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Shooting for the moon, again
Behind 18 inches of concrete in stainless steel cabinets flushed with pure nitrogen rests a material rarer than gold, more valuable than diamonds. Not even Nasa curator Gary Lofgren knows both combinations to the Johnson Space Centre’s vault that contains 600 pounds of lunar rocks and soil.
Of late, Lofgren has noticed something unusual — there’s been a run on moon dirt. Gram by precious gram, he’s been doling out samples to researchers around the world eager to study the desolate orb again. Thirty-four years after the last Apollo astronaut walked on the lunar surface, a new space race is underway.
It will be a long race, with humans unlikely to set foot on the moon again in the next 10 to 15 years. But countries are gearing up to take their first steps.
India’s 20,000 space workers are readying a lunar orbital mission set for 2007. Japan plans to send a robotic rover to the lifeless rock by 2013, and the European Space Agency has a probe, SMART-1, orbiting the moon.
Although many countries are talking about sending people to the moon, only two — the United States and China — have set dates for manned lunar landings. Nasa says its next manned mission will be as early as 2018; China says it wants to land “taikonauts” — as Chinese astronauts are called — as early as 2017.
“There is a lunar armada” on the way back to the moon, said James B. Garvin, head of Nasa’s Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter project, scheduled to lift off in 2008.
It’s an unlikely renaissance of lunar exploration after decades of sending robots to distant planets while human explorers busied themselves building a space station in low-Earth orbit.
Decline in cancer deaths
For the first time since the American government began keeping national death statistics in 1930, the number of cancer deaths in the United States has fallen as improvements in diagnosis, therapy and prevention have finally overtaken increases caused by aging and population growth.
The number of deaths declined by only a sliver — 369 out of about 557,000 between 2002 and 2003, the latest years for which data are available. But the American Cancer Society, which conducted the analysis, believes the downward trend is solid, and it is projecting a substantially larger decrease this year.
The results “mark a remarkable turn in our decades-long fight to eliminate cancer as a major health threat,” said American Cancer Society Chief Executive John R. Seffrin. “For the first time, advances we have made in prevention, early detection and treatment are outpacing even the population factors that … obscured the success.”
The number of cancer deaths in women increased by 409 in 2003, but that growth was offset by a decline of 778 in men, according to data from the National Centre for Health Statistics in Hyattsville, Maryland. “That may seem like a small number, but it represents an important milestone,” said Dr Michael Thun, scientific director of the American Cancer Society. The society projects that deaths in 2006 will total about 565,000, down from an estimated 570,280 in 2005.
A continued decline could have substantial economic benefits. In 2005, direct medical costs of cancer care totalled $74 billion, while lost productivity and other effects added an additional $136 billion, the National Institutes of Health reported. — Dawn/LAT-WP News Service (c) Los Angles Times
Embarrassing voyage
The decision by French President Jacques Chirac to withdraw the asbestos-contaminated aircraft carrier Clemenceau from dismantling in India ends an embarrassing journey for the ship, and for the French government.
Chirac announced last week that “on the issue of dismantling ships, which poses questions on a global dimension related to protection of the environment, France must act in the most exemplary way.” Defence minister Michelle Alliot Marie said France was dealing with the matter “in an exemplary way” — in sending the ship to the Indian scrap yard Alang for dismantling.
Chirac’s decision came only hours after the French state council, the highest judicial authority, ordered suspension of the Clemenceau’s journey to Alang. The council accepted the arguments of Greenpeace, the association of asbestos victims Andeva and other organizations.
The decision came after the Supreme Court of India passed an order banning entry of the ship in Indian waters. “Finally an end for a most embarrassing story,” the weekly L’Express commented. Chirac is due to visit India soon.
The French government had continued to deny until a few hours before the announcement that the ship contains high levels of asbestos. Acknowledgement of high asbestos content would mean that under international rules signed by France, the ship could not be exported to a developing country for disposal.
The French government had sold the ship to a Panama-based scrap company for dismantling at Alang. Experts say the ship contains up to 1,000 tonnes of poisonous asbestos, while the French government has said it contains only a fraction of that amount.
The French authorities said they had disposed of 115 tonnes of asbestos from the ship. But the defence ministry admitted recently that it had documents only to show removal of 70 tonnes of asbestos. — Dawn/IPS News Service
New focus on technology
China, one of only three countries to put a man in space, announced a strategy last week to raise its scientific prowess and push it to the forefront of technology. The “National Medium and Long-Term Science and Technology Development Plan Outline,” issued by the State Council, demands that by 2020, spending on research and development reach 2.5 per cent of gross domestic product. The plan calls for additional spending in 16 key areas. — AP
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