NASA TV airs a variety of regularly scheduled, pre-recorded educational and public relations programming 24 hours a day on its various channels. Programs include “NASA Gallery”, which features photographs and video from NASA’s history; “Video File”, which broadcasts b-roll footage for news and media outlets; “Education File”, which provides special programming for schools; “This Week @ NASA”, which shows news from NASA centers around the country; and “NASA Edge” and “NASA 360″, hosted programs that focus on various projects and activities within NASA. Live ISS coverage and related commentary is aired in hour-long segments throughout the day.

The network also provides an array of live programming, such as 24-hour coverage of Space Shuttle missions, ISS events (spacewalks, media interviews, educational broadcasts), press conferences and rocket launches. These often include running commentary by members of the NASA Public Affairs Office who serve as the “voice of Mission Control”, including Rob Navias, Josh Byerly, Nicole Cloutier and Brandi Dean.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article NASA TV, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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Science and technology have always preoccupied China’s leaders and indeed, China’s political leadership comes almost exclusively from technical backgrounds and has a high regard for science. Deng Xiaoping called it “the first productive force.” In recent times, with Hu Jintao and Wen Jiabao and their predecessors Jiang Zemin and Zhu Rongji all being trained engineers, China’s leaders have been described as technocrats.

Since the early 1980s scientific and technological modernization has been given an especially high priority. Plans were made to rebuild the educational structure, continue sending students abroad, negotiate technological purchases and transfer arrangements with the U.S. and others, and develop ways to disseminate scientific and technological information. Areas of most critical interest have included microelectronics, telecommunications, computers, automated manufacturing, and energy. China also has had a space program since the 1960s and, by the late 1990s, had successfully launched more than 25 satellites.

On the other hand, distortions in the economy and society created by party rule have severely hurt Chinese science, according to some Chinese science policy experts. The Chinese Academy of Sciences, modeled on the Soviet system, puts much of China’s greatest scientific talent in a large, under-funded apparatus that remains largely isolated from industry, although the reforms of the past decade have begun to address this problem.

Chinese science strategists have seen China’s greatest opportunities in newly emerging fields such as biotechnology and computers where there is still a chance for China to become a significant player. A majority of Chinese students who went abroad have not returned, but they have built a dense network of global contacts that have greatly facilitated international scientific cooperation. The United States is often held up as the standard of scientific modernity in China. Indeed, photos of the Space Shuttle often appear in Chinese advertisements as a symbol of advanced technology. China’s growing space program, which has put a man in space and successfully completed their second manned orbit in October 2005, is a focus of national pride.

At the end of 1996, China had 5,434 state-owned independent research and development institutions at and above the county level. There were another 3,400 research institutions affiliated with universities, 13,744 affiliated with medium and large industrial enterprises, and 726 affiliated with medium and large construction enterprises. A total of people were engaged in scientific and technological activities in these institutions.

The U.S.–China Science and Technology Agreement remains the framework for bilateral cooperation between the two countries in this field. It was originally signed in 1979. A five-year agreement to extend and amend the accord, including provisions for the protection of intellectual property rights, was signed in May 1991, and the Agreement was again extended for five years in April 1996. Five-year agreements to extend the accord were signed in April 2001 and April 2006. The Agreement is among the longest-standing U.S.–China accords, and includes over eleven U.S. Federal agencies and numerous branches that participate in cooperative exchanges under the S&T Agreement and its nearly 60 protocols, memoranda of understanding, agreements and annexes. The Agreement covers cooperation in areas such as marine conservation, high-energy physics, renewable energy, and health. Biennial Joint Commission Meetings on Science and Technology bring together policymakers from both sides to coordinate joint science and technology cooperation. Executive Secretaries meetings are held biennially to implement specific cooperation programs.

Japan and the European Union also have high profile science and technology cooperative relationships with China.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article Economy of the People’s Republic of China, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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* January 5 – President of the United States Richard Nixon orders the development of a space shuttle program.

* February 4 – Mariner 9 sends pictures from Mars

* February 21 – The Soviet unmanned spacecraft Luna 20 lands on the Moon.

* March 2 – Launch of Pioneer 10 spacecraft.

* April 16 – Apollo 16 launched

* July 23 – The United States launches Landsat 1, first Earth-resources satellite.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article 1972 in science, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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* December 2 – STS-61 is launched – This Space Shuttle mission to the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) installed corrective optics, plus upgrades, that not only allowed the telescope to focus properly, but also increased magnification/clarity beyond the original design: HST had been pre-designed for such future upgrades (see: continuous improvement).

* February 13 – Asteroid 7253 Nara was discovered by Fumiaki Uto.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article 1993 in science, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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During early shuttle development there was great debate about the optimal shuttle design that best balanced capability, development cost and operating cost. Ultimately the current design was chosen, using a reusable winged orbiter, reusable solid rocket boosters, and an expendable external tank.

The shuttle program was formally launched on January 5, 1972, when President Nixon announced that NASA would proceed with the development of a reusable space shuttle system. The final design was less costly to build and less technically ambitious than earlier fully reusable designs. The initial design parameters included a larger external fuel tank, which would have been carried to orbit, where it could be used as a section of a space station, but this idea was killed due to budgetary and political considerations.

The prime contractor for the program was North American Aviation (later Rockwell International, now Boeing), the same company responsible for building the Apollo Command/Service Module. The contractor for the Space Shuttle Solid Rocket Boosters was Morton Thiokol (now part of Alliant Techsystems), for the external tank, Martin Marietta (now Lockheed Martin), and for the Space shuttle main engines, Rocketdyne (now Pratt & Whitney Rocketdyne, part of United Technologies).

The first complete orbiter was originally planned to be named ”Constitution”, but a massive write-in campaign from fans of the ”Star Trek” television series convinced the White House to change the name to ”Enterprise”. Amid great fanfare, the ”Enterprise”

The first fully functional orbiter was the ”Columbia” (designated OV-102), built in Palmdale, California. It was delivered to Kennedy Space Center on March 25, 1979, and was first launched on April 12, 1981—the 20th anniversary of Yuri Gagarin’s space flight—with a crew of two. ”Challenger” (OV-099) was delivered to KSC in July 1982, ”Discovery” (OV-103) in November 1983, and ”Atlantis” (OV-104) in April 1985. ”Challenger” was originally built and used as a Structural Test Article (STA-099) but was converted to a complete shuttle when this was found to be less expensive than converting ”Enterprise” from its Approach and Landing Test configuration, according to NASA. ”Challenger” was destroyed during ascent due to O-Ring failure on the right solid rocket booster (SRB) on January 28, 1986, with the loss of all seven astronauts on board. ”Endeavour” (OV-105) was built to replace ”Challenger” (using structural spare parts originally intended for the other orbiters) and delivered in May 1991; it was first launched a year later. Seventeen years after ”Challenger”, ”Columbia” broke up on reentry, killing all seven crew members, on February 1, 2003, and it has not been replaced. Out of the five fully functional shuttle orbiters built, three remain. ”Enterprise”, which was used for sub-orbital test flights but not intended for orbital flight, had many parts taken out for use on the other orbiters. It was later visually restored and is on display at the National Air and Space Museum’s Steven F. Udvar-Hazy Center. (NASA also maintains warehoused extensive catalogs of recovered pieces from the two destroyed orbiters.)

Adapted from the Wikipedia article Space Shuttle program, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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Space Shuttle ”Explorer” is a full-scale replica of a Space Shuttle. The ”Explorer” includes replicas of the interior spaces. It is located at the Kennedy Space Center Visitor Complex and is accessible by tourists.

”Explorer” is displayed alongside a gantry-style tower (which includes an elevator for accessibility) and visitors may view a mock-up payload, a mannequin wearing an early model of the orange launch/entry pressure suit worn by shuttle astronauts, and a mock-up cockpit with controls and instruments. There is a replica external tank mated to two solid rocket boosters adjacent to ”Explorer” as well.

Internal details of the mock-up are not remarkably accurate, though the size and scope of the payload bay is correct.

Externally, the mock-up features simulated thermal protection system tiles (bearing numbers, as the genuine flight articles do), paneling that looks like reinforced carbon-carbon (RCC) panels on the leading edges of the wings, and Michelin tires on the landing gear. Handling points are also shown, but the external detailing does not extend to the inclusion of thermal blankets.

”Explorer” is mounted atop cement pilings and secured with steel cabling. Aside from entry through the mock-gantry, no other points of entry are available.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article Space Shuttle Explorer, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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Ultraviolet astronomy is generally used to refer to observations of electromagnetic radiation at ultraviolet wavelengths between approximately 10 and 320 nanometres; shorter wavelengths—higher energy photons—are studied by X-ray astronomy and gamma ray astronomy. Light at these wavelengths is absorbed by the Earth’s atmosphere, so observations at these wavelengths must be performed from the upper atmosphere or from space.

Ultraviolet line spectrum measurements are used to discern the chemical composition, densities, and temperatures of the interstellar medium, and the temperature and composition of hot young stars. UV observations can also provide essential information about the evolution of galaxies.

The ultraviolet Universe looks quite different from the familiar stars and galaxies seen in visible light.

Most stars are actually relatively cool objects emitting much of their electromagnetic radiation in the visible part of the spectrum. Ultraviolet radiation is the signature of hotter objects, typically in the early and late stages of their evolution.

If we could see the sky in ultraviolet light, most stars would fade in prominence. We would see some very young massive stars and some very old stars and galaxies, growing hotter and producing higher-energy radiation near their birth or death. Clouds of gas and dust would block our vision in many directions along the Milky Way.

The Hubble Space Telescope and FUSE have been the most recent major space telescopes to view the near and far UV spectrum of the sky, though other UV instruments have flown on sounding rockets and the Space Shuttle.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article Ultraviolet astronomy, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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* September 29 – NASA resumes space shuttle flights, grounded after the Challenger disaster.

* November 15 – In the Soviet Union, the uncrewed Shuttle ”Buran” is launched by an Energia rocket on her maiden orbital spaceflight (this was the first and last space flight for the shuttle).

*Asteroid 3994 Ayashi is discovered by Masahiro Koishikawa.

*4407 Taihaku is discovered.

*4539 Miyagino is discovered.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article 1988 in science, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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Space Shuttle ”Atlantis” (Orbiter Vehicle Designation: OV-104) is a Space Shuttle orbiter belonging to the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the spaceflight and space exploration agency of the United States (the other two surviving Space Shuttles are the ”Discovery” and the ”Endeavour”). The ”Atlantis” was the fourth operational (and the next-to-the-last) Space Shuttle to be constructed by the Rockwell International company in Southern California, and she was delivered to the John F. Kennedy Space Center in eastern Florida in April 1985. Atlantis is the only orbiter which lacks the ability to draw power from the International Space Station while docked there, it must continue to provide its own power through fuel cells.

In early 2008, the NASA Administrator, with the approval of the President and the United States Congress, decided to continue with the ”Atlantis” making space flights until sometime in 2010, the tentatively predetermined end of the Space Shuttle’s spaceflight program. This reversed a previous decision to retire ”Atlantis” in 2008.

The final reading on Atlantis’ “odometer” after its 32nd flight (STS-132) is approximately the same distance as 505 flights from the Earth to the Moon and back.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article Space Shuttle Atlantis, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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Information industry

The information industry has become China’s economic mainstay. In 2004, the added value of China’s information industry, the world’s third largest, stood at 950 billion yuan. Output value, sales and profits of electronic and telecoms manufacturing all outstripped those of traditional industries, making the greatest contribution to national economic growth.

By the end of 2004, China had boasted 74,429 MB export broadband capacity, 670,000 websites, 430,000 China-coded domain names, 41.6 million computers with Internet access, and 94 million Internet users, ranking second in the world. By the June of 2010, China boasts 420 million Internet users, claiming the title of the nation with most Internet users in the world. A host of web-based services have thrived, among them network education, online banking, E-commerce, Internet advertising, news, video, and charged Mailpostal services, Internet Protocol telephone, SMS text-messaging, online recruitment, information services and games.

Posts and telecommunications are important elements of the information industry. After decades of construction and development, a national postal network has taken shape, with Beijing and other major cities as the centers, linking all cities and rural areas. As for the construction of the telecommunications network, a basic transmission network featuring large capacity and high speed is now in place. It covers the whole country, with the optical cable as the mainstay, supplemented by satellite and digital microwave systems.

By 2000 China had comple

At the end of 2004, China had 647.26 million telephone subscribers, 312.44 million fixed lines and 334.82 million mobile phone subscribers, constituting the world’s second-largest telephone network. All cities above the county level had program-controlled switchboards, and program-controlled telephones made up 99.8 percent of the total. There were 8.7 million circuits, all of them automated, for long-distance business. China started mobile telecommunication business in 1987 and the mobile network now covers all large and medium-sized cities, and more than 2,800 small cities and county seats. International roaming service exists with over 150 countries and regions all over the world.

The public data telecommunications network has taken initial shape, with group data exchange network, digital data network, computer Internet, multimedia telecom network, and frame relay network as the mainstays, covering over 90 percent of counties and cities in China, making it one of the world’s largest public data telecommunications networks. Radio and TV networks continue to develop rapidly, and the number of radio and TV users exceeded 200 million by 2005. Almost all villages in China have access to radio and TV broadcasting.

Agriculture and medicine

Agricultural research: NNSFC funds applied research for agriculture. Important progress has been made on proteinase inhibitors which kill insects by halting their digestive processes.

Work on medicine and drugs in China includes the development of hepatitis vaccines and studies on the activity of traditional Chinese materia medica. For the first few decades of the PRC, Chinese research focused on examining the traditional pharmacopoeia from the perspective of modern medicine to identify active ingredients in Chinese medicines. This approach was not very successful, said NNSFC officials recently, so now research examines the effect of traditional Chinese medicines on the whole body. These include efforts to understand the effectiveness of traditional pharmaceuticals in such areas as post-stroke rehabilitation.

Some Chinese traditional medicines are now used to reduce suffering and extend the lives of HIV victims in China. Chinese assistance workers in Africa also provide these remedies to their patients. Trachosantheum derived from a traditional Chinese pharmaceutical has been a valuable tool to combating multiple-drug resistant malarial strains in South Asia. Important work on this drug has been done at the Institute of Cell Biology in Shanghai.

Genetics and biodiversity

NNSFC began funding projects on biodiversity in 1993. There are six research groups working on biodiversity, one of which is in Beijing.

China’s Genome project is headquartered in Shanghai. Since 1993, the Chinese Genome Project has carried out genome structural analyses, collected samples of Chinese minorities for a national depository and developed techniques for human genome research informatics. The project started with the rice genome and expanded to human genome research with a focus on disease-causing genes. A liver cancer gene project begun in 1993 is now focusing on chromosome 17. Other groups focus on genes associated with esophageal cancer and psychological disorders. A research group at the Institute of Medical Biology at West China University in Chengdu is looking for disease causing genes in several cell lines. Twelve institutes and nineteen research groups are involved in the human genome project. Shanghai has become a major Chinese center for biotechnology and human genome research.

Global change

Global change research projects include the carbon cycle in ice zones of Antarctica; the relationship between elevation of carbon dioxide concentrations in atmosphere and aquatic organisms, and the effect of sulphocompounds in China on global change. The global change program is linked to four international programs on global change: the International Geosphere and Biosphere Program (IGBP), the World Climate Research Program (WCRP), the Human Dimensions Program for Global Change (HDP/GC) and DIVERSITAS.

Chinese science strategists see Mainland China’s greatest opportunities in newly emerging fields such as biotechnology and computers where there is still a chance for the PRC to become a significant player. Most Chinese students who went abroad have not returned, but they have built a dense network of transpacific contacts that will greatly facilitate U.S.-China scientific cooperation in coming years. The United States is often held up as the standard of modernity in the PRC. Indeed, photos of the Space Shuttle often appear in Chinese advertisements as a symbol of advanced technology. The PRC’s small but growing human spaceflight program, whose Shenzhou spacecraft carried the first PRC citizen safely into space October 15, 2003, is a source of national pride.

The U.S.-PRC Science and Technology Agreement remains the framework for bilateral cooperation in this field. A five-year agreement to extend the S&T Agreement was signed in April 2001. The agreement was extended for five years April 18, 2006. There are currently over 30 active protocols under the Agreement, covering cooperation in areas such as marine conservation, renewable energy, and health. Japan and the European Union also have high profile science and technology cooperative relationships with the People’s Republic of China. Biennial Joint Commission Meetings on Science and Technology bring together policymakers from both sides to coordinate joint S&T cooperation. Executive Secretaries meetings are held each year to implement specific cooperation programs.

Space science

Chang’e I, China’s moon probing project is proceeding in full swing in a well-organized way. China’s first moon probing is planned to be launched in three years. Four scientific goals have been set for the first stage of the program, Chang’e I moon orbiting project. This was disclosed recently by Ou’yang Ziyuan, academician of Chinese Academy of Sciences and China’s chief scientist on moon probing. He also detailed the project as follows. Verifications have been conducted on China’s moon probing program for years. There were additional verifications on the technical scheme in recent two years. Now everything is going on as scheduled.

The first stage of the program, Chang’e I as it is called, will mostly adopt existing mature technologies and there is nothing insurmountable or fundamental problems technically. However, it takes time to develop all equipment to be installed inside the satellite and to establish systems for orbiting, carrying, monitoring, and ground receiving, as the project aims at the lift-off of a moon probing satellite and making it orbit the moon. It is scheduled that three years is needed before the maiden visit to the moon can be made.

According to the short-term planning, there are three stages for China’s moon probing, that is, orbiting, docking, and returning. In the first stage, orbiting, China’s first moon exploration satellite will be developed and launched which will conduct a comprehensive, overall, and panoramic observation to capture three-dimensioned graphs of the moon. Researches for the second stage, docking, include the launch of a docking vehicle for lunar soft landing, soft landing test, inspection around the lunar surface by a lunar rover, on-spot explorations, and moon-based astronomical observations. For the third stage, returning, in addition to a docking vehicle, a small-sized sampling capsule will be launched which will collect key samples from the moon and return to the earth. “Orbiting” is presently central to China’s moon probing program.

There are four scientific goals for this stage of “orbiting”.

For the first goal, there will be three-dimensioned graphs of the lunar surface. Basic structures and physiognomy units of the lunar surface will be defined precisely. Researches on the shape, size, distribution, and density will be made on the crates on the moon. These researches on the crates will produce data for identifying the age of the surface and early history of terrestrial planets and provide information needed to select the sites selecting for soft landing on the moon surface and for the lunar base.

The second goal is concentrating on the distribution and types of elements. It will be focused on the content and distribution of 14 elements such as titanium and iron which can be exploited. A map of elements distribution around the moon will be sketched. Graphs for lunar rocks, mineral materials and geology will also be drawn respectively. The area rich in specific elements will be identified. And prospects of the development and exploitation of the mineral resources will be evaluated.

The third goal is to detect the depth of the lunar soil through microwave radiation. In this way we can calculate the age of the lunar surface and distribution of the lunar soil on the lunar surface. This lays a foundation for the further estimates of the content, distribution, and quantity of helium-3 which is power generating fuel caused by nuclear fusion.

The fourth goal is focused on the space environment between the earth and the moon. The average distance between the earth and the moon is approximately 384,000& km, which is in the Earth’s far magnetotail. Here the satellite probes solar energetic particles, plasma in solar wind, and the interaction between the solar wind and the moon and between the tail of the magnetic field of the earth and the moon.

Astronautics

As the fifth country to develop and launch an independent man-made satellite, the third to master satellite recovery technology, China is in the world’s front ranks in many important technological fields, including satellite recovery, the carrying of multiple satellites on one rocket, rocket technology, and the launch, test and control of static-orbit satellites. Achievements have been made in remote-sensing satellites, communications satellites, and in manned space experiments.

*Manned spacecraft: October 15, 2003 saw the successful launch of the first manned spacecraft “Shenzhou V”, developed independently by China, at the Jiuquan Satellite Launch Center, and following four unmanned launches between November 1999 and December 2002. “Shenzhou V” sent China’s first astronaut into space and returned successfully, making China the world’s third country to independently develop and deploy manned space flight technology. ” Shengzhou VI”, carrying two astronauts, successfully accomplished its space flight on October 12-17, 2005.Shenzhou 7 (simplified Chinese: 神舟七号; traditional Chinese: 神舟七號; pinyin: shénzhōu qīhào) was the third human spaceflight mission of the Chinese space program. The mission, which included the first Chinese extra-vehicular activity (EVA) carried out by crewmembers Zhai Zhigang and Liu Boming.The EVA carried out during the flight makes China the third country to have conducted an EVA, after the Soviet Union and the United States.

*Man-made earth satellites: From the launch of its first man-made earth satellite “Dongfanghong No. 1″ in April 1970 to the end of 2000, China successfully launched 75 satellites, including 48 developed by China itself and 27 commercial satellites for foreign customers. Fifteen types of satellite were launched in the 10th Five-Year Plan period (2001-2005), including communications, navigation, meteorological, resource remote-sensing, and space survey satellites, representing half of all satellites launched in the past 30 years.

*Carrier rockets: China has developed 12 models of the “Long March” carrier rocket series, and is able to launch low earth orbit, geostationary orbit, and sun-synchronous orbit satellites and spaceships. The successful launch rate is over 90 percent; between October 1996 and December 2004, “Long March” rockets made 83 launches. China’s next step is to develop a new carrier rocket series. The Jiuquan, Xichang and Taiyuan satellite-launch centers are internationally recognized.

Social sciences

There are five major systems for social sciences research, which involve about 100,000 researchers; they are: the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, local academies of social sciences, schools of higher learning, research units affiliated to government agencies and army-affiliated research units.

The Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, established in 1977, is responsible for creative theoretical exploration and policy research for the improvement of humanities and social sciences standards throughout China. The academy is the top academic organization in the field, by virtue of its comprehensive scope and concentration of human talent, data and research materials. The Academy has 31 research institutes and 45 research centers with over 3,200 researchers, some 1,700 of them senior experts.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article Science and technology in the People’s Republic of China, under the G. N. U. Free Documentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki

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