Alkohol daraus als gelbes Pulver gefällt wird, welches schwach nach Rhabarber riecht. Die Analyse gab keine verständlichen Zahlen, daher ist die Substanz wahrscheinlich ein Gemenge. Zuerst bildet sich aber ein öliger, unzersetzt flüchtiger Körper, der einen an Cumarin erinnernden Geruch besitzt, und der höchst wahrscheinlich das Methylaceton der Zimmtsäure ist: … ." (In order to provide further proof for this view, I have treated a mixture of benzaldehyde and acetone with dehydrating agents [e.g.,] hydrochloric acid, sulfuric acid, potash. The condensation occurs extraordinarily quickly, after just a few minutes, and after some time the whole mass becomes resinous. The final product is a yellow resin, which [is] soluble in ether and is precipitated therefrom by alcohol as a yellow powder, which smells faintly of rhubarb. Analysis [to determine its empirical formula] produced no intelligible numbers, so the substance is probably a mixture. Initially, however, an oily, stable, volatile substance is formed, which has a smell recalling coumarin, and which is very likely the methyl acetone of cinnamic acid: … .)
Preparation
The trans,trans'' isomer can be prepared in high yield and purity by condensation of benzaldehyde and acetone with sodium hydroxide in a water/ethanol medium followed by recrystallization.
This reaction, which proceeds via the intermediacy of benzylideneacetone, is often performed in organic chemistry classes, and is called Claisen-Schmidt condensation.
Reactions and derivatives
Prolonged exposure to sunlight initiates [2+2] cycloadditions, converting it to a mixture of dimeric and trimeric cyclobutane cycloadducts.
Uses
Dibenzylideneacetone is used as a component in sunscreens and as a ligand in organometallic chemistry.
For example, it is a component of the catalyst tris(dibenzylideneacetone)dipalladium(0). It is a labile ligand that is easily displaced by triphenylphosphine, hence it serves a useful entry point into palladium(0) chemistry.
References
Enones
Sunscreening agents |
4323467 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Holidays%20with%20Pay%20%28Agriculture%29%20Convention%2C%201952 | Holidays with Pay (Agriculture) Convention, 1952 | Holidays with Pay (Agriculture) Convention, 1952 is an International Labour Organization Convention.
It was established in 1952, with the preamble stating:
Revision
The principles contained in the convention were subsequently revised and included in the ILO Convention C132, Holidays with Pay Convention (Revised), 1970.
Ratifications
As of 2013, the convention had been ratified by 46 states. Of the ratifying states, 12 had denounced the treaty by an automatic process which denounces the 1952 convention when the state ratifies a superseding treaty.
External links
Text.
Ratifications.
Leave of absence
International Labour Organization conventions
Holidays
Treaties concluded in 1952
Treaties entered into force in 1954
Agricultural treaties
Treaties of Algeria
Treaties of Antigua and Barbuda
Treaties of Austria
Treaties of Barbados
Treaties of Belize
Treaties of Burundi
Treaties of the Central African Republic
Treaties of Colombia
Treaties of Costa Rica
Treaties of the Comoros
Treaties of Cuba
Treaties of Djibouti
Treaties of Ecuador
Treaties of the Republic of Egypt (1953–1958)
Treaties of the French Fourth Republic
Treaties of Gabon
Treaties of Guatemala
Treaties of Israel
Treaties of Mauritania
Treaties of Morocco
Treaties of the Netherlands
Treaties of New Zealand
Treaties of Paraguay
Treaties of Peru
Treaties of the Polish People's Republic
Treaties of Saint Lucia
Treaties of Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
Treaties of Senegal
Treaties of Sierra Leone
Treaties of Francoist Spain
Treaties of Suriname
Treaties of Eswatini
Treaties of the United Arab Republic
Treaties of Tanganyika
Treaties extended to the Netherlands Antilles
Treaties extended to Aruba
Treaties extended to Surinam (Dutch colony)
Treaties extended to French Guiana
Treaties extended to Guadeloupe
Treaties extended to Martinique
Treaties extended to Réunion
Treaties extended to the West Indies Federation
Treaties extended to British Honduras
Treaties extended to the Isle of Man
Treaties extended to British Mauritius
Treaties extended to the Crown Colony of Singapore
Treaties extended to Swaziland (protectorate)
Treaties extended to Tanganyika (territory)
Treaties extended to British Hong Kong
1952 in labor relations |
4324335 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pisa%20International%20Airport | Pisa International Airport | Pisa International Airport () , also named Galileo Galilei Airport is an airport located in Pisa, Italy. It is the main airport in Tuscany and the 10th in Italy in terms of passengers. It is named after Galileo Galilei, the famous scientist and native of Pisa. The airport was first developed for the military in the 1930s and 1940s.
The airport was used by 5,233,118 passengers in 2017. It serves as a focus city of Ryanair.
Overview
Since 2017 the airport has its own Pisa Mover shuttle service to and from Pisa Central railway station. A return ticket is ten euros and the shuttle takes 5 minutes. The airport also has 5 passenger and 1 coach parking areas.
Besides civilian operations, the airport is also used extensively by the Aeronautica Militare (Italian Air Force) and is a base for, amongst others, the C-130 Hercules and C-27J Spartan transport aircraft. The airport is home to 46ª Brigata Aerea Silvio Angelucci (46th Air Brigade). During the end of World War II the airport was used as a base for the 15th Air Force of the United States Army Air Forces.
Facilities
The airport is at an elevation of above mean sea level. It has 2 asphalt paved runways: 04R/22L measuring and 04L/22R measuring . The terminal building has 16 gates (numbered 01–11 and 21–25), one of which (Gate 23) is equipped with a jetbridge, however this is almost never used. Gates 1–11 are on the ground floor and are for Schengen flights. Shuttle buses are used to take passengers to the plane. Gates 21–25 are non-Schengen and are on level one. Walk-boarding, bus-boarding and boarding by jetway is used here.
Airlines and destinations
The following airlines operate regular scheduled and charter flights at Pisa Airport:
Statistics
In 2006 and 2007, the airport was the fastest growing among Italy's top 15 airports with passenger numbers up 30% in 2006 and 24% in 2007. In 2008 it was Italy's 11 busiest airport handling and 4,011,525 passengers in 2010. In 2011 the growth rise to 11.3% and the airport carried 4.526.723 passengers.
Accidents and incidents
On 27 January 1952, Seaboard & Western Airlines Douglas C-54A-5-DO overshot the runway on landing. Fire consumed the aircraft. 47 out of the 50 cows carried on board the plane died.
On 23 November 2009, Italian Air Force Lockheed KC-130J Hercules MM62176 of the based 46 Aerobrigata crashed just after take-off. All five crew members were killed.
See also
Pisa Aeroporto railway station
Florence Airport, Peretola, the second Tuscan international airport
Marina di Campo Airport, another Tuscan airport
References
External links
Official website
Toscana Aeroporti website
News about the airport
Airports in Italy
Transport in Tuscany
Airport
Buildings and structures in Pisa
Geography of Pisa
Airfields of the United States Army Air Forces in Italy
Airports established in 1911
1911 establishments in Italy |
4327995 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/National%20emblem%20of%20East%20Timor | National emblem of East Timor | The national emblem of East Timor (officially: Timor-Leste) is one of the national symbols of East Timor.
Current emblem
The emblem, also known as Belak (Tetum for "Disk"), was introduced on 18 January 2007 by Law 2/2007, replacing the coat of arms based on the shield of the National Council of Timorese Resistance (CNRT), which had been used since independence in 2002. The current coat of arms is a variant of the emblem used by East Timorese representatives during Indonesian occupation. It is based on a design first used when the country unilaterally declared independence on 28 November 1975.
Design
The center of the coat of arms shows the outline of the highest mountain in East Timor, the Tatamailau (Foho Ramelau), on a white background in the national colors "ruby red" on the outside, black on the inside with a thin golden-yellow border. It is shaped like a square pyramid with three corners pointing down and one pointing up. The edges are arched.
In the center of the top corner of the mountain is a five-pointed white star. One of the points of the star, without touching it, points to the top corner of the mountain. Out of the star come five white, pyramidal rays, ending at the top of an open book located in the upper part of the black part of the mountain.
The book has a ruby red cover, the edges are golden yellow. There are four black lines on the right side of the book and five on the left. There is a golden yellow band at the bottom of the pages. The book is in front of a golden yellow cog wheel standing on a golden yellow pedestal. To the right of the gear wheel and book is an ear of rice with two leaves and eleven grains, to the left is a corncob, also with two leaves. Both are golden yellow and turned tip down.
Below the gear and book is a white-rimmed Kalashnikov with butt to the left and barrel to the right. The barrel is slightly higher than the butt, but does not touch the gear. A golden-yellow, Timorese spear (diman) lies behind the weapon, the tip of which points to the left.
Below the rifle, in the middle of the black part of the mountain, is a yellow-gold, Timorese bow (Rama-inan), the string of which points upwards.
Below the outline of the mountain is a wavy, "light red" framed, white banner on which the new national motto is written in ruby red in Portuguese: "Unidade, Acção, Progresso". This band runs in waves parallel to the edge of the mountain outline.
The mountain and banner are surrounded by two thin dark red rings. Between the circles is the official country name in Portuguese, República Democrática de Timor-Leste, on a white background with ruby red writing in the upper part . The inscription runs on the ring from the level of the lower left corner of Mount Tatamailau to the level of the lower right corner. In the lower part of the ring is the abbreviation of the country name RDTL.
Meaning
The coat of arms symbolizes the globe with the country of East Timor and at the same time stands for national unity. The white background color within the ring, star and rays symbolizes peace. The yellow in the coat of arms signifies wealth, black symbolizes the eclipse that must be conquered, and red represents love of homeland and the struggle for national liberation.
The five points of the star symbolize the light of generosity and honesty leading the people to peace. Its rays represent the light of solidarity and the will to bring peace to the whole world.
The four corners of the outline of Mount Tatamailau represent the principle of the separation of powers (president, parliament, government, and judiciary) and the independence of state organs.
The open book, cogwheel, ear of rice and corncob symbolize wisdom and the people's ability to advance in the fields of education, culture, social justice, agriculture and industry.
The rifle, spear and bow represent the values of the people's centuries-long struggle for national liberation and self-defense for the honor and dignity of East Timor's sovereignty. The rifle may be a homage to the emblem of Mozambique. The FALINTIL East Timor did not use a Kalashnikov in the liberation struggle.
The motto in Portuguese, "Unidade, Acção, Progresso" ("Unity, Action, Progress"), states the basic values of politics and ethics that govern the life of the nation and the people.
Previous emblems
Under Majapahit Empire (1293–1527)
During The Time Timor was a Majapahit Tributary, the Surya Majapahit was officially assigned.
Portuguese colonial era (1935–1975)
In 1935, the Portuguese colonies were officially assigned coats of arms that followed a standard design pattern. The three-part shield shows in the first field on silver five blue shields, each with five silver coins (quinas) forming a cross; the central element from the coat of arms of Portugal. The arms of Portuguese Timor followed the same format of other Portuguese colonies (later overseas provinces) with the territory being represented by the black and white Dominican cross in recognition of the role played by the Dominican Order in converting the East Timorese to Roman Catholicism. The field was silver/black eightfold confessed with a silver/black fleur-de-lys cross, additionally there was a quina in the centre of the cross. In the third field there are green waves on silver.
Japanese occupation (1942–1945)
The imperial seal of Japan was used in the territory during the Japanese occupation of Timor.
Unilateral declaration of independence (1975)
After East Timor unilaterally declared independence on 28 November 1975, the Democratic Republic of East Timor used a national emblem similar to the current emblem that was adopted in 2007.
Indonesian occupation (1975–1999)
Indonesia invaded East Timor on 7 December 1975, established a Provisional Government of East Timor and annexed it the following year as its 27th province of Timor Timur.
The province of Timor Timur had its own emblem which remained in use until Indonesia rescinded its annexation in 1999. The emblem, in the Indonesian heraldic style, consisted of a golden shield containing wreaths of wheat and cotton enclosing a blue roundel containing a stylised traditional Timorese holy house (uma lulik). This was surmounted by a blue shield depicting a gold star representing the faith in one God. Below the blue shield followed a red banner with the motto "Houri Otas, Houri Wain, Oan Timor Asswa'in" in Tetum translated as "From the ages past, from today, we are Timorese warriors". Below the roundel appeared a golden traditional Timorese headdress (Kaibauk) bearing the inscription "Timor Timur".
United Nations Administered East Timor (1999–2002)
United Nations Administered East Timor used the emblem of the United Nations with the legend UNTAET below for official purposes. The initial transitional administration formed in July 2000 used a logo depicting a map of Timor Island with East Timor highlighted with the words East Timor superimposed above and the legend East Timor Transitional Administration below. Following elections held August 2001, the newly established transitional government used a seal depicting an outline of the island of Timor, a crocodile, traditional head-dress and tais patterns. The seal included the words Timor Lorosa’e and Governu in Tetum or Timor Leste and Governo in Portuguese.
First post-independence emblem (2002–2007)
The first emblem of post-independence East Timor contained the shield of the Conselho Nacional de Resistência Timorense (National Council of Timorese Resistance). The shield originated from the military arm of the Timorese resistance group, Falintil, in 1987. The main elements were two crossed Suriks (traditional Timorese swords), together with a spear, a star, and two arrows. The inner red shield takes the form of a quay buoy on the upper side. The country's title, in Portuguese, is on a blue ring around the shield and a sun with 14 rays. The motto in the banner translated as: "Honour, Homeland, and People".
Subnational emblems
Some of the Municipalities of East Timor have adopted their own emblems.
See also
Flag of East Timor
Sources
Law 02/2007, National symbols of Timor-Leste
References
National symbols of East Timor
East Timor
East Timor
East Timor
East Timor
East Timor
East Timor
East Timor
East Timor |
4329468 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/9617%20Grahamchapman | 9617 Grahamchapman | 9617 Grahamchapman, provisional designation , is a binary Florian asteroid from the inner regions of the asteroid belt, approximately 2.8 kilometers in diameter.
The asteroid was discovered on 17 March 1993, during the Uppsala–ESO Survey of Asteroids and Comets (UESAC) at ESO's La Silla Observatory in northern Chile. It was named for actor and Monty Python member, Graham Chapman.
Orbit and classification
Grahamchapman is a member of the Flora family, one of the largest collisional groups of stony asteroids. It orbits the Sun in the inner main-belt at a distance of 2.0–2.5 AU once every 3 years and 4 months (1,211 days). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.11 and an inclination of 6° with respect to the ecliptic.
A first precovery was taken at Palomar Observatory in 1951, extending the body's observation arc by 42 years prior to its official discovery observation at La Silla.
Physical characteristics
Diameter and albedo
According to the survey carried out by NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer with its subsequent NEOWISE mission, Grahamchapman measures 2.84 kilometers in diameter and its surface has an albedo of 0.245. The Collaborative Asteroid Lightcurve Link agrees with Petr Pravec's revised NEOWISE data and gives an albedo of 0.224 with a diameter of 2.85 kilometers with an absolute magnitude of 14.97.
Asteroid moon
In February 2006, observations by the Ondřejov NEO Photometric Program determined that Grahamchapman is orbited by a minor-planet moon. The satellite is about a quarter the size of Grahamchapman, and orbits it about once every 19 hours, 23 minutes, and 5 seconds.
Rotation period and shape
The lightcurve study also showed that Grahamchapman itself has a rotation period of 2.28561 hours with a brightness variation of 0.10 magnitude (). A second photometric observation in December 2008, gave an identical period with an amplitude of 0.11 magnitude (). A low brightness amplitude typically indicates that the body has a nearly spheroidal shape.
Naming
This minor planet is named after the comic actor Graham Chapman (1941–1989). It is the first in a series of six asteroids carrying the names of members of the Monty Python comedy troupe, the others being 9618 Johncleese, 9619 Terrygilliam, 9620 Ericidle, 9621 Michaelpalin and 9622 Terryjones. The approved naming citation was published by the Minor Planet Center on 20 March 2000 ().
References
External links
Uppsala–ESO Survey of Asteroids and Comets
Asteroids with Satellites, Robert Johnston, johnstonsarchive.net
Ondrejov Asteroid Photometry Project
Asteroid Lightcurve Database (LCDB), query form (info )
Dictionary of Minor Planet Names, Google books
Asteroids and comets rotation curves, CdR – Observatoire de Genève, Raoul Behrend
Discovery Circumstances: Numbered Minor Planets (5001)-(10000) – Minor Planet Center
Flora asteroids
Discoveries by UESAC
Grahamchapman
Binary asteroids
9617
19930317 |
4331360 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/171P/Spahr | 171P/Spahr | 171P/Spahr is a periodic comet in the Solar System. 171P/Spahr was recovered on 20–24 October 2011 at apparent magnitude 20.6 using the Faulkes Telescope South. 171P/Spahr is peaked at about magnitude 18 in 2012.
During the 1999 passage the comet brightened to about magnitude 13.5.
At perihelion on January 13, 2019 when the comet was 1AU from Earth, the 3-sigma uncertainty in the comet's Earth distance was ±500 km.
References
External links
Orbital simulation from JPL (Java) / Horizons Ephemeris
171P/Spahr – Seiichi Yoshida @ aerith.net
Elements and Ephemeris for 171P/Spahr – Minor Planet Center
Discovery and Historical Highlights at Gary W. Kronk's Cometography
Periodic comets
0171
Comets in 2019 |
4331411 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/172P/Yeung | 172P/Yeung | 172P/Yeung is a periodic comet in the Solar System.
References
External links
172P on Seiichi Yoshida's comet list
172P on Gary Kronk's Cometography
Periodic comets
0172 |
4331574 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/173P/Mueller | 173P/Mueller | 173P/Mueller, also known as Mueller 5, is a periodic comet in the Solar System.
References
External links
Orbital simulation from JPL (Java) / Horizons Ephemeris
173P on Seiichi Yoshida's comet list
Periodic comets
0173
173P |
4332186 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Martine%20Rothblatt | Martine Rothblatt | Martine Aliana Rothblatt is an American lawyer, author, entrepreneur, and transgender rights advocate. Rothblatt graduated from University of California, Los Angeles with J.D. and M.B.A. degrees in 1981, then began to work in Washington, D.C., first in the field of communications satellite law, and eventually in life sciences projects like the Human Genome Project. She is also influential in the field of aviation, particularly electric aviation, as well as with sustainable building.
She is the founder and chairwoman of the board of United Therapeutics. She was also the CEO of GeoStar and the creator of SiriusXM Satellite Radio. She was the top earning CEO in the biopharmaceutical industry in 2018.
Early life and education
Rothblatt was born 1954 into a Jewish family in Chicago, Illinois, to Rosa Lee and Hal Rothblatt, a dentist. She was raised in a suburb of San Diego, California.
Rothblatt left college after two years and traveled throughout Europe, Turkey, Iran, Kenya, and the Seychelles. It was at the NASA tracking station in the Seychelles, during the summer of 1974, that she had her epiphany to unite the world via satellite communications. She then returned to University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), graduating summa cum laude in communication studies in 1977, with a thesis on international direct-broadcast satellites.
As an undergraduate, she became a convert to Gerard K. O'Neill's "High Frontier" plan for space colonization after analyzing his 1974 Physics Today cover story on the concept as a project for Professor Harland Epps' Topics in Modern Astronomy seminar. Rothblatt subsequently became an active member of the L5 Society and its Southern California affiliate, the Organization for the Advancement of Space Industrialization and Settlement (OASIS).
During her four-year J.D./M.B.A. program, also at UCLA, she published five articles on the law of satellite communications and prepared a business plan for the Hughes Space and Communications Group titled PanAmSat about how satellite spot beam technology could be used to provide communication service to multiple Latin American countries. She also became a regular contributor on legal aspects of space colonization to the OASIS newsletter.
Career
Satellite communications
Upon graduating from UCLA in 1981 with a joint J.D./M.B.A. degree, Rothblatt was hired by the Washington, D.C., law firm of Covington & Burling to represent the television broadcasting industry before the Federal Communications Commission in the areas of direct broadcast satellites and spread spectrum communication. In 1982, she left to study astronomy at the University of Maryland, College Park, but was soon retained by NASA to obtain FCC approval for the IEEE C band system on its tracking and data relay satellites and by the National Academy of Sciences' Committee on Radio Frequencies to safeguard before the FCC radio astronomy quiet bands used for deep space research. Later that year she was also retained as vice president by Gerard K. O'Neill to handle business and regulatory matters for her newly invented satellite navigation technology, known as the Geostar System.
Rothblatt is a regulatory attorney. She also served as a member of the Space Studies Institute (SSI) board of trustees.
In 1984, she was retained by Rene Anselmo, founder of Spanish International Network, to implement her PanAmSat MBA thesis as a new company that would compete with the global telecommunications satellite monopoly, Intelsat. In 1986, she discontinued her astronomy studies and consulting work to become the full-time CEO of Geostar Corporation, under William E. Simon as chairman. She left Geostar in 1990 to create both WorldSpace and Sirius Satellite Radio. She left Sirius in 1992 and WorldSpace in 1997 to become the full-time chairman and CEO of American medical biotechnology company United Therapeutics.
Rothblatt was responsible for launching several communications satellite companies, including the first private international spacecom project (PanAmSat, 1984), the first global satellite radio network (WorldSpace, 1990), and the first non-geostationary satellite-to-car broadcasting system (Sirius Satellite Radio, 1990).
Rothblatt helped pioneer airship internet services with her Sky Station project in 1997, together with Alexander Haig.
She then successfully led the effort to get the US Federal Communications Commission (FCC) to allocate frequencies for airship-based internet services.
As an attorney-entrepreneur, Rothblatt was also responsible for leading the efforts to obtain worldwide approval, via new international treaties, of satellite orbit/spectrum allocations for space-based navigation services (1987) and for direct-to-person satellite radio transmissions (1992). She also led the International Bar Association's biopolitical project to develop a draft Universal Declaration on the Human Genome and Human Rights for the United Nations (whose final version was adopted by the UNESCO on November 11, 1997, and endorsed by the United Nations General Assembly on December 9, 1998).
Medical and pharmaceutical
Rothblatt is a well-known voice for medical and pharmaceutical innovation. In 1994, motivated by her daughter being diagnosed with life-threatening pulmonary hypertension, Rothblatt created the PPH Cure Foundation and in 1996 founded United Therapeutics. That same year, she says, she had sex reassignment surgery. At that time she also began studying for a Ph.D. in medical ethics at the Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry, Queen Mary University of London. The degree was granted in June 2001 based upon her dissertation on the conflict between private and public interests in xenotransplantation. This thesis, defended before England's leading bioethicist John Harris, was later published by Ashgate House under the title Your Life or Mine.
In 2013, Rothblatt was the highest-paid woman CEO in America, earning $38 million.
As of April 2018, Rothblatt earned a compensation package worth $37.1 million from United Therapeutics. The majority of the compensation package is for stock options.
In January 2022, Rothblatt's company Lung Biotechnology made an attempt at effectuating her Ph.D. dissertation by transplanting the first genetically-modified porcine heart in hopes that it would successfully save the life of a patient. The recipient subsequently died on Tuesday, March 8, 2022.
In June 2022, Rothblatt unveiled the world's most complex 3D printed object, a human lung scaffold, based on 44 trillion [voxel]s of data and comprising four thousand kilometers of capillaries and 200 million alveoli.
Aviation
Rothblatt is an airplane and helicopter pilot with night-vision goggle (NVG) certification. She generally pilots a Pilatus PC-12NG and a Bell 429WLG. Her other achievements in aviation include providing current weather information to all XM radio-equipped North American aircraft via her SiriusXM satellite system, and pioneering Aircraft Geolocation Tracking via her Geostar Satellite System. In 2018, Rothblatt received the American Helicopter Museum and Education Center Annual Achievement Award for innovation in rotary-wing flight.
Electric aviation
Rothblatt's company United Therapeutics formed a subsidiary, Lung Biotechnology, to preserve and restore selected donor lungs, making them viable for transplantation. Rothblatt began looking at electric helicopters as a way of reducing energy consumption and noise while reducing transportation time for the sensitive organs.
In September 2016, Rothblatt teamed with Glen Dromgoole of Tier 1 Engineering and pilot Ric Webb of OC Helicopters to conduct the world's first electric-powered full-size helicopter flight at Los Alamitos Army Airfield. The helicopter, a modified Robinson R44 weighed 2,500 pounds with Webb as its test pilot, flew for five minutes, attained 400 feet and exceeded 80 knots airspeed, all completely powered by rechargeable batteries.
On February 16, 2017, Rothblatt's electric helicopter established new world records of a 30-minute duration flight and an 800-foot altitude at Los Alamitos Army Airfield. At the end of the flight, the 2,500 pound helicopter still had 8% state of charge remaining in its Brammo batteries. On March 4, 2017, Rothblatt and Ric Webb set a world speed record for electric helicopters of 100 knots at Los Alamitos Army Airfield under an FAA Experimental permit for tail number N3115T. This was also the first-ever flight of two people in a battery-powered helicopter. On December 7, 2018, Rothblatt earned certification in the Guinness Book of World Records for the farthest distance traveled (56.82 kilometers) by an electric helicopter.
In 2019, she received the inaugural UP Leadership Award for her advances in eVTOL technology.
In September 2021, Dr. Rothblatt's project to deliver transplantable organs by electric drones was successfully achieved at Toronto General Hospital (TGH), resulting in the world's first delivery of transplanted lungs by drone.
In October 2022, Rothblatt piloted the historic first-ever electric helicopter flight between two airports, flying from Jacqueline Cochran Regional Airport in Thermal, California, to Palm Springs International Airport.
Rothblatt's United Therapeutics has placed orders for with both EHang and BETA Technologies for electric vertical take-off and landing eVTOL aircraft. In June 2021, she was the first flight engineer to fly BETA's ALIA eVTOL aircraft, and as of November 2021 sat on the company’s board of directors.
Sustainable building
In September 2018 Rothblatt inaugurated the world's largest net zero office building site, called the Unisphere, containing 210,000 square feet of space in Silver Spring, Maryland, powered, heated and cooled completely from on-site sustainable energy technologies. This office building uses 1 MW of solar panels, fifty-two geothermal wells, a quarter mile long earth labyrinth and electrochromic glass to operate with a zero carbon footprint while graphically communicating its net energy status in real time to the building occupants.
Personal life
In 1982, Rothblatt married Bina Aspen, a realtor from Compton, California. Rothblatt and Aspen each had a child from a previous relationship and legally adopted each other's children; they went on to have two more children together.
In 1994, at age 40, she came out as transgender and changed her name to Martine Aliana Rothblatt. She has since become a vocal advocate for transgender rights.
Social activism
In 2004, Rothblatt launched the Terasem Movement, a transhumanist school of thought focused on promoting joy, diversity, and the prospect of technological immortality via mind uploading and geoethical nanotechnology. Through a charitable foundation, leaders of this school convene publicly accessible symposia, publish explanatory analyses, conduct demonstration projects, issue grants, and encourage public awareness and adherence to Terasem values and goals. The movement maintains a "Terasem Island" on the Internet-based virtual world Second Life, which is currently composed of two sims, which was constructed by the E-Spaces company.
Rothblatt is an advocate for LGBTQ rights and an outspoken opponent of North Carolina's controversial Public Facilities Privacy & Security Act or HB-2 law.
Through her blog Mindfiles, Mindware and Mindclones, she writes about "the coming age of our own cyberconsciousness and techno-immortality" and started a vlog together with Ulrike Reinhard on the same topic. She also created Lifenaut.com as a place where thousands of people could go to backup their minds.
Rothblatt contributed $258,000 to SpacePAC, a super PAC that supported her son, Gabriel, who was running as a Democrat in Florida's 8th congressional district but lost. Gabriel is a pastor for the Terasem Movement.
Reception
Lawyer and bioethicist Wesley J. Smith ridiculed the feasibility of the Terasem Movement Foundation's claims to offer a free service that can "preserve one's individual consciousness so that it remains viable for possible uploading with consciousness software into a cellular regenerated or bionanotechnological body by future medicine and technology". Smith facetiously questioned whether this offer would be followed by the sale of "longevity products".
Rhetorician and technocritic Dale Carrico harshly criticized Rothblatt's writings for promoting what he argues to be the pseudoscience of mind uploading and the techno-utopianism of the Californian Ideology. Carrico later criticized Rothblatt's claims about digital technology and "mindclones" as being nothing more than wishful thinking. Carrico went on to criticize Rothblatt for caring more about rights of "virtual, uploaded persons"—who he argues are neither real nor possible—more than the rights of actual human persons and some animals, such as great apes and dolphins.
Describing a conversation with BINA48, one of "humanity's first cybernetic companions," created by Rothblatt and Hanson Robotics, journalist Amy Harmon concluded it was "not that different from interviewing certain flesh and blood subjects."
Awards and honors
Rothblatt has received many awards, including several honorary doctorate degrees.
In April 2008, Rothblatt was elected a Member of the American Philosophical Society.
On May 11, 2010, she was awarded an honorary doctorate by Ben Gurion University of the Negev in recognition of her accomplishments in satellite communications and biotechnology.
In September 2017 Forbes magazine named Rothblatt one of the 100 Greatest Living Business Minds of the past century, with special reference to her roles as a "perpetual reinventor, founder of Sirius and United Therapeutics, and creator of PanAmSat." On December 5, 2017, North Carolina State University conferred her an honorary Doctor of Sciences degree.
In January 2018 Rothblatt was presented the UCLA Medal, the university's highest award, in recognition of her creation of Sirius XM satellite radio, advancing organ transplant technology, and having "expanded the way we understand fundamental concepts ranging from communication to gender to the nature of consciousness and mortality." On May 16, 2018, Rothblatt and Didi Chuxing President Jean Liu were awarded Doctors of Commercial Science degrees, honoris causa, at NYU's 186th Commencement at Yankee Stadium. In 2018, the University of Victoria's Chair in Transgender Studies, Founder and Academic Director of the Transgender Archives, nominated Martine for an Honorary Doctor of Laws (LLD). She was officially awarded this on November 13, 2019, at the 10:00 am graduation ceremony.
In 2019 Rothblatt was recognized as one of Business Insider's most powerful LGBTQ+ people in tech. Also in 2019, Rothblatt received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement presented by Awards Council member Sir Peter Jackson during the International Achievement Summit in New York City.
In October 2021, the National Business Aviation Association (NBAA) selected Dr. Rothblatt for its highest honor, the Meritorious Service to Aviation Award, for her fostering of aviation weather information on the flight deck and of advanced air mobility such as electric helicopters.
In April 2023, Rothblatt received the Benjamin Franklin Medal for Distinguished Achievement in the Sciences in recognition of her many transformative, diverse, singular scientific and public service contributions.
Bibliography
Radiodetermination Satellite Services and Standards, Artech House, 1987, (communications satellite technology)
Apartheid of Sex: a Manifesto on the Freedom of Gender, Crown, 1995 (transgenderism)
From Transgender to Transhuman: a Manifesto on the Freedom of Form, Martine Rothblatt, 2011,
Unzipped Genes, Temple University Press, 1997 (bioethics and biopolitics)
Your Life or Mine, Ashgate, 2003 (xenotransplantation)
Two Stars for Peace, iUniverse, 2003 (Middle East peace process)
Virtually Human, St. Martin's Press, 2014 (artificial intelligence)
Filmography
Rothblatt is the executive producer of the following films:
2B, Transformer Films, 2009. The film is a techno-thriller set in the near-future that deals with the moral questions confronting society following the creation of the world's first posthuman.
The Singularity Is Near, Exponential Films, 2010. The documentary, based upon Ray Kurzweil's book The Singularity Is Near, is directed by Anthony Waller and stars Pauley Perrette.
References
Further reading
External links
Lifeboat Foundation Bios: Martine Rothblatt
United Therapeutics
"My daughter, my wife, our robot, and the quest for immortality" (TED2015)
1954 births
20th-century American businesspeople
20th-century American non-fiction writers
20th-century American lawyers
21st-century American businesspeople
21st-century American non-fiction writers
Alumni of Barts and The London School of Medicine and Dentistry
American investors
American people of Polish-Jewish descent
American people of Ukrainian-Jewish descent
American radio executives
American radio company founders
American women chief executives
Businesspeople from Chicago
Businesspeople from Los Angeles
Businesspeople from San Diego
Businesspeople from Washington, D.C.
American telecommunications industry businesspeople
Chief executives in the pharmaceutical industry
American LGBT businesspeople
American LGBT lawyers
LGBT people from California
LGBT people from Illinois
Living people
Transgender women writers
Transgender rights activists
Transgender businesspeople
UCLA Anderson School of Management alumni
UCLA School of Law alumni
Lawyers from Washington, D.C.
American women company founders
American company founders
20th-century American women writers
21st-century American women writers
People from Satellite Beach, Florida
People from Silver Spring, Maryland
People from Montgomery County, Maryland
American health care chief executives
American transhumanists
Cryonicists
Transgender Jews
American women non-fiction writers
Sirius XM
20th-century American women lawyers
20th-century American businesswomen
21st-century American businesswomen
American transgender writers
Founders of new religious movements |
4332470 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horologion | Horologion | The horologion or horologium (pl. horologia), also known by other names, is the book of hours for the Eastern Orthodox and Eastern Catholic Churches. It provides the acolouthia (, akolouthíai), the fixed portions of the Divine Service used every day at certain canonical hours. Additional parts of the service are changed daily, mostly according to the Menologium.
Names
is the latinized version of the Greek hōrológion (), from hṓra (, "time period, hour"), lógos (, "writing, recording") + -ion (), together originally meaning a sundial, clepsydra, or other timekeeping device. (The same roots are used in horology, the scientific study of time.) In Byzantine Greek, the word was repurposed to also denote the Eastern books of hours, records of the hymns and prayers to be offered at the proper times of each day. The plural form of both the Latin and Greek forms of the word is horologia.
In English, the horologion is also sometimes known as the Book of Hours or the Orthodox book of hours, from the nearest Roman Catholic equivalent. The book is known as the Chasoslov () in Church Slavonic and as the in Romanian.
Description
The horologion is primarily a book for the use of the reader and chanters. The Euchologion is used by the priest and deacon instead. Several varieties of horologia exist, the most complete of which is the Great Horologion or Horologium (, Hōrológion tò méga; , Velikij Chasoslov; ). It contains the fixed portions of the Daily Office (Vespers, Greater and Lesser Compline, the Midnight Office, Matins, the Little Hours, the Inter-Hours, Typica, and the prayers before meals). The parts for the reader and chanters are given in full, while the priest and deacon's parts are abbreviated. Great Horologia also contain a list of the saints commemorated throughout the year with their troparia and kontakia; selected propers for Sundays; moveable feasts from the Menaion, Triodion, and Pentecostarion; and the various canons and other devotional services. The Great Horologion is most commonly used in Greek-speaking churches.
Other editions of the horologion are usually shorter. They still give the fixed portions of the Daily Office in full, but other texts are much more abbreviated since they are found in full in other liturgical books. In addition, such texts also often contain morning and evening prayers, the Order of Preparation for Holy Communion, and prayers to be said after receiving Holy Communion.
See also
Agpeya
Canonical hours
Menologion
External links
Liturgy.io Horologion
Horologion for use at reader's services when a priest is not present
Horologion texts
Guide to building a liturgical library
Photo of monks reading the Divine Office at the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, Jerusalem
Byzantine Catholic Horologion
Eastern Orthodox liturgical books |
4334427 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Thermoscope | Thermoscope | A thermoscope is a device that shows changes in temperature. A typical design is a tube in which a liquid rises and falls as the temperature changes. The modern thermometer gradually evolved from it with the addition of a scale in the early 17th century and standardisation throughout the 17th and 18th centuries.
Function
Devices employing both heat and pressure were common during Galileo's time, used for fountains, nursing, or bleeding in medicine. The device was built from a small vase filled with water, attached to a thin vertically rising pipe, with a large empty glass ball at the top. Changes in temperature of the upper ball would exert positive or negative pressure on the water below, causing it to rise or lower in the thin column. The device established fixed points but does not measure specific quantity, although it can tell when something is warmer than another thing.
Essentially, thermoscopes served as a justification of sorts regarding what is observed or experienced by the senses – that the device's basic agreement with the indications of the senses generates initial confidence in its reliability.
Large thermoscopes placed outdoors appeared to cause perpetual motion of contained water, and these were therefore sometimes called perpetuum mobile. Galileo's own work with the thermoscope led him to develop an essentially atomistic conception of heat, published in his book Il Saggiatore in 1623.
History
It is thought, but not certain, that Galileo Galilei discovered the specific principle on which the device is based and built the first thermoscope in 1593. In the 17th century Galileo mentioned to his friend Cesare Marsili that he invented a thermoscope as far back as 1606. The inventor could be his physician friend Santorio Santorio or another person of the learned circle in Venice of which they were members. What is certain is that the thermoscope had started circulating in market squares during Galileo's time. The development of the actual device is attributed to four inventors; namely: Galileo, Santorio Santorio, Robert Fludd, and Cornelius Drebbel. However, the general pneumatic principle of the thermoscope was used in the Hellenic period, and it was written about even earlier, by Empedocles of Agrigentum in his 460 B.C. book On Nature.
Santorio Santorio wrote a Commentary on the Medical Art of Galen in 1612 that described the device in print. Shortly afterward, in 1617 Giuseppe Biancani published the first clear diagram. The device at this time could not be used for quantitative or standardized measurement and used the temperature of air to expand or contract gas, thereby moving a column of water. It was Drebbel who announced in the early 17th century one of the earliest or possibly the first prototype, which was filled with air and blocked by water containing a little aqua fortis to prevent it from freezing and being discolored.
The device was improved by early German scientist Otto von Guericke in the 17th century. Ferdinando II de' Medici, Grand Duke of Tuscany personally made a further improvement by introducing the use of a colored alcohol, so that the material responding to heat was now liquid instead of gas.
It is possible that Francesco Sagredo or Santorio may have added some kind of scales to thermoscopes, and Robert Fludd may have accomplished something similar in 1638. In 1701 Ole Christensen Rømer effectively invented the thermometer by adding a temperature scale (see Rømer scale) to the thermoscope.
See also
Galileo thermometer
Tasimeter
References
The Galileo Project, "The Thermometer"
Benedict, Robert P., 1984. Chapter 1, "Early attempts to measure degrees of heat", in Fundamentals of Temperature, Pressure and Flow Measurement, 3rd ed, Wiley .
Thermometers
Meteorological instrumentation and equipment
Inventions by Galileo Galilei
nl:Thermometer#Thermoscoop
pl:Termometr Galileusza#Historia |
4339415 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The%20Sleeping%20Gypsy | The Sleeping Gypsy | The Sleeping Gypsy () is an 1897 oil on canvas painting by the French Naïve artist Henri Rousseau (1844–1910). It is a fantastical depiction of a lion musing over a sleeping woman on a moonlit night. It is held by the Museum of Modern Art in New York City, to which it was donated by Mrs. Simon Guggenheim in 1939.
Description
Rousseau described his painting as follows: "A wandering Negress, a mandolin player, lies with her jar beside her (a vase with drinking water), overcome by fatigue in a deep sleep. A lion chances to pass by, picks up her scent yet does not devour her. There is a moonlight effect, very poetic. The scene is set in a completely arid desert. The gypsy is dressed in oriental costume."
In the painting, a dark-skinned woman – the Romany gypsy of the title, variously linked in French literature to Bohemia or to Egypt – is sleeping in an arid landscape with mountains in the background, under a dark sky with a few stars and a full moon. She is wearing a long robe with a rainbow of colourful stripes, perhaps a djellaba or jellabiya, and lies upon a similarly striped cloth. Her right hand holds a staff, while beside her rests a mandolin and a tall jar with slim neck. While she continues to lie passively, a maned lion has approached and dips its head to cautiously sniff.
The painting measures . Although painted in a naïve manner, with simple shapes and large blocks of colour, the painting may be based on Rousseau's observations of animals at the Jardin des Plantes and of reconstructed colonial villages at the 1889 World's Fair in Paris.
Provenance
Rousseau first exhibited the painting at the 13th Salon des Indépendants in 1897, and tried unsuccessfully to sell it to the mayor of his hometown, Laval. Instead, it entered the private collection of a Parisian charcoal merchant where it remained until 1924, when it was discovered and bought by the art critic Louis Vauxcelles. The Paris-based art dealer Daniel-Henry Kahnweiler purchased the painting in 1924, although a controversy arose over whether the painting was a forgery. It was acquired by art historian Alfred H. Barr Jr. for the New York Museum of Modern Art.
It was bought by John Quinn in 1924, and after his death later that year his estate sold at Hôtel Drouot to , who sold to Mme Emma Ruckstuhl of Küssnacht in Switzerland. She sold to Mrs. Simon Guggenheim in December 1939, who donated it to the Museum of Modern Art.
References
External links
The Sleeping Gypsy MoMA Provenance Research
The Sleeping Gypsy-an artists Interpretation
Modern paintings
1897 paintings
Paintings by Henri Rousseau
Paintings in the Museum of Modern Art (New York City)
Lions in art
Musical instruments in art
Moon in art |
4344462 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mike%20Golding | Mike Golding | Mike Golding (born 27 August 1960) is an English yachtsman, born in Great Yarmouth and educated at Reading Blue Coat School. He is one of the few yachtsmen to have raced round the world non stop in both directions. He held the solo record for sailing round the world westabout (the most challenging direction for circumnavigation) between 1994 and 2000.
Golding, who was named president of the Little Ship Club in 2017 and is a member of Royal Southampton Yacht Club, is the eponymous co founder of the commercial company Mike Golding Yacht Racing Ltd. His partner in this venture was Jorgen Philip-Sorensen (d.2010).
Golding led the team Group 4 to second place in the British Steel Challenge in 1992–3. He did one better in the next edition the BT Global Challenge 1996–7, taking first place with a new team of amateur sailors, again onboard Group 4.
Golding came seventh in the 2000–2001 Vendée Globe solo non stop round the world race having lost seven days to the dismasting of his Open 60, again called Group 4. His present Open 60 campaign is sponsored by Ecover, a Belgian ecological cleaning products company which has sponsored his team since 2001. In 2004, he won the IMOCA World Championship and successfully defended his title the following year, in which he also won the 2005 FICO World Championship. In the 2004 Vendée Globe, Golding finished third despite losing his keel — an accident which had caused boats in previous Vendée Globe races to overturn — on the last day of the race. He sailed the last fifty miles with a tiny sailplan to keep the boat upright.
In October 2006, he started the Velux 5 Oceans yacht race. He rescued fellow sailor Alex Thomson in the Southern Ocean, then the yacht Ecover had a mast failure with them both aboard. He announced he was retiring from the race on making emergency landfall in Cape Town.
In March 2007 Golding announced a technical partnership with fellow British sailor Dee Caffari to allow both the UK entries in the Vendée Globe 2008–9 round the world yacht race to work together.
Golding skippered the Ecover Sailing Team in the 2009 iShares cup, a selection of races all over Europe, sailing catamarans in fast, competitive races against world-leaders in this sport. The races took place in Venice, Hyères, Cowes, Kiel, Amsterdam and Almeria.
With four races to go in the iShares cup event in Cowes Week (Isle of Wight), Golding's team's dagger board broke but the team still completed the last four races and finished second in the last race.
Golding lives with his wife and son in Warsash, Hampshire, near Southampton.
Career highlights
References
'Mike Golding', The Observer, 13 February 2006 (London).
External links
Mike Golding Official Website
Single-handed circumnavigating sailors
1960 births
Living people
English male sailors (sport)
World champions in sailing for Great Britain
2000 Vendee Globe sailors
2004 Vendee Globe sailors
2008 Vendee Globe sailors
2012 Vendee Globe sailors
British Vendee Globe sailors
Vendée Globe finishers
People educated at Reading Blue Coat School
Sportspeople from Great Yarmouth
Extreme Sailing Series sailors |
4344583 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Octocrylene | Octocrylene | Octocrylene is an organic compound used as an ingredient in sunscreens and cosmetics. It is an ester formed by the condensation of 2-ethylhexyl cyanoacetate with benzophenone. It is a viscous, oily liquid that is clear and colorless.
The extended conjugation of the acrylate portion of the molecule absorbs UVB and short-wave UVA (ultraviolet) rays with wavelengths from 280 to 320 nm, protecting the skin from direct DNA damage. The ethylhexanol portion is a fatty alcohol, adding emollient and oil-like (water resistant) properties.
Safety
Octocrylene can penetrate into the skin where it acts as a photosensitizer, resulting in an increased production of free radicals under illumination. It may also pass through the skin, into the blood stream, eventually being metabolized and excreted in urine in form of its metabolites. Octocrylene can convert to benzophenone through a retro-aldol condensation. The reaction occurs slowly over time, yielding significant concentration of benzophenone in all commercial cosmetics tested formulated with octocrylene.
In coral, octocrylene has been shown to accumulate in the form of fatty acid conjugates and trigger mitochondrial dysfunction.
Regulation
Palau banned the sale and use of 3 reef toxic UV filters including octocrylene in its Responsible Tourism Education Act of 2018.
See also
Sunscreen controversy
References
Carboxylate esters
Household chemicals
Sunscreening agents |
4345823 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2-Ethylhexyl%20salicylate | 2-Ethylhexyl salicylate | 2-Ethylhexyl salicylate, or octyl salicylate, is an organic compound used as an ingredient in sunscreens and cosmetics to absorb UVB (ultraviolet) rays from the sun. It is an ester formed by the condensation of salicylic acid with 2-ethylhexanol. It is a colorless oily liquid with a slight floral odor.
The salicylate portion of the molecule absorbs ultraviolet light, protecting skin from the harmful effects of exposure to sunlight. The ethylhexanol portion is a fatty alcohol, adding emollient and oil-like (water resistant) properties.
Safety
Octisalate and all other salicylates have a good safety profile. It is often used to improve affinity and reduce photodegradation of other sunscreen ingredients (such as oxybenzone and avobenzone), and <1% of the applied dose of Octisalate penetrates through the skin. Although Octisalate is a weaker UVB absorber it has superior stability than some other sunscreen active ingredients and does not produce reactive oxygen species when exposed to sunlight. However, it does have some minor sensitization potential; with some individuals experiencing minimal to mild skin irritation.
Notes
References
Salicylate esters
Sunscreening agents
2-Ethylhexyl esters |
4351377 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Biosatellite | Biosatellite | A bio satellite is an artificial satellite designed to carry plants or animals in outer space. They are used to research the effects of space (cosmic radiation, weightlessness, etc.) on biological matter while in orbit around a celestial body. The first satellite carrying an animal (a dog, "Laika") was Soviet Sputnik 2 on November 3, 1957. On August 20, 1960 Soviet Sputnik 5 launched and recovered dogs from Earth orbit.
NASA launched 3 satellites between 1966 and 1969 for the Biosatellite program.
The most famous biosatellites include:
Biosatellite program launched by NASA between 1966 and 1969.
Bion space program by Soviet Union
The Mars Gravity Biosatellite
Orbiting Frog Otolith (OFO-A)
See also
Animals in space
Biosatellite (NASA)
References
Satellites by type
Animals in space |
4356937 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonization%20of%20Titan | Colonization of Titan | Saturn's largest moon Titan is one of several candidates for possible future colonization of the outer Solar System, though protection against extreme cold is a major consideration.
According to Cassini data from 2008, Titan has hundreds of times more liquid hydrocarbons than all the known oil and natural gas reserves on Earth. These hydrocarbons rain from the sky and collect in vast deposits that form lakes and dunes. "Titan is just covered in carbon-bearing material—it's a Mega factory of organic chemicals", said Ralph Lorenz, who leads the study of Titan based on radar data from Cassini. "This vast carbon inventory is an important Look into the geology and climate history of Titan." Several hundred lakes and seas have been observed, with several dozen estimated to contain more hydrocarbon liquid than Earth's oil and gas reserves. The dark dunes that run along the equator contain a volume of organics several hundred times larger than Earth's coal reserves.
Radar images obtained on July 21, 2006 appear to show lakes of liquid hydrocarbon (such as methane and ethane) in Titan's northern latitudes. This is the first discovery of currently existing lakes beyond Earth. The lakes range in size from about a kilometer in width to one hundred kilometers across.
On March 13, 2007, the Jet Propulsion Laboratory announced that it found strong evidence of seas of methane and ethane in the northern hemisphere. At least one of these is larger than any of the Great Lakes in North America.
Suitability
The American aerospace engineer and author Robert Zubrin identified Saturn as the most important and valuable of the four gas giants in the Solar System, because of its relative proximity, low radiation, and excellent system of moons. He also named Titan as the most important moon on which to establish a base to develop the resources of the Saturn system.
Habitability
Robert Zubrin has pointed out that Titan possesses an abundance of all the elements necessary to support life, saying "In certain ways, Titan is the most hospitable extraterrestrial world within our solar system for human colonization." The atmosphere contains plentiful nitrogen and methane. Additionally, strong evidence indicates that liquid methane exists on the surface. Evidence also indicates the presence of liquid water and ammonia under the surface, which are delivered to the surface by volcanic activity. While this water can be used to generate breathable oxygen, more is blown into Titan's atmosphere from the geysers on the icy moon of Enceladus (also a moon of Saturn), as they start as water molecules and evolve into oxygen and hydrogen. Nitrogen is ideal to add buffer gas partial pressure to breathable air (it forms about 78% of Earth's atmosphere). Nitrogen, methane and ammonia can all be used to produce fertilizer for growing food.
Gravity
Titan has a surface gravity of 0.138 g, slightly less than the Moon. Managing long-term effects of low gravity on human health would therefore be a significant issue for long-term occupation of Titan, more so than on Mars. These effects are still an active field of study. They can include symptoms such as loss of bone density, loss of muscle density, and a weakened immune system. Astronauts in Earth orbit have remained in microgravity for up to a year or more at a time. Effective countermeasures for the negative effects of low gravity are well-established, particularly an aggressive regimen of daily physical exercise or weighted clothing. The variation in the negative effects of low gravity as a function of different levels of low gravity are not known, since all research in this area is restricted to humans in zero gravity. The same goes for the potential effects of low gravity on fetal and pediatric development. It has been hypothesized that children born and raised in low gravity such as on Titan would not be well adapted for life under the higher gravity of Earth.
In situ energy resources
In situ energy resources on Titan for use by future humans include chemical, nuclear, wind, solar and hydropower. Electrical power could be produced using chemical power plants adding hydrogen to acetylene (i.e. hydrogenation; oxygen is not freely available), or turbines in large methane seas such as Kraken Mare where the tidal pull of Saturn causes up to a meter of tidal change each Titan day. Nuclear and solar power might also be feasible.
Flight
The very high ratio of atmospheric density to surface gravity also greatly reduces the wingspan needed for an aircraft to maintain lift, so much so that a human would be able to strap on wings and easily fly through Titan's atmosphere while wearing a sort of spacesuit that could be manufactured with today's technology. Another theoretically possible means to become airborne on Titan would be to use a hot air balloon-like vehicle filled with an Earth-like atmosphere at Earth-like temperatures (because oxygen is only slightly denser than nitrogen, the atmosphere in a habitat on Titan would be about one third as dense as the surrounding atmosphere), although such a vehicle would need a skin able to keep the extreme cold out in spite of the light weight required. Due to Titan's extremely low temperatures, heating of any flight-bound vehicle becomes a key obstacle.
See also
Titan in fiction
References
Further reading
Stephen L. Gillett, "Titan as the Abode of Life," Analog, Vol. CXII No. 13, pp. 40–55 (1992)
Julian Nott - Titan: A Distant But Enticing Destination for Human Visitors (White Paper for National Academy of Sciences]
Titan (moon)
Titan |
4360799 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cassini%20%28lunar%20crater%29 | Cassini (lunar crater) | Cassini is a lunar impact crater that is located in the Palus Nebularum, at the eastern end of Mare Imbrium. The crater was named after astronomers Giovanni Cassini and Jacques Cassini. To the northeast is the Promontorium Agassiz, the southern tip of the Montes Alpes mountain range. South by south-east of Cassini is the crater Theaetetus. To the northwest is the lone peak Mons Piton.
Description
The floor of Cassini is flooded, and is likely as old as the surrounding mare. The surface is peppered with a multitude of impacts, including a pair of significant craters contained entirely within the rim. Cassini A is the larger of these two, and it lies just north-east of the crater center. A hilly ridge area runs from this inner crater toward the south-east. Near the south-west rim of Cassini is the smaller crater Cassini B.
The walls of this crater are narrow and irregular in form but remain intact despite the lava flooding. Beyond the crater rim is a significant and irregular outer rampart.
Cassini is a crater of Lower (Early) Imbrian age.
For unknown reasons, this crater was omitted from early maps of the Moon. This crater is not of recent origin, however, so the omission was most likely an error on the part of the map-makers.
Satellite craters
By convention these features are identified on lunar maps by placing the letter on the side of the crater midpoint that is closest to Cassini.
See also
Cassini (Martian crater)
References
Impact craters on the Moon
Moon |
4360893 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ni%C3%B0afj%C3%B6ll | Niðafjöll | In Norse mythology, Niðafjöll (pronounced , also written Niðvellir, often anglicized as Nidafjöll), which means dark mountains, are located in the northern underworld. Niðafjöll is the site from which the dragon Níðhöggr comes. According to Snorri Sturluson, the good and virtuous people will live here in a golden palace after the Ragnarök, despite its proximity to Hel.
Niðafjöll is mentioned in Völuspá from the Poetic Edda.
References
Other sources
Faulkes, Anthony (trans. and ed.) (1987) Edda of Snorri Sturluson (Everyman's Library)
Lindow, John (2001) Handbook of Norse mythology (Santa Barbara: ABC-Clio)
Orchard, Andy (1997) Dictionary of Norse Myth and Legend (Cassell)
Simek, Rudolf (2007) translated by Angela Hall. Dictionary of Northern Mythology (D.S. Brewer)
External links
Bellows, Henry Adams (trans.) (1923) The Poetic Edda. New York: The American-Scandinavian Foundation. Available online in www.voluspa (org).
Locations in Norse mythology
Mythological mountains
Norse underworld |
4361430 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Acoustic%20location | Acoustic location | Acoustic location is a method of determining the position of an object or sound source by using sound waves. Location can take place in gases (such as the atmosphere), liquids (such as water), and in solids (such as in the earth).
Location can be done actively or passively:
Active acoustic location involves the creation of sound in order to produce an echo, which is then analyzed to determine the location of the object in question.
Passive acoustic location involves the detection of sound or vibration created by the object being detected, which is then analyzed to determine the location of the object in question.
Both of these techniques, when used in water, are known as sonar; passive sonar and active sonar are both widely used.
Acoustic mirrors and dishes, when using microphones, are a means of passive acoustic localization, but when using speakers are a means of active localization. Typically, more than one device is used, and the location is then triangulated between the several devices.
As a military air defense tool, passive acoustic location was used from mid-World War I to the early years of World War II to detect enemy aircraft by picking up the noise of their engines. It was rendered obsolete before and during World War II by the introduction of radar, which was far more effective (but interceptable). Acoustic techniques had the advantage that they could 'see' around corners and over hills, due to sound diffraction.
Civilian uses include locating wildlife and locating the shooting position of a firearm.
Overview
Acoustic source localization is the task of locating a sound source given measurements of the sound field. The sound field can be described using physical quantities like sound pressure and particle velocity. By measuring these properties it is (indirectly) possible to obtain a source direction.
Traditionally sound pressure is measured using microphones. Microphones have a polar pattern describing their sensitivity as a function of the direction of the incident sound. Many microphones have an omnidirectional polar pattern which means their sensitivity is independent of the direction of the incident sound. Microphones with other polar patterns exist that are more sensitive in a certain direction. This however is still no solution for the sound localization problem as one tries to determine either an exact direction, or a point of origin. Besides considering microphones that measure sound pressure, it is also possible to use a particle velocity probe to measure the acoustic particle velocity directly. The particle velocity is another quantity related to acoustic waves however, unlike sound pressure, particle velocity is a vector. By measuring particle velocity one obtains a source direction directly. Other more complicated methods using multiple sensors are also possible. Many of these methods use the time difference of arrival (TDOA) technique.
Some have termed acoustic source localization an "inverse problem" in that the measured sound field is translated to the position of the sound source.
Methods
Different methods for obtaining either source direction or source location are possible.
Time difference of arrival
The traditional method to obtain the source direction is using the time difference of arrival (TDOA) method. This method can be used with pressure microphones as well as with particle velocity probes.
With a sensor array (for instance a microphone array) consisting of at least two probes it is possible to obtain the source direction using the cross-correlation function between each probes' signal. The cross-correlation function between two microphones is defined as
which defines the level of correlation between the outputs of two sensors and . In general, a higher level of correlation means that the argument is relatively close to the actual time-difference-of-arrival. For two sensors next to each other the TDOA is given by
where is the speed of sound in the medium surrounding the sensors and the source.
A well-known example of TDOA is the interaural time difference. The interaural time difference is the difference in arrival time of a sound between two ears. The interaural time difference is given by
where
is the time difference in seconds,
is the distance between the two sensors (ears) in meters,
is the angle between the baseline of the sensors (ears) and the incident sound, in degrees.
Triangulation
In trigonometry and geometry, triangulation is the process of determining the location of a point by measuring angles to it from known points at either end of a fixed baseline, rather than measuring distances to the point directly (trilateration). The point can then be fixed as the third point of a triangle with one known side and two known angles.
For acoustic localization this means that if the source direction is measured at two or more locations in space, it is possible to triangulate its location.
Indirect methods
Steered response power (SRP) methods are a class of indirect acoustic source localization methods. Instead of estimating a set of time-differences of arrival (TDOAs) between pairs of microphones and combining the acquired estimates to find the source location, indirect methods search for a candidate source location over a grid of spatial points. In this context, methods such as the steered-response power with phase transform (SRP-PHAT) are usually interpreted as finding the candidate location that maximizes the output of a delay-and-sum beamformer. The method has been shown to be very robust to noise and reverberation, motivating the development of modified approaches aimed at increasing its performance in real-time acoustic processing applications.
Military use
Military uses have included locating submarines and aircraft. The first use of this type of equipment was claimed by Commander Alfred Rawlinson of the Royal Naval Volunteer Reserve, who in the autumn of 1916 was commanding a mobile anti-aircraft battery on the east coast of England. He needed a means of locating Zeppelins during cloudy conditions and improvised an apparatus from a pair of gramophone horns mounted on a rotating pole. Several of these equipments were able to give a fairly accurate fix on the approaching airships, allowing the guns to be directed at them despite being out of sight. Although no hits were obtained by this method, Rawlinson claimed to have forced a Zeppelin to jettison its bombs on one occasion.
The air-defense instruments usually consisted of large horns or microphones connected to the operators' ears using tubing, much like a very large stethoscope.
End of the 1920s, an operational comparison of multiple large acoustic listening devices from different nations by the Meetgebouw in The Netherlands showed drawbacks. Fundamental research showed that the human ear is better than one understood in the 20s and 30s. New listening devices closer to the ears and with airtight connections were developed. Moreover, mechanical prediction equipment, given the slow speed of sound as compared to the faster planes, and height corrections provided information to point the searchlight operators and the anti-aircraft gunners to where the detected aircraft flies. Searchlights and guns needed to be at a distance from the listening device. Therefore, electric direction indicator devices were developed.
Most of the work on anti-aircraft sound ranging was done by the British. They developed an extensive network of sound mirrors that were used from World War I through World War II. Sound mirrors normally work by using moveable microphones to find the angle that maximizes the amplitude of sound received, which is also the bearing angle to the target. Two sound mirrors at different positions will generate two different bearings, which allows the use of triangulation to determine a sound source's position.
As World War II neared, radar began to become a credible alternative to the sound location of aircraft. For typical aircraft speeds of that time, sound location only gave a few minutes of warning. The acoustic location stations were left in operation as a backup to radar, as exemplified during the Battle of Britain. Today, the abandoned sites are still in existence and are readily accessible.
After World War II, sound ranging played no further role in anti-aircraft operations.
Active / passive locators
Active locators have some sort of signal generation device, in addition to a listening device. The two devices do not have to be located together.
Sonar
Sonar (sound navigation and ranging) is a technique that uses sound propagation under water (or occasionally in air) to navigate, communicate or to detect other vessels. There are two kinds of sonar – active and passive. A single active sonar can localize in range and bearing as well as measuring radial speed. However, a single passive sonar can only localize in bearing directly, though Target Motion Analysis can be used to localize in range, given time. Multiple passive sonars can be used for range localization by triangulation or correlation, directly.
Biological echo location
Dolphins, whales and bats use echolocation to detect prey and avoid obstacles.
Time-of-arrival localization
Having speakers/ultrasonic transmitters emitting sound at known positions and time, the position of a target equipped with a microphone/ultrasonic receiver can be estimated based on the time of arrival of the sound. The accuracy is usually poor under non-line-of-sight conditions, where there are blockages in between the transmitters and the receivers.
Seismic surveys
Seismic surveys involve the generation of sound waves to measure underground structures. Source waves are generally created by percussion mechanisms located near the ground or water surface, typically dropped weights, vibroseis trucks, or explosives. Data are collected with geophones, then stored and processed by computer. Current technology allows the generation of 3D images of underground rock structures using such equipment.
Other
Because the cost of the associated sensors and electronics is dropping, the use of sound ranging technology is becoming accessible for other uses, such as for locating wildlife.
See also
Acoustic camera
3D sound reconstruction
3D sound localization
Sound localization
Boomerang
Multilateration
Acoustic mirror
Acoustic wayfinding, the practice of using auditory cues and sound markers to navigate indoor and outdoor spaces
Animal echolocation, animals emitting sound and listening to the echo in order to locate objects or navigate
Echo sounding, listening to the echo of sound pulses to measure the distance to the bottom of the sea, a special case of sonar
Gunfire locator
Human echolocation, the use of echolocation by blind people
Human bycatch
Medical ultrasonography, the use of ultrasound echoes to look inside the body
Sensory substitution
References
External links
"Huge Ear Locates Planes and Tells Their Speed" Popular Mechanics, December 1930 article on French aircraft sound detector with photo.
Many references can be found in Beamforming References
An Empirical Study of Collaborative Acoustic Source Localization
Acoustics
Anti-aircraft warfare
Measuring instruments
Sound
Geopositioning |
4361469 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Passive%20margin | Passive margin | A passive margin is the transition between oceanic and continental lithosphere that is not an active plate margin. A passive margin forms by sedimentation above an ancient rift, now marked by transitional lithosphere. Continental rifting forms new ocean basins. Eventually the continental rift forms a mid-ocean ridge and the locus of extension moves away from the continent-ocean boundary. The transition between the continental and oceanic lithosphere that was originally formed by rifting is known as a passive margin.
Global distribution
Passive margins are found at every ocean and continent boundary that is not marked by a strike-slip fault or a subduction zone. Passive margins define the region around the Arctic Ocean, Atlantic Ocean, and western Indian Ocean, and define the entire coasts of Africa, Australia, Greenland, and the Indian Subcontinent. They are also found on the east coast of North America and South America, in Western Europe and most of Antarctica. Northeast Asia also contains some passive margins.
Key components
Active vs. passive margins
The distinction between active and passive margins refers to whether a crustal boundary between oceanic lithosphere and continental lithosphere is a plate boundary. Active margins are found on the edge of a continent where subduction occurs. These are often marked by uplift and volcanic mountain belts on the continental plate. Less often there is a strike-slip fault, as defines the southern coastline of West Africa. Most of the eastern Indian Ocean and nearly all of the Pacific Ocean margin are examples of active margins. While a weld between oceanic and continental lithosphere is called a passive margin, it is not an inactive margin. Active subsidence, sedimentation, growth faulting, pore fluid formation and migration are all active processes on passive margins. Passive margins are only passive in that they are not active plate boundaries.
Morphology
Passive margins consist of both onshore coastal plain and offshore continental shelf-slope-rise triads. Coastal plains are often dominated by fluvial processes, while the continental shelf is dominated by deltaic and longshore current processes. The great rivers (Amazon. Orinoco, Congo, Nile, Ganges, Yellow, Yangtze, and Mackenzie rivers) drain across passive margins. Extensive estuaries are common on mature passive margins. Although there are many kinds of passive margins, the morphologies of most passive margins are remarkably similar. Typically they consist of a continental shelf, continental slope, continental rise, and abyssal plain. The morphological expression of these features are largely defined by the underlying transitional crust and the sedimentation above it. Passive margins defined by a large fluvial sediment budget and those dominated by coral and other biogenous processes generally have a similar morphology. In addition, the shelf break seems to mark the maximum Neogene lowstand, defined by the glacial maxima. The outer continental shelf and slope may be cut by great submarine canyons, which mark the offshore continuation of rivers.
At high latitudes and during glaciations, the nearshore morphology of passive margins may reflect glacial processes, such as the fjords of Greenland and Norway.
Cross-section
The main features of passive margins lie underneath the external characters. Beneath passive margins the transition between the continental and oceanic crust is a broad transition known as transitional crust. The subsided continental crust is marked by normal faults that dip seaward. The faulted crust transitions into oceanic crust and may be deeply buried due to thermal subsidence and the mass of sediment that collects above it. The lithosphere beneath passive margins is known as transitional lithosphere. The lithosphere thins seaward as it transitions seaward to oceanic crust. Different kinds of transitional crust form, depending on how fast rifting occurs and how hot the underlying mantle was at the time of rifting. Volcanic passive margins represent one endmember transitional crust type, the other endmember (amagmatic) type is the rifted passive margin. Volcanic passive margins also are marked by numerous dykes and igneous intrusions within the subsided continental crust. There are typically a lot of dykes formed perpendicular to the seaward-dipping lava flows and sills. Igneous intrusions within the crust cause lava flows along the top of the subsided continental crust and form seaward-dipping reflectors.
Subsidence mechanisms
Passive margins are characterized by thick accumulations of sediments. Space for these sediments is called accommodation and is due to subsidence of especially the transitional crust. Subsidence is ultimately caused by gravitational equilibrium that is established between the crustal tracts, known as isostasy. Isostasy controls the uplift of the rift flank and the subsequent subsidence of the evolving passive margin and is mostly reflected by changes in heat flow. Heat flow at passive margins changes significantly over its lifespan, high at the beginning and decreasing with age. In the initial stage, the continental crust and lithosphere is stretched and thinned due to plate movement (plate tectonics) and associated igneous activity. The very thin lithosphere beneath the rift allows the upwelling mantle to melt by decompression. Lithospheric thinning also allows the asthenosphere to rise closer to the surface, heating the overlying lithosphere by conduction and advection of heat by intrusive dykes. Heating reduces the density of the lithosphere and elevates the lower crust and lithosphere. In addition, mantle plumes may heat the lithosphere and cause prodigious igneous activity. Once a mid-oceanic ridge forms and seafloor spreading begins, the original site of rifting is separated into conjugate passive margins (for example, the eastern US and NW African margins were parts of the same rift in early Mesozoic time and are now conjugate margins) and migrates away from the zone of mantle upwelling and heating and cooling begins. The mantle lithosphere below the thinned and faulted continental oceanic transition cools, thickens, increases in density and thus begins to subside. The accumulation of sediments above the subsiding transitional crust and lithosphere further depresses the transitional crust.
Classification
There are four different perspectives needed to classify passive margins:
map-view formation geometry (rifted, sheared, and transtensional),
nature of transitional crust (volcanic and non-volcanic),
whether the transitional crust represents a continuous change from normal continental to normal oceanic crust or this includes isolated rifts and stranded continental blocks (simple and complex), and
sedimentation (carbonate-dominated, clastic-dominated, or sediment starved).
The first describes the relationship between rift orientation and plate motion, the second describes the nature of transitional crust, and the third describes post-rift sedimentation. All three perspectives need to be considered in describing a passive margin. In fact, passive margins are extremely long, and vary along their length in rift geometry, nature of transitional crust, and sediment supply; it is more appropriate to subdivide individual passive margins into segments on this basis and apply the threefold classification to each segment.
Geometry of passive margins
Rifted margin
This is the typical way that passive margins form, as separated continental tracts move perpendicular to the coastline. This is how the Central Atlantic opened, beginning in Jurassic time. Faulting tends to be listric: normal faults that flatten with depth.
Sheared margin
Sheared margins form where continental breakup was associated with strike-slip faulting. A good example of this type of margin is found on the south-facing coast of west Africa. Sheared margins are highly complex and tend to be rather narrow. They also differ from rifted passive margins in structural style and thermal evolution during continental breakup. As the seafloor spreading axis moves along the margin, thermal uplift produces a ridge. This ridge traps sediments, thus allowing for thick sequences to accumulate. These types of passive margins are less volcanic.
Transtensional margin
This type of passive margin develops where rifting is oblique to the coastline, as is now occurring in the Gulf of California.
Nature of transitional crust
Transitional crust, separating true oceanic and continental crusts, is the foundation of any passive margin. This forms during the rifting stage and consists of two endmembers: volcanic and non-volcanic. This classification scheme only applies to rifted and transtensional margin; transitional crust of sheared margins is very poorly known.
Non-volcanic rifted margin
Non-volcanic margins are formed when extension is accompanied by little mantle melting and volcanism. Non-volcanic transitional crust consists of stretched and thinned continental crust. Non-volcanic margins are typically characterized by continentward-dipping seismic reflectors (rotated crustal blocks and associated sediments) and low P-wave velocities (<7.0 km/s) in the lower part of the transitional crust.
Volcanic rifted margin
Volcanic margins form part of large igneous provinces, which are characterised by massive emplacements of mafic extrusives and intrusive rocks over very short time periods. Volcanic margins form when rifting is accompanied by significant mantle melting, with volcanism occurring before and/or during continental breakup. The transitional crust of volcanic margins is composed of basaltic igneous rocks, including lava flows, sills, dykes, and gabbro.
Volcanic margins are usually distinguished from non-volcanic (or magma-poor) margins (e.g. the Iberian margin, Newfoundland margin) which do not contain large amounts of extrusive and/or intrusive rocks and may exhibit crustal features such as unroofed, serpentinized mantle. Volcanic margins are known to differ from magma-poor margins in a number of ways:
A transitional crust composed of basaltic igneous rocks, including lava flows, sills, dykes, and gabbros
A huge volume of basalt flows, typically expressed as seaward-dipping reflector sequences (SDRS) rotated during the early stages of crustal accretion (breakup stage)
The presence of numerous sill/dyke and vent complexes intruding into the adjacent basin
The lack of significant passive-margin subsidence during and after breakup
The presence of a lower crust with anomalously high seismic P-wave velocities (Vp=7.1-7.8 km/s) – referred to as lower crustal bodies (LCBs) in the geologic literature
The high velocities (Vp > 7 km) and large thicknesses of the LCBs are evidence that supports the case for plume-fed accretion (mafic thickening) underplating the crust during continental breakup. LCBs are located along the continent-ocean transition but can sometimes extend beneath the continental part of the rifted margin (as observed in the mid-Norwegian margin for example). In the continental domain, there are still open discussion on their real nature, chronology, geodynamic and petroleum implications.
Examples of volcanic margins:
The Yemen margin
The East Australian margin
The West Indian margin
The Hatton-Rockal margin
The U.S. East Coast
The mid-Norwegian margin
The Brazilian margins
The Namibian margin
The East Greenland margin
The West Greenland margin
Examples of non-volcanic margins:
The Newfoundland Margin
The Iberian Margin
The Margins of the Labrador Sea (Labrador and Southwest Greenland)
Heterogeneity of transitional crust
Simple transitional crust
Passive margins of this type show a simple progression through the transitional crust, from normal continental to normal oceanic crusts. The passive margin offshore Texas is a good example.
Complex transitional crust
This type of transitional crust is characterized by abandoned rifts and continental blocks, such as the Blake Plateau, Grand Banks, or Bahama Islands offshore eastern Florida.
Sedimentation
A fourth way to classify passive margins is according to the nature of sedimentation of the mature passive margin. Sedimentation continues throughout the life of a passive margin. Sedimentation changes rapidly and progressively during the initial stages of passive margin formation because rifting begins on land, becoming marine as the rift opens and a true passive margin is established. Consequently, the sedimentation history of a passive margin begins with fluvial, lacustrine, or other subaerial deposits, evolving with time depending on how the rifting occurred and how, when, and by what type of sediment it varies.
Constructional
Constructional margins are the "classic" mode of passive margin sedimentation. Normal sedimentation results from the transport and deposition of sand, silt, and clay by rivers via deltas and redistribution of these sediments by longshore currents. The nature of sediments can change remarkably along a passive margin, due to interactions between carbonate sediment production, clastic input from rivers, and alongshore transport. Where clastic sediment inputs are small, biogenic sedimentation can dominate especially nearshore sedimentation. The Gulf of Mexico passive margin along the southern United States is an excellent example of this, with muddy and sandy coastal environments down current (west) from the Mississippi River Delta and beaches of carbonate sand to the east. The thick layers of sediment gradually thin with increasing distance offshore, depending on subsidence of the passive margin and the efficacy of offshore transport mechanisms such as turbidity currents and submarine channels.
Development of the shelf edge and its migration through time is critical to the development of a passive margin. The location of the shelf edge break reflects complex interaction between sedimentation, sealevel, and the presence of sediment dams. Coral reefs serve as bulwarks that allow sediment to accumulate between them and the shore, cutting off sediment supply to deeper water. Another type of sediment dam results from the presence of salt domes, as are common along the Texas and Louisiana passive margin.
Starved
Sediment-starved margins produce narrow continental shelves and passive margins. This is especially common in arid regions, where there is little transport of sediment by rivers or redistribution by longshore currents. The Red Sea is a good example of a sediment-starved passive margin.
Formation
There are three main stages in the formation of passive margins:
In the first stage a continental rift is established due to stretching and thinning of the crust and lithosphere by plate movement. This is the beginning of the continental crust subsidence. Drainage is generally away from the rift at this stage.
The second stage leads to the formation of an oceanic basin, similar to the modern Red Sea. The subsiding continental crust undergoes normal faulting as transitional marine conditions are established. Areas with restricted sea water circulation coupled with arid climate create evaporite deposits. Crust and lithosphere stretching and thinning are still taking place in this stage. Volcanic passive margins also have igneous intrusions and dykes during this stage.
The last stage in formation happens only when crustal stretching ceases and the transitional crust and lithosphere subsides as a result of cooling and thickening (thermal subsidence). Drainage starts flowing towards the passive margin causing sediment to accumulate over it.
Economic significance
Passive margins are important exploration targets for petroleum. Mann et al. (2001) classified 592 giant oil fields into six basin and tectonic-setting categories, and noted that continental passive margins account for 31% of giants. Continental rifts (which are likely to evolve into passive margins with time) contain another 30% of the world's giant oil fields. Basins associated with collision zones and subduction zones are where most of the remaining giant oil fields are found.
Passive margins are petroleum storehouses because these are associated with favorable conditions for accumulation and maturation of organic matter. Early continental rifting conditions led to the development of anoxic basins, large sediment and organic flux, and the preservation of organic matter that led to oil and gas deposits. Crude oil will form from these deposits. These are the localities in which petroleum resources are most profitable and productive. Productive fields are found in passive margins around the globe, including the Gulf of Mexico, western Scandinavia, and Western Australia.
Law of the Sea
International discussions about who controls the resources of passive margins are the focus of law of the sea negotiations. Continental shelves are important parts of national exclusive economic zones, important for seafloor mineral deposits (including oil and gas) and fisheries.
See also
Convergent boundary
Divergent boundary
References
| http://www.mantleplumes.org/VM_Norway.html
| http://www.mantleplumes.org/VM_Norway.html
Plate tectonics |
4361793 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Millennium%20Live | Millennium Live | Millennium Live is a cancelled international television special, which was an unsuccessful attempt to broadcast an international celebration of the beginning of the Year 2000, or the so-called Millennium. Reports claimed that the show was to have involved broadcasters in up to 130 nations. Millennium Live: Humanity's Broadcast was going to compete against the 2000 Today international broadcast that was supported by ABC in the United States, and led by BBC in the United Kingdom.
The programme was called off on 28 December 1999 when its organizers, the Millennium Television Network (MTN), announced that it had failed to obtain sufficient financing for the broadcast. MTN reportedly was not paying production and satellite companies for their services prior to the cancellation before MTN shelved their efforts to establish a global broadcast for the following New Year's Eve.
History
The Millennium Television Network (MTN) was formed by Live Aid's American producer Hal Uplinger to prepare and conduct the broadcast. A series of early planning activities among international representatives reportedly occurred in Cannes in October 1998. Millennium Live was planned as a 24- or 25-hour broadcast from 11:00 UTC 31 December 1999.
Pax TV (now known as Ion Television) of the United States had the exclusive rights to broadcast the show which they billed as Pax Millennium Live: A New World's Eve.
Scheduled musical guests included Aerosmith, Bee Gees, Blondie, Chicago, Phil Collins, Destiny's Child, Ricky Martin, 'N Sync, The Pretenders, Sting, Santana and 10,000 Maniacs. Bryan Adams, Simply Red and the Spice Girls were also sought as featured artists.
New Year's Eve celebrations from various worldwide locations were to have been seen on the show. (Chile), Carmen Electra (US), Ramzi Malouki (France), and Zam Nkosi (South Africa) were also scheduled as a program hosts for the represented nations. The studios of a television special were to have been hosted in Los Angeles on a set contained in a 90-foot geodesic dome at Manhattan Beach in the United States.
The program was cancelled on 28 December 1999 with an announcement that MTN had failed to obtain sufficient financing for the broadcast. MTN reportedly was not paying production and satellite companies for their services prior to the cancellation. Pax aired a series of movies in Millennium Live's place, and MTN never materialised its reported plans to establish a global broadcast for the following New Year's Eve on the real Millennium (2001).
Broadcasters
The following broadcasters were reported as participants in Millennium Live:
Australia: Nine Network
Brazil: Rede Bandeirantes
Canada: MuchMoreMusic
Chile: Chilevisión
Estonia: TV1
France: France 2
Germany: Sat.1
Hong Kong: STAR TV, ATV and TVB
India: Zee TV
Italy: Rai 1, Rai 2, Rai 3, Italia1, Rete 4, Canale5
Japan: Vibe TV (now MTV Japan)
Mexico: Televisa, and TV Azteca
New Zealand: TV3
Portugal: SIC
South Africa: SABC
South Korea: KBS
Spain: Telecinco
Turkey: NTV
United Kingdom: ITV
United States: Pax (now Ion Television)
Venezuela: Venevisión
Note: Italy's RAI was the only broadcaster that moved to the 2000 Today broadcast
See also
2000 Today – the successful international television special, which was broadcast in 78 countries (including broadcasters from the cancelled Millennium Live TV special)
References
External links
Everything 2000 - New Year's Eve Broadcast Plans 26 January 1999
Everything 2000 - Millennium Live Worldwide Broadcast Cancelled 29 December 1999
Kansas City Star - Y2K: The TV takeover 29 December 2001
Kansas City Star - Funding glitch shuts down Pax's millennium special (via TV Barn) 30 December 1999
Millennium Hell - Pax Backs Hacks. Lacks Facts. Backtracks. Sacks Millennium Quacks to the Max
Egypt2000.com - The Twelve Dreams of the Sun - Jean-Michel Jarre performance
Unaired television shows
International broadcasting
Turn of the third millennium |
4362108 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supersynchronous%20orbit | Supersynchronous orbit | A supersynchronous orbit is either an orbit with a period greater than that of a synchronous orbit, or just an orbit whose major axis is larger than that of a synchronous orbit. A synchronous orbit has a period equal to the rotational period of the body which contains the barycenter of the orbit.
Geocentric supersynchronous orbits
One particular supersynchronous orbital regime of significant economic value to Earth commerce is a band of near-circular Geocentric orbits beyond the geosynchronous belt—with perigee altitude above , approximately above synchronous altitude
—called the geo graveyard belt.
The geo graveyard belt orbital regime is valuable as a storage and disposal location for derelict satellite space debris after their useful economic life is completed as geosynchronous communication satellites. Artificial satellites are left in space because the economic cost of removing the debris would be high, and current public policy does not require nor incentivize rapid removal by the party that first inserted the debris in outer space and thus created a negative externality for others—a placing of the cost onto them.
One public policy proposal to deal with growing space debris is a "one-up/one-down" launch license policy for Earth orbits. Launch vehicle operators would have to pay the cost of debris mitigation. They would need to build the capability into their launch vehicle-robotic capture, navigation, mission duration extension, and substantial additional propellant – to be able to rendezvous with, capture and deorbit an existing derelict satellite from approximately the same orbital plane.
An additional common use of supersynchronous orbits are for the launch and transfer orbit trajectory of new commsats intended for geosynchronous orbits. In this approach, the launch vehicle places the satellite into a supersynchronous elliptical transfer orbit, an orbit with a somewhat larger apogee than the more typical geostationary transfer orbit (GTO) typically used for communication satellites. Such an orbit is used because a small change in inclination at a lower altitude requires much more energy than the same change at a higher altitude. Thus is it sometimes optimal to use spacecraft propulsion to change the inclination at a higher-than-desired apogee, then lower the apogee to the desired altitude—resulting in a lower total expenditure of propellant by the satellite's kick motor.
This technique was used, for example, on the launch and transfer orbit injection of the first two SpaceX Falcon 9 v1.1 GTO launches in December 2013 and January 2014, SES-8 and Thaicom 6 (-apogee), respectively. In both cases, the satellite owner uses the propulsion built into the satellite to reduce the apogee and circularize the orbit to a geostationary orbit. This has also been a common practice by ULA, including the WGS communications satellite constellation. This technique was also used on the launch of SES-14 and Al Yah 3 during Ariane 5 flight VA241. However, due to launch crew error resulting in anomaly and a deviation of the trajectory, the satellites were not inserted into the intended orbit, causing a reschedule of their maneuvering plan.
Non-Geocentric supersynchronous orbits
Most natural satellites in the Solar System are in supersynchronous orbits. The Moon is in a supersynchronous orbit of Earth, orbiting more slowly than the 24-hour rotational period of Earth. The inner of the two Martian moons, Phobos, is in a subsynchronous orbit of Mars with an orbital period of only 0.32 days. The outer moon Deimos is in supersynchronous orbit around Mars.
The Mars Orbiter Mission—currently orbiting Mars—is placed into highly elliptical supersynchronous orbit around Mars, with a period of 76.7 hours and a planned periapsis of and apoapsis of .
See also
Subsynchronous orbit
List of orbits
References
Astrodynamics
Orbits |
4362140 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Subsynchronous%20orbit | Subsynchronous orbit | A subsynchronous orbit is an orbit of a satellite that is nearer the planet than it would be if it were in synchronous orbit, i.e. the orbital period is less than the sidereal day of the planet.
Technical considerations
An Earth satellite that is in (a prograde) subsynchronous orbit will appear to drift eastward as seen from the Earth's surface.
Economic importance in commercial spaceflight
The Geosynchronous-belt subsynchronous orbital regime is regularly used in spaceflight. This orbit is typically used to house working communication satellites that have not yet been deactivated, and may be still be used again in geostationary service if the need arises.
See also
Supersynchronous orbit
List of orbits
References
Orbits |
4363024 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shi%20Zhengrong | Shi Zhengrong | Shi Zhengrong (, born on February 10, 1963) is a Chinese-Australian businessman and philanthropist. He is the founder and, up to March 2013, chairman and chief executive officer of Suntech Power.
Biography
Shi was born in Yangzhong, Jiangsu, China. His identical twin brother is Chen Henglong, who is also a tycoon. He finished his undergraduate study at Changchun University of Science and Technology, and obtained his Master's degree from the Shanghai Institute of Optics and Fine Mechanics, Chinese Academy of Sciences. Afterward, Shi went to the University of New South Wales's School of Photovoltaic and Renewable Energy Engineering where he obtained his doctorate degree on solar power technology.
He acquired Australian citizenship and returned to China in 2001 to set up his solar power company - Suntech Power. According to Hurun Report's China Rich List 2013, he had a personal net worth of US$330 million.
Shi was elected Fellow of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering in 2009. In 2009, Shi also received the Oslo Business for Peace Award, an award chosen by Nobel winners to leaders in the private sector who have demonstrated transformative and positive change through ethical business practices.
Amid fierce price competition on its products, on 20 March 2013, the Suntech board declared bankruptcy in the wake of defaulting on US$541 million-worth of bonds, Shi had been demoted from chairman to director earlier that month. The Financial Times, quoting the Shanghai Securities News, reported at the time that Shi's movements were being restricted and that he was not allowed to leave China pending an investigation into his role at Suntech. By 2016, he was living in Shanghai and frequently visiting Australia. As of 2017 and 2018, Dr. Shi Zhengrong had been seen actively giving key note speeches at solar conferences and promoting the use of solar technologies in both China and overseas.
Philanthropy
He has donated funds to a renewable energy research unit at the University of NSW, Australia "because he felt it was not getting an appropriate level of government support", according to Australian Greens Senator Christine Milne.
References
External links
China: the Sun King, ABC Radio National
Shi Zhengrong: China's sunshine boy, CNN
Shi Zhengrong, Time Magazine
#396 Shi Zhengrong, The World's Billionaires 2008, Forbes
Mr Sunshine: China's solar billionaire Shi Zhengrong
1963 births
Living people
21st-century Chinese businesspeople
Australian chief executives
Australian company founders
Australian energy industry businesspeople
Billionaires from Jiangsu
Businesspeople from Jiangsu
Changchun University of Science and Technology alumni
Chinese chief executives
Chinese company founders
Chinese emigrants to Australia
Chinese energy industry businesspeople
Fellows of the Australian Academy of Technological Sciences and Engineering
Identical twins
Naturalised citizens of Australia
People associated with solar power
People from Zhenjiang
Renewable energy commercialization
Sustainability advocates
Chinese twins
University of New South Wales alumni |
4363435 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mirovia | Mirovia | Mirovia or Mirovoi (from Russian мировой, mirovoy, meaning "global") was a hypothesized superocean which may have been a global ocean surrounding the supercontinent Rodinia in the Neoproterozoic Era, about 1 billion to 750 million years ago. Mirovia may be essentially identical to, or the precursor of, the hypothesized Pan-African Ocean, which followed the rifting of Rodinia. The Panthalassa (proto-Pacific) Ocean developed in the Neoproterozoic Era by subduction at the expense of the global Mirovia ocean.
Geologic evidence suggests that the middle Neoproterozoic, the Cryogenian period, was an extreme ice age so intense that Mirovia may have been completely frozen to a depth of 2-km. This is part of the Snowball Earth hypothesis.
See also
Panthalassa
References
Plate tectonics
Historical oceans |
4368975 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropical%20nations%20at%20the%20Winter%20Olympics | Tropical nations at the Winter Olympics | Several tropical nations have participated in the Winter Olympics despite not having the climate for winter sports. Partly because of that, their entries are a subject of human interest stories during the Games. No tropical nation has ever won a Winter Olympic medal.
The first warm-weather, but not tropical, nation participating in the Winter Olympics was Mexico. Much of Mexico is at a latitude north of the Tropic of Cancer, and most of the country has a subtropical highland or semi-arid climate, so it is not exclusively a tropical nation. Nonetheless, Mexico made its Winter Olympic debut at the 1928 Winter Olympics with a five-man bobsleigh team that finished eleventh of twenty-three entrants. Mexico did not return again to the Winter Games until the 1984 Winter Olympics.
The first truly tropical nation to compete in the Winter Olympic Games is the Philippines, who sent two alpine skiers to the 1972 Winter Olympics in Sapporo, Japan. Ben Nanasca placed 42nd in giant slalom skiing (out of 73 entrants), and Juan Cipriano did not finish. In slalom skiing, neither skier was able to finish. Costa Rica became the second tropical nation to participate at the Winter Games, in the 1980 Winter Olympics at Lake Placid, New York, where Arturo Kinch also competed in alpine skiing events. Kinch would continue to compete for Costa Rica at three more Winter Games, including the 2006 Winter Olympics at age 49. There he finished 96th in the 15 km cross-country skiing event, ahead of only Prawat Nagvajara of Thailand, another tropical nation.
The 1988 Winter Olympics in Calgary, Alberta, Canada attracted many tropical nations, including Costa Rica, Fiji, Guam, Guatemala, Jamaica, Netherlands Antilles, the Philippines, Puerto Rico, and the United States Virgin Islands. The Jamaica bobsleigh team became a fan favorite at these Games and were later the inspiration of the 1993 motion picture Cool Runnings. In the 1994 Winter Olympics six years later, the Jamaican four-man sled placed a creditable fourteenth, ahead of the United States and Russia, while Jamaican-born bobsledder Lascelles Brown won silver for Canada in 2006.
The 2006 Winter Olympics in Turin, Italy marked the Winter Games debut of Ethiopia and Madagascar. The 2010 Winter Olympics in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada saw the debut of the Cayman Islands, Colombia, Peru, and Ghana. The 2014 Winter Olympics saw the debut of Dominica, Paraguay, Timor-Leste, Togo, Tonga, and Zimbabwe. The 2018 Winter Olympics saw the debut of Ecuador, Eritrea, Malaysia, Nigeria, and Singapore. The 2022 Winter Olympics saw the debut of Haiti.
List of participating tropical nations
This list of nations includes those that lie entirely or predominantly within the tropical latitudes and also have a mostly tropical climate according to the Köppen climate classification system. Years of Winter Olympic Games participation are shown.
Other warm-weather nations (located in the subtropics, for example) that have competed in the Winter Games include Australia (which has a tropical far north, and became the first Southern Hemisphere nation to win a gold medal at the Winter Olympics in 2002), Bermuda, Chinese Taipei, Eswatini, Hong Kong, India, Mexico, South Africa, Uruguay and several North African nations including Algeria, Egypt and Morocco.
Tonga sought to make its Winter Olympic debut at the 2010 Winter Olympics by entering a single competitor in luge, attracting some media attention, but he crashed in the final round of qualifying. Two years later, he attracted media attention again when it was discovered he had altered his name to that of one of his sponsors, a lingerie firm, as a marketing stunt. He was, at that time, in training to attempt to qualify for the 2014 Winter Olympics.
Notable winter Olympians from tropical nations
Winter Paralympic Games
As of 2022, only three tropical nations have been represented at the Winter Paralympic Games. Tofiri Kibuuka of Uganda competed in cross-country skiing at the inaugural edition of the Winter Paralympics in 1976 and again at the 1980 Games. After Kibuuka obtained Norwegian nationality, he began to compete for Norway at the Paralympics starting in 1984, winning several medals in athletics at the Summer Paralympics. Brazil sent two athletes as part of its debut at the 2014 Winter Paralympics. Puerto Rico sent one athlete as part of its debut at the 2022 Winter Paralympics.
Winter Youth Olympic Games
Five tropical nations were represented at the First Winter Youth Olympics in Innsbruck, Austria.
See also
List of participating nations at the Winter Olympic Games
Notes
References
Nations at the Winter Olympics
Winter Olympics
Winter Olympics
Olympics
Winter Olympics
Olympics
Olympics |
4368981 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tubilustrium | Tubilustrium | In Ancient Rome the month of March was the traditional start of the campaign season, and the Tubilustrium was a ceremony to make the army fit for war. The ceremony involved sacred trumpets called tubae.
Johannes Quasten, however, argues that the common term for war trumpets being tubae is not the same as the tubi form here. He states that tubi was only used for trumpets used in sacrifices and goes on to show how this ceremony was a feast to cleanse and purify the trumpets used in sacrifices - it is a good example, he argues, of the special connection between music and cult in Roman ritual.
The festival was held on March 23, the last day of the Quinquatria festival held in tribute to the Roman God Mars and Nerine, a Sabine goddess. The event took place again on May 23.
The ceremony was held in Rome in a building called the Hall of the Shoemakers (atrium sutorium) and involved the sacrifice of a ewe lamb. Romans who did not attend the ceremony would be reminded of the occasion by seeing the Salii dancing through the streets of the city.
Notes
March observances
May observances
Festivals of Mars
Processions in ancient Rome |
4369263 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Superocean | Superocean | A superocean is an ocean that surrounds a supercontinent. It is less commonly defined as any ocean larger than the current Pacific Ocean. Named global superoceans include Mirovia, which surrounded the supercontinent Rodinia, and Panthalassa, which surrounded the supercontinent Pangaea. Pannotia and Columbia, along with landmasses before Columbia (such as Ur and Kenorland), were also surrounded by superoceans.
As surface water moves unobstructed east to west in superoceans, it tends to warm from the exposure to sunlight so that the western edge of the ocean is warmer than the eastern. Additionally, seasonal changes in temperature, which would have been significantly more rapid inland, probably caused powerful monsoons. In general, however, the mechanics of superoceans are not well understood.
List of superoceans
Nealbara/Gyrosia (Vaalbara/Ur) (4.404–1.071 Ga)
Lerova (Kenorland) (2.523–1.805 Ga)
Atlanta-Pacifica Ocean (Atlic Ocean) (Columbia) (1.41–1.065 Ga)
Mirovia (Rodinia) (1,380–600 Ma)
Pan-African Ocean (Rodinia/Pannotia) (987.5-605 Ma)
Panthalassa (Pannotia/Pangaea) (750–173 Ma)
Possible future superoceans
Southern-Atlantic Ocean (Amasia)
Atlantic Ocean (Novopangaea)
Propanthalassic Ocean (Pangaea Proxima)
Baikal Ocean (Pan-Asian Ocean) (Aurica)
See also
World Ocean
References
External links
Historical oceans
Plate tectonics |
4370134 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/110393%20Rammstein | 110393 Rammstein | 110393 Rammstein, provisional designation , is a background asteroid from the central region of the asteroid belt, approximately 4 kilometers in diameter. It was discovered on 11 October 2001, by French astronomer Jean-Claude Merlin at the Le Creusot Observatory in France. The asteroid was named after the German industrial metal band Rammstein.
Orbit and classification
Rammstein is a non-family asteroid from the main belt's background population. It orbits the Sun in the central asteroid belt at a distance of 2.5–2.9 AU once every 4 years and 6 months (1,630 days; semi-major axis of 2.71 AU). Its orbit has an eccentricity of 0.09 and an inclination of 12° with respect to the ecliptic.
The body's observation arc begins with its first observation made by LONEOS at Lowell Observatory in September 2001, less than a month prior to its official discovery observation at Le Creusot. A telescope is required to see Rammstein, as its maximum brightness is of the brightness of the faintest objects that can be seen with the unaided eye.
Physical characteristics
The asteroid's spectral type is unknown.
Diameter and albedo
Rammstein has not been observed by any of the space-based surveys such as the Infrared Astronomical Satellite IRAS, the Japanese Akari satellite or the NEOWISE mission of NASA's Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer. Based on a generic magnitude-to-diameter conversion, the asteroid measures 3.0 and 5.5 kilometers in diameter based on an absolute magnitude of 15.0 and a geometric albedo of 0.20 and 0.06, which roughly correspond to a body of carbonaceous and stony composition, respectively (both types are common in the central asteroid belt). The Minor Planet Center (MPC) similarly estimates the object's mean-diameter to be between 3 and 6 kilometers.
Rotation period
As of 2018, no rotational lightcurve of Rammstein has been obtained from photometric observations. The body's rotation period, shape and poles remain unknown.
Naming
This minor planet was named after the German NDH-Metal band Rammstein, which in turn took its name from the city of Ramstein after the tragic 1988 air show disaster at Ramstein Air Base (also see Ramstein air show disaster). The official naming citation was published by the MPC on 19 February 2006 ().
References
External links
Further information about the observatory
110393
Discoveries by Jean-Claude Merlin
Named minor planets
110393 Rammstein
20011011 |
4370330 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Classical%20albedo%20features%20on%20Mars | Classical albedo features on Mars | The classical albedo features of Mars are the light and dark features that can be seen on the planet Mars through an Earth-based telescope. Before the age of space probes, several astronomers created maps of Mars on which they gave names to the features they could see. The most popular system of nomenclature was devised by Giovanni Schiaparelli, who used names from classical antiquity. Today, the improved understanding of Mars enabled by space probes has rendered many of the classical names obsolete for the purposes of cartography; however, some of the old names are still used to describe geographical features on the planet.
History
Observing albedo features
Early telescopic astronomers, observing Mars from a great distance through primitive instruments (though they were advanced for their day), were limited to studying albedo contrasts on the surface of the planet. These lighter and darker patches rarely correspond to topographic features and in many cases obscure them. The origins of the albedo contrasts were a mystery. The lighter patches at the poles were correctly believed to be a frozen substance, either water or carbon dioxide, but the nature of the dark patches seen against the general reddish tint of Mars was uncertain for centuries. When Giovanni Schiaparelli began observing Mars in 1877, he believed that the darker features were seas, lakes, and swamps and named them accordingly in Latin (mare, lacus, palus etc.). Within a few decades, however, most astronomers came to agree that Mars lacks large bodies of surface water. The dark features were then thought by some to be indications of Martian vegetation, since they changed shape and intensity over the course of the Martian year. They are now known to be areas where the wind has swept away the paler dust, exposing a darker surface, often basaltic rock; so their borders change in response to windstorms on the Martian surface that move the dust around, widening or narrowing the features.
The dust-storms themselves also appear as light patches, can cover vast areas and sometimes last for many weeks; when Mariner 9 arrived in Martian orbit in November 1971 the entire planet was covered by a single enormous dust-storm, with only the peaks of the four or five highest mountains showing above it. This variability may explain many of the differences between telescopic observations over the years.
Early non-classical names
The first map of Martian albedo features was published in 1840 by Johann Heinrich Mädler and Wilhelm Beer, but they simply labelled the features a, b, c ... without giving them names. Over the next two decades the most prominent features picked up various informal names (such as the Hourglass Sea for our Syrtis Major Planum) but there was no overall system.
The first astronomer to name Martian albedo features systematically was Richard A. Proctor, who in 1867 created a map (based in part on the observations of William Rutter Dawes) in which several features were given the names of astronomers who had been involved in mapping Mars. In some cases, the same names were used for multiple features. Proctor's names remained in use for several decades, notably in several early maps drawn by Camille Flammarion in 1876 and Nathaniel Green in 1877.
Schiaparelli's classical names
However, within a few decades Proctor's names were superseded by a new scheme devised by Giovanni Schiaparelli, whose observations differed from Proctor's, and who used this difference to justify drawing up an entirely new system of nomenclature. Schiaparelli was an expert on ancient astronomy and geography, and used Latin names, drawn from the myths, history and geography of classical antiquity; dark features were named after ancient seas and rivers, light areas after islands and legendary lands.
When E. M. Antoniadi took over as the leading telescopic observer of Mars in the early 20th century, he followed Schiaparelli's names rather than Proctor's, and the Proctorian names quickly became obsolete. In his encyclopedic work La Planète Mars (1930) Antoniadi used all Schiaparelli's names and added more of his own from the same classical sources. However, there was still no 'official' system of names for Martian features.
In 1958, the International Astronomical Union set up an ad hoc committee under Audouin Dollfus, which settled on a list of 128 officially recognised albedo features. Of these, 105 came from Schiaparelli, 2 from Flammarion, 2 from Percival Lowell, and 16 from Antoniadi, with an additional 3 from the committee itself. This involved a considerable amount of pruning; Antoniadi's La Planète Mars had mentioned 558 named features.
The pictures returned by interplanetary spacecraft, notably the observations made from Martian orbit by Mariner 9 over the course of 1972, have revolutionized the scientific understanding of Mars, and some of the classical albedo features have become obsolete as they do not correspond clearly with the detailed images provided by the spacecraft. However, many of the names used for topographic features on Mars are still based on the classical nomenclature for the feature's location; for instance, the albedo feature 'Ascraeus Lacus' provides the basis of the name of the volcano Ascraeus Mons in roughly the same position.
In addition, since most Earth-based amateur telescopes are not powerful enough to resolve the topographic surface features of Mars, amateur astronomers still use many of the old feature-names to orient themselves and record their observations.
Common feature names
Several Latin words involved here are common nouns. These are generally, but not always, second in the name, but are usually ignored in alphabetizing below:
Campi () – fields
Cherso () – peninsula
Cornu () – horn, peninsula
Depressio () – lowland
Fastigium () – summit
Fons () – fountain
Fretum () – strait
Insula () – island
Lacus () – lake
Lucus () – grove
Mare () – sea
Nix () – snow
Palus () – marsh
Pons () – bridge
Promontorium () – cape
Regio () – region
Silva () – wood
Sinus () – bay
List of albedo features
Not listed here are the "canals" also observed and named by Schiaparelli, for which see the article Martian canals.
Note that the pronunciation refers to English pronunciation, not Latin or Italian.
A
B-E
F-L
M-N
O-S
T-Z
Interactive Mars map
See also
Aspledon Undae
Dark dune spots
List of craters on Mars
List of Martian canals
Mars
Martian canals
Siton Undae
References
Further reading
External links
USGS Astrologeology Program, Martian Nomenclature |
4370870 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nancy%20Roman | Nancy Roman | Nancy Grace Roman (pronounced "Roman"; May 16, 1925 – December 25, 2018) was an American astronomer who made important contributions to stellar classification and motions. The first female executive at NASA, Roman served as NASA's first Chief of Astronomy throughout the 1960s and 1970s, establishing her as one of the "visionary founders of the US civilian space program".
She created NASA's space astronomy program and is known to many as the "Mother of Hubble" for her foundational role in planning the Hubble Space Telescope. Throughout her career, Roman was an active public speaker and educator, and an advocate for women in the sciences.
In May 2020, NASA Administrator Jim Bridenstine announced that the Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope would be named the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope in recognition of her enduring contributions to astronomy.
Early life
Nancy Grace Roman was born in Nashville, Tennessee, to music teacher Georgia Frances Smith Roman and physicist/mathematician Irwin Roman. Shortly after, her father took a job as a geophysicist for an oil company and the family moved to Oklahoma three months after Roman's birth. Roman and her parents later moved to Houston, Texas, New Jersey, Michigan, and then Nevada in 1935, when her father joined the Civil Service in geophysical research.
When she was about 12 years old, the family moved to Baltimore, Maryland, when Irwin Roman was hired as Senior Geophysicist at the Baltimore office of the U.S. Geological Survey. Roman considered her parents to be major influences in her interest in science.
When Roman was 11 years old, she formed an astronomy club, gathering with classmates once a week and learning about constellations from books. Although discouraged by those around her, Roman knew by seventh grade that she would dedicate her life to astronomy. She attended Western High School in Baltimore where she participated in an accelerated program, graduating in three years.
Education
Swarthmore
Roman attended Swarthmore College, intending to study astronomy. The dean of women was not encouraging in this. Roman said “if you insisted on majoring in science or engineering, she wouldn't have anything more to do with you”. The dean referred her to the astronomy department, then chaired by Peter van de Kamp, who was initially discouraging, but did teach her astronomy. She worked on the two student telescopes available there, which had been defunct. Roman says that helped with “getting a feel for instruments and instrumentation and just having the fun of playing around with observing techniques.”
In her sophomore year, she began working at the Sproul Observatory processing astronomical photographic plates, inheriting Van de Kamp's ethos that since he had used “plates that were taken by his predecessors 50 years earlier," he felt obliged "to replace those with plates that his successors would use 50 years in the future”. Van de Kamp taught Roman in a solo lecture course on astrometry, encouraging her to learn about professional astronomy through use of the astronomy library. She graduated in February 1946, and van de Kamp suggested that she continue studies at the University of Chicago, which was rebuilding its astronomy department after World War II. Years later, Roman remained involved with her alma mater, serving on the Swarthmore Board of Managers from 1980 to 1988.
Chicago/Yerkes
She started graduate school at the University of Chicago in March 1946. Finding the classes easier than at Swarthmore, she approached three professors, Otto Struve, George van Biesbroeck, and William Wilson Morgan, asking each for an observational astronomy project to work on. The first gave her a theory project, the second a data analysis project, and Morgan provided an observational project using a 12-inch telescope, most likely the refractor from the Kenwood Astrophysical Observatory .Although Morgan was initially dismissive of Roman, at one point not speaking to her for six months, he continued to support her research. She received her Ph.D. in astronomy in 1949, having written a dissertation on the Ursa Major Moving Group.
After a two-month break at the Warner and Swasey Observatory, she was invited by Morgan to be his research associate at Yerkes Observatory. She worked at Yerkes for six years, often traveling to the McDonald Observatory in Texas, which at the time was managed by the University of Chicago, and once to the David Dunlap Observatory in Toronto, supported by the Office of Naval Research. The research position was not permanent, so Roman became an instructor and later, an assistant professor.
At Yerkes, her research focused on stellar spectroscopy, emphasizing F and G type stars and high-velocity stars. Her work produced some of the most highly cited papers of the time, including, in 1950, three top-100 papers in a year with over 3,000 publications. She was offered research positions at Wayne State University and the University of Southern California, but turned them down as she felt the institutions lacked sufficient astronomical instrumentation, an issue of great importance to her.
She traveled to Argonne National Laboratory to use their new astrometry device for measuring photographic plates, but was unable to convince Yerkes to acquire one. She advocated for the purchase of a then-novel digital computer for data analysis in 1954, but was turned down by department chair Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar, who declared computers as unuseful for this purpose. Roman eventually left her job at the university because of the paucity of tenured research positions available to women. They had never had a woman on the academic staff. Gerard Kuiper recommended to her a position at the Naval Research Laboratory in the new field of radio astronomy.
Professional work
Research career
Roman conducted a survey of all naked-eye stars similar to the Sun and realized that they could be divided into two categories by chemical content and motion through the galaxy. One of her discoveries was that stars made of hydrogen and helium move faster than stars composed of other heavier elements. Another discovery was finding that not all stars that were common were the same age. That was proven by comparing hydrogen lines of the low dispersion spectra in the stars.
Roman noticed that the stars with the stronger lines moved closer to the center of the Milky Way and the others moved in more elliptical patterns, off of the plane of the galaxy. These fundamental observations of the structure of the galaxy provided the first clue to its formation and laid the foundation for later work; her paper was selected as one of the 100 most important papers in 100 years by the Astrophysical Journal.
While working at Yerkes Observatory of the University of Chicago, Roman observed the star AG Draconis and discovered that its emission spectrum had completely changed since earlier observations. She later credited the publication of her discovery as a stroke of luck – the star is in that state only 2-3% of the time—that substantially raised her profile within the astronomical community, advancing to her career.
In 1955, the Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series published her catalog of high-velocity stars, which documented new “spectral types, photoelectric magnitudes and colors, and spectroscopic parallaxes for about 600 high-velocity stars.” Her “UV excess” method became widely used by astronomers to find stars with more heavier elements using only the colors of the stars rather than having to take spectra. In 1959, Roman wrote a paper on the detection of extraterrestrial planets. She also did research and published on the subjects of locating constellations from their 1875.0 positions.
Naval Research Laboratory
After leaving the University of Chicago, Roman went to the Naval Research Laboratory and entered the radio astronomy program in 1954. Radio astronomy was then a very young field in the United States, and the NRL had taken an early lead by building the largest accurate radio telescope in 1951, a 50-foot parabolic antenna located on top of one of its research buildings. Roman's work at the NRL included radio astronomy, geodesy, and even the propagation of sound underwater. She spent three years there, rising to become head of the microwave spectroscopy section of the radio astronomy program.
One of the few people at the NRL in radio astronomy with a classical astronomy background, she was consulted on a wide variety of topics. During Roman's time at the NRL, she provided astronomy consultation for the Project Vanguard satellite program, although she did not formally work on any of the rocket projects, introducing her to space astronomy. At the time, she was concerned that the science being done in the rocket projects was not of high quality, though she saw the potential of space astronomy.
Roman's radio astronomy work included mapping much of the Milky Way galaxy at a frequency of 440 MHz, determining the spectral break in the nonthermal radio emission. She pioneered the use of radio astronomy in geodetic work, including radar ranging to improve our calculation of the distance to the Moon at a wavelength of 10 cm (2.86 GHz). Roman presented this at a geodesy conference in 1959 as the best way to determine the mass of the Earth.
While at the NRL, Roman received an invitation to speak on her work with stars in Armenia, then in the Soviet Union, in 1956 for the dedication of the Byurakan Observatory. This cemented her international reputation, and as she was the first civilian to visit Armenia after the start of the Cold War. The visit raised her visibility in the United States, with invitations to speak about the trip leading to a series of astronomy lectures. Her reputation was well established, including with people at the newly formed National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA).
NASA
At a lecture by Harold Urey at NASA, Roman was approached by Jack Clark, who asked whether she knew someone interested in creating a program for space astronomy at NASA. She interpreted that as an invitation to apply and was the applicant who accepted the position. While the position nominally allowed for 20% of her time to be used for scientific research, she recognized that such a position would effectively mean she was giving up research, but, as she said in 2018, “the chance to start with a clean slate to map out a program that I thought would influence astronomy for fifty years was more than I could resist.”
Roman arrived at NASA in late February 1959 as Head of Observational Astronomy. She quickly inherited a broad program which included the Orbiting Solar Observatories and geodesy and relativity. In early 1960, Roman became the first astronomer in the position of Chief of Astronomy in NASA's Office of Space Science, setting up the initial program; she was also the first woman to hold an executive position at the space agency.
Part of her job was traveling throughout the country and giving lectures at astronomy departments, where she discussed the fact that the program was in development. Roman also was looking to find out what other astronomers wanted to study and to educate them on the advantages of observing from space. Her visits set the precedent that NASA scientific research would be driven by the needs of the broader astronomical community, or in her words, the visits were “to tell them what we were planning at NASA and what the NASA opportunities were, but it was equally to try to get from them a feeling of what they thought NASA ought to be doing.”
Her work was instrumental in converting what was then a ground-based astronomical community, hostile to the space science program, into supporters of astronomy from space. She established the policy that major astronomy projects would be managed by NASA for the good of the broader scientific community, rather than as individual experiments run by academic research scientists. As early as 1960, a year into her new position, Roman began publishing plans for NASA astronomy with policy statements, such as “A fundamental part of all of these plans is the participation of the entire astronomical community. NASA will act as a coordinating agency to enable astronomers to obtain the basic observations they need from outer space.”
During her employment at NASA, Roman developed and prepared the budgets for various programs and she organized their scientific participation. From 1959 through the 1970s, when the introduction of peer review brought in outside expertise, she was the sole individual accepting or rejecting proposals for NASA astronomy projects based on their merit and her own knowledge.
In 1959, Roman proposed, perhaps for the first time, that detecting planets around other stars might be possible using a space-based telescope, and even suggested a technique employing a rotated coronagraphic mask; a similar approach was ultimately used with the Hubble Space Telescope to image the possible exoplanet Fomalhaut B (ref K.) and will be used by the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope to image exoplanets similar to the giant planets in the Solar System. She also believed as early as 1980 that the future Hubble would be able to detect Jupiter exoplanets by astrometry; this was successful in 2002 when astronomers characterized a previously discovered planet around the star Gliese 876.
Roman's position became Chief of Astronomy and Solar Physics at NASA from 1961 to 1963. During this time, she oversaw the development of the Orbiting Solar Observatory (OSO) program, developing and launching OSO 1 in May 1962 and developing OSO 2, (February 1965) and OSO 3 (March 1967). She held various other positions in NASA, including Chief of Astronomy and Relativity.
She also led, from 1959, the orbiting astronomical observatories (OAO) program, working with engineer Dixon Ashworth, initially a series of optical and ultraviolet telescopes. The first, OAO-1, was slated to be launched in 1962, but technical difficulties resulted in a descoped version launched in 1966, but which failed three days after reaching orbit. Roman explained these problems by analogy in 2018:
She continued to develop Orbiting Astronomical Observatory 2, launched in December 1968, which became the first successful space telescope. OAO-3, named Copernicus, was a highly successful ultraviolet telescope which operated from 1972 to 1981.
Roman oversaw the development and launch of the three small astronomical satellites: the X-ray explorer Uhuru (satellite) in 1970 with Riccardo Giacconi, the gamma-ray telescope Small Astronomy Satellite 2 in 1972, and the multi-instrument X-ray telescope Small Astronomy Satellite 3 in 1975. Other projects she oversaw included four geodetic satellites. She planned for other smaller programs such as the Astronomy Rocket Program, the Scout Probe to measure the relativistic gravity redshift, programs for high energy astronomy observatories, and other experiments on Spacelab, Gemini, Apollo, and Skylab.
Roman was known to be blunt in her dealings, or as Robert Zimmerman put it, "her hard-nosed and realistic manner of approving or denying research projects had made her disliked by many in the astronomical community". This was very much in evidence in the early 1960s when she terminated the relativity program, which at the time consisted of three separate projects, when the Pound-Rebka experiment achieved better accuracy than was projected for the space-based projects.
Roman worked with Jack Holtz, on the small astronomy satellite and Don Burrowbridge on the space telescope. She set up NASA's scientific ballooning program, inheriting the Stratoscope balloon projects led by Martin Schwarzschild from the ONR and the National Science Foundation. Roman led the development of NASA's airborne astronomy program, beginning with a 12-inch telescope in a Learjet in 1968 and followed in 1974 by the Kuiper Airborne Observatory with a 36-inch telescope, opening up the obscured infrared region of the spectrum for astronomical observations to researchers such as Frank J. Low.
Other long wavelength missions started during her tenure were the Cosmic Background Explorer, which, although she was initially unconvinced would be able to pass review garnered the Nobel Prize in 2006 for two of its leading scientists, and the Infrared Astronomy Satellite, both of which were overseen by Nancy Boggess, who Roman had hired in 1968 to help manage the growing portfolio of astronomy missions. Roman was instrumental in NASA's acceptance of partnership in the International Ultraviolet Explorer, which she felt was her greatest success, saying, “IUE was an uphill fight. I don't mean I didn't have some support, but I think I carried it on almost single handedly.”
The last program in which Roman was highly involved was the Hubble Space Telescope, then referred to as the Large Space Telescope (LST). While a large telescope in space had been proposed by Lyman Spitzer in 1946, and astronomers became interested in a 3m-class space telescope in the early 1960s as the Saturn V rocket was being developed, Roman chose to focus on developing smaller-scale OAO telescopes first in order to demonstrate the necessary technologies. She felt that even the modest 12 inch (30.5 cm) telescopes of OAO-2, which did not launch until 1968, were a major leap forward, not least because the development of suitable pointing control systems was a major technological hurdle. Astronomers promoted the idea of a telescope on the Moon, which Roman felt had too many insurmountable issues such as dust, and engineers at NASA's Langley Research Center promoted the idea in 1965 of a space telescope with human operators, which Roman considered an absurd complication.
After the success of OAO-2, Roman began to entertain beginning the Large Space Telescope, and started giving public lectures touting the scientific value of such a facility. NASA asked the National Academy of Sciences in 1969 to study the science of a 3m-class telescope in space, resulting in an endorsement for NASA to proceed. In 1971 Roman set up the Science Steering Group for the Large Space Telescope, and appointed both NASA engineers and astronomers from all over the country to serve on it, for the express purpose of designing a free-floating space observatory that could meet the community's needs but would be feasible for NASA to implement.
Roman was very involved with the early planning and specifically, the setting up of the program structure. According to Robert Zimmerman, "Roman had been the driving force for an LST from its earliest days" and that she, along with astronomer Charles Robert O'Dell, hired in 1972 to be the Project Scientist under Roman as the Program Scientist, “were the primary advocates and overseers of the LST within NASA, and their efforts working with the astronomical community produced a detailed paradigm for NASA operation of a large scientific project that now serves as a standard for large astronomical facilities.”
This included creating and devolving responsibility for mission science operations to the Space Telescope Science Institute. With both the astronomical community and the NASA hierarchy convinced of the feasibility and value of the LST, Roman then spoke to politically connected men in a series of dinners hosted by NASA Administrator James Webb in order to build support for the LST project, and then wrote testimony for Congress throughout the 1970s to continue to justify the telescope. She invested in detector technology, resulting in the Hubble being the first major observatory to use Charge-Coupled Device detectors, although these had been flown in space in 1976 in the KH-11 Kennen reconnaissance satellites. Roman's final role in the development of Hubble was to serve on the selection board for its science operations.
Because of her contribution, she often is called the "Mother of Hubble". Later in life she stated being uncomfortable with that appellation given the many contributions made by others. NASA's then-Chief Astronomer, Edward J. Weiler, who worked with Roman at the agency, called her 'the mother of the Hubble Space Telescope'. He said, "which is often forgotten by our younger generation of astronomers who make their careers by using Hubble Space Telescope". Weiler added, "Regretfully, history has forgotten a lot in today's Internet age, but it was Nancy in the old days before the Internet and before Google and e-mail and all that stuff, who really helped to sell the Hubble Space Telescope, organize the astronomers, who eventually convinced Congress to fund it." Williams recalls Roman as someone "whose vision in a NASA leadership position shaped U.S. space astronomy for decades".
Post-NASA
After working for NASA for twenty-one years, she took an early retirement opportunity in 1979 in part to allow her to care for her elderly mother. She continued on as a consultant for another year in order to complete the selection of STScI. Roman was interested in learning computer programming, and so audited a course on FORTRAN at Montgomery College that garnered her a job as a consultant for ORI, Inc. from 1980 to 1988. In that role, she was able to support research in geodesy and the development of astronomical catalogs, two of her former research areas. This led to her becoming the head of the Astronomical Data Center at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in 1995.
She continued her work until 1997 for contractors who supported the Goddard Space Flight Center. Roman then spent three years teaching advanced junior high and high school students and K-12 science teachers, including those in underserved districts. She then spent ten years recording astronomical textbooks for Reading for the Blind and Dyslexic. In a 2017 interview, Roman said: “I like to talk to children about the advantages of going into science and particularly to tell the girls, by showing them my life, that they can be scientists and succeed.”
From 1955 on, she lived in the Washington, D.C. area, in the later years in Chevy Chase, Maryland with her mother, who died in 1992. Outside her work, Roman enjoyed going to lectures and concerts and was active in the American Association of University Women. She died on December 25, 2018, following a long illness.
Women in science
Like most women in the sciences in the mid-twentieth century, Roman was faced with problems related to male domination in science and technology and the roles perceived as appropriate for women in that time period. She was discouraged from going into astronomy by people around her. In an interview with Voice of America, Roman remembered asking her high school guidance counselor if she could take second year algebra instead of Latin. "She looked down her nose at me and sneered, 'What kind of lady would take mathematics instead of Latin?' That was the sort of reception I got most of the way", recalled Roman.
At one time, she was one of very few women in NASA, being the only woman with an executive position. She attended courses entitled, "Women in Management", in Michigan and at Penn State to learn about issues regarding being a woman in a management position. Roman stated in an interview in 1980 that the courses were dissatisfying and addressed women's interests rather than women's problems.
In 1963, when entry to the astronaut corps was restricted to men, Roman said in a speech that “I believe that there will be women astronauts some time, just as there are women airplane pilots”. In her position she did not affect change to this, something she admitted to regretting.
In recognition of her advancement of women in senior science management, Roman received recognitions from several women's organizations, including the Women's Education and Industrial Union, the Ladies' Home Journal magazine, Women in Aerospace, the Women's History Museum, and the American Association of University Women. She was also one of four women featured in 2017 in the “Women of NASA LEGO Set,” which of all her honors she described as “by far the most fun.”
Selected publications
Roman published 97 scientific papers during her lifetime.
Recognition
Federal Woman's Award – 1962
One of 100 Most Important Young People, Life magazine – 1962
Citation for Public Service, Colorado Women's College – 1966
Ninetieth Anniversary Award, Women's Education and Industrial Union (Boston) – 1967
Exceptional Scientific Achievement Medal NASA – 1969
NASA Outstanding Scientific Leadership Award – 1978
Fellow, American Astronautical Society – 1978
William Randolph Lovelace II Award, American Astronautical Association – 1979 & 2011
Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science– 1988
Lifetime Achievement Award – Women in Aerospace – 2010
Woman of Distinction from American Association of University Women, Maryland – 2016
Honorary Doctorates from Russell Sage College (1966), Hood College (1969), Bates College (1971) and Swarthmore College (1976)
The asteroid 2516 Roman is named in her honor
NASA fellowship program, The Nancy Grace Roman Technology Fellowship in Astrophysics, is named for her
In 2017, a "Women of NASA" LEGO set went on sale featuring (among other things) mini-figurines of Roman, Margaret Hamilton, Mae Jemison, and Sally Ride
Episode 113 of the "Hubblecast" podcast "Nancy Roman – The Mother of Hubble" was created in her honor, a video presentation that documents her career and explores her contribution to science
In 2020, NASA named the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope, formerly the Wide Field Infrared Survey Telescope, in her honor.
References
Further reading
External links
Oral History interview transcript with Nancy G. Roman 19 August 1980, American Institute of Physics, Niels Bohr Library and Archives
Nancy Grace Roman resume
Interviews with Nancy Grace Roman, The Mother of Hubble, 2014-2017 - Media Resources from NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center
Nancy Grace Roman and the Dawn of Space Astronomy
Archival collections
Nancy Grace Roman papers, 1931-1993 (bulk 1950-1980), Niels Bohr Library & Archives
Nancy Grace Roman addition to papers, 1935-2010, Niels Bohr Library & Archives
Nancy Grace Roman addition to papers, 1934-2006, Niels Bohr Library & Archives
1925 births
2018 deaths
American astronomers
American women astronomers
NASA astrophysicists
Scientists from Nashville, Tennessee
Swarthmore College alumni
University of Chicago alumni
Hubble Space Telescope |
4372188 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rhizophora%20mangle | Rhizophora mangle | Rhizophora mangle, the red mangrove, is distributed in estuarine ecosystems throughout the tropics. Its viviparous "seeds", in actuality called propagules, become fully mature plants before dropping off the parent tree. These are dispersed by water until eventually embedding in the shallows.
Rhizophora mangle grows on aerial prop roots, which arch above the water level, giving stands of this tree the characteristic "mangrove" appearance. It is a valuable plant in Florida, Louisiana, and Texas coastal ecosystems. The name refers to the red colour on the inner part of its roots when halved, so it does not display any red colour in its regular appearance. In its native habitat it is threatened by invasive species such as the Brazilian pepper tree (Schinus terebinthifolius). The red mangrove itself is considered an invasive species in some locations, such as Hawaii, where it forms dense, monospecific thickets. R. mangle thickets, however, provide nesting and hunting habitat for a diverse array of organisms, including fish, birds, and crocodiles.
Distribution and habitat
Red mangroves are found in subtropical and tropical areas in both hemispheres, extending to near 28°N to S latitude. They thrive on coastlines in brackish water and in swampy salt marshes. Because they are well adapted to salt water, they thrive where many other plants fail and create their own ecosystems, the mangals. Red mangroves are often found near white mangroves (Laguncularia racemosa), black mangroves (Avicennia germinans), and buttonwood (Conocarpus erectus) though often more seaward than the other species. Through stabilization of their surroundings, mangroves create a community for other plants and animals (such as mangrove crabs). Though rooted in soil, mangrove roots are often submerged in water for several hours or on a permanent basis. The roots are usually sunk in a sand or clay base, which allows for some protection from the waves.
Specimens of Moesziomyces aphidis have been collected from water samples and on Rhizophora mangle leaves along the Perequê-Áçu River, in mangroves located in São Paulo State, Brazil.
Description
Red mangroves are easily distinguishable through their unique prop roots system and viviparous seeds. The prop roots of a red mangrove suspend it over the water, thereby giving it extra support and protection. They also help the tree to combat hypoxia by allowing it a direct intake of oxygen through its root structure.
A mangrove can reach up to in height in ideal conditions, but it is commonly found at a more modest . Its bark is thick and a grey-brown color. Mangrove leaves are wide and long, with smooth margins and an elliptical shape. They are a darker shade of green on the tops than on the bottoms. The tree produces yellow flowers in the spring.
Reproduction
As a viviparous plant, R. mangle creates a propagule that is in reality a living tree. Though resembling an elongated seed pod, the fully grown propagule on the mangrove is capable of rooting and producing a new tree. The trees are hermaphrodites, capable of self or wind pollination. The tree undergoes no dormant stage as a seed, but rather progresses to a live plant before leaving its parent tree. A mangrove propagule may float in brackish water for over a year before rooting.
Uses
In the Casamance region in southern Senegal, halved roots of R. mangle are commonly used to create roof and ceiling structures, as well as for production of firewood and charcoal.
Gallery
See also
Wetland
References
External links
Rhizophora mangle images at bioimages.vanderbilt.edu
https://web.archive.org/web/20100114230245/http://www.dpi.qld.gov.au/28_9227.htm More detailed information on the Red Mangrove.
mangle
Mangroves
Pantropical flora
Flora of West Tropical Africa
Flora of Australasia
Flora of Southern America
Flora of Florida
Flora of Mexico
Plants described in 1753
Taxa named by Carl Linnaeus |
4372328 | https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tracy%27s%20Rock | Tracy's Rock | Tracy's Rock, known as Split Rock or the Station 6 Boulder in the scientific literature, is a large boulder on the Moon which was visited by the Apollo 17 crew on December 13, 1972 at their Taurus-Littrow landing site. "Tracy's Rock" is its popular name.
Examination
Geologist-astronaut Harrison H. Schmitt and mission commander Eugene A. Cernan spent considerable time studying the rock and its vicinity at station 6 during their third Extravehicular Activity (EVA-3).
"Gene stepped to the northeast corner of fragment 1, put his left hand on the dust-covered shelf to support himself, and reached out as far as possible toward the center of the dusted area and swept the bag twice from his right to his left, leaving furrows and, at the lefthand end of each furrow, a small mound of dust where he stopped... A labeled detail from frame AS17-140-21496 shows the sample location, the area on the shelf probably disturbed by his left hand, and the area on the ground between fragment 1 and the foreground rock that he disturbed while taking the sample and earlier, at about 165:25:48, in the flightline."
At about 165:33:38, Cernan took a series of photos from higher up the hill. In this photomontage, Schmitt is standing to the left of the rock and the Lunar Roving Vehicle (LRV) is parked to the right.
"Cernan - 'I haven't seen the rock from this perspective in nearly nineteen years. My hand print really shows you how big the rock is and, in 21482, you can see across to the South Massif and the Scarp. The Scarp looks small in this photo, but I remember how big it was (80 meters) because we went up it.'"
The Tracy's Rock/Station 6 panorama is also featured in David Harland's "Geology 101 Field Trip" on the Apollo Lunar Surface Journal's "Fun Images" page.
Naming
The patch of dirt on the north face of the boulder is the subject of a 1984 painting by Apollo 12 astronaut Alan Bean. Bean took up a career as a professional artist after he left the Astronaut Corps and, in the years since, he has developed a considerable reputation as a space artist.
As a result of the painting, those who know the story call the Station 6 boulder "Tracy's Rock". Tracy is Gene Cernan's daughter, who was nine years old at the time of the mission.
"Cernan - 'It was on this part of the rock that Al Bean wrote "Tracy", my daughter's name, in one of his paintings. After we came home I started to see a picture of the boulder in lots of places. It was the picture of Jack going past the corner of the rock (21496), one of the pictures from my pan. It became very popular. One day Al Bean came by and said he was doing a painting of it. And it was a big painting, six feet by three feet or something like that.
"Al likes to have stories in his paintings and he wanted to talk about it. So we talked about the slope and how hard it was to climb up there and I said that, if I'd known the picture was going to get so much notoriety, I wished I would have done something that I hadn't even thought of at the time. And that is to have printed Tracy's name in the dust.
"Al's daughter Amy and Tracy had grown up together and he asked 'How would you have done it'. So I wrote it out on a piece of paper and, some time later, he called and wanted me to come over and look at what he'd done. He had erased the place where I'd taken the sample and had put in Tracy's name, instead.
"And in the little story he put with the picture, he said that he'd done it to save me the trouble of going back to do it myself, and to save the taxpayers the expense of sending me back."
References
Alan Bean Gallery - Tracy's Boulder, 1984
NASA Human Spaceflight Gallery
Geological features on the Moon
Apollo 17
Gene Cernan
Alan Bean
Harrison Schmitt |