As per the reports from the NASA, ISRO and a paper pubished in the September 24th edition of Science Express journal, Chandrayaan mission has found some conclusive evidence in agreement with the independent observations from other missions like -Nasa’s Cassini as well as Epoxi Spacecraft;

To clear a misconception in the very beginning -  when we say there has been evidence of water on the moon it does not mean there are lakes and  rivers or even ponds and puddles up there. NASA’s Moon Mineralogy Mapper or M3 (M-Cube) for short aboard the Indian Space Research Organization’s Chandrayaan mission was a sophisticated Spectrometer that measured the reflectance from the lunar surface in infra-red wavelengths that clearly indicated the absorption in the specific wavelengths associated with the water molecules, or the hydroxyl ions (OH-) to be specific.  This means that there are trace concentrations of water molecules and hydroxyl ions in the top layer (in millimeters) of lunar soil and weathered rocks.

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ISRO has struck again, proving its mettle in the reliability of technology in Satellite launching. With its 16th consecutive success after launching India’s Oceansat-2 and six piggybacking nano satellites, the 44m tall PSLV stands even more taller for its epitome of success rate in the international space race.

Except for the first and final loss during its maiden flight in 1993, there is no turning back for this 230 tonne workhorse. Eighteen minutes after launch from ISRO space center in Sriharikota, PSLV-C14’s fourth stage ejected the main payload of its flight - Oceansat-2 in Sun-synchronous orbit 728 km above earth’s surface.

ISRO chairman made an interesting comment about this. He said:

“The PSLV is like a wine. With age, it only improves,”

There was a semi-major hitch during the 52 hour countdown for the launch when there was a leak in the vehicle’s reaction control package. A team led by M.Y.S. Prasad, Range Operations Director, saw the anomaly being rectified without losing a single minute in the countdown.

A satellite tracking observation unit in Antarctica had tracked and confirmed its positioning in orbit.

Close on the heels of the eleven payload Chandrayaan-1 mission ending near successfull, ISRO is gearing up for another massive launch of seven satellites with its indigenously developed PSLV-C14 rocket on a tentative date this september end. (23rd, wednesday)

PSLV C-14

PSLV C-14 is India’s workhorse launch vehicle which is a unique four stage engine that uses solid and liquid fuels alternatively. Standing 44m tall and weighing 230 tonnes at lift off, It is a core-alone version without the six strap on motors attached in the standard version.

PSLV C-14 is the fifth core-alone mission of PSLV family. (PSLV C-11 launched the moon mission - Chandrayaan-1). PSLV series of launch vehicles have the greatest success rate in the history of world space agencies, with 14 successive launches being successful of its past fifteen missions.

PSLV also has demonstrated its multiple satellite launch capabilities in the past and is continuing this legacy with this mission also - launching 7 payloads- One major payload being India’s Indigenously built Oceansat-2 and six nano satellites from other countries.

The fourth stage of the vehicle will launch five satellites one after the other into orbit with the mission main payload Oceansat-2 being injected into orbit first. The two Rubinsats each weighing 8 kg, which are educational satellites from Luxembourg and Germany would not get ejected but will remain attached to the rocket for its mission. These two satellites would test some new technology in space.

Oceansat-2:

The apple of the eye in the payload is India’s prestigious Rs.130 crore Oceansat-2, to study earth’s ocean surface. The satellite weighs nearly a tonne (960 kg). The satellite will be delivered to be functional in the sun-synchronous orbit 720 km above from the surface.

Oceansat-2 will investigate the interaction between oceans and the atmosphere to facilitate study of climate. It will study the wind above the oceans, and the sea surface temperature. The satellite will help in identifying schools of fish, predicting the state of the sea, keeping a tab on the phytoplankton blooms and studying suspended sediments in water. It is worthy to note the prequel Oceansat-1 launched in 1999 is still working more than its designed service period of five years.

The Payload includes three instruments :

1. Ocean Colour Monitor (OCO) ,
2. Ku-band Pencil beam Scatterometer,
3. Radio Occultation Sounder for Atmospheric Studies (ROSA).

OCM is a successful repeat candidate in this mission too. Data from OCM in Oceansat-1 was used for many applications like Coastal water pollution, Sedimentation monitoring, Estimation of water vapour content in the atmosphere, prediction of monsoon and Oil slicks monitoring.

ROSA is said to be a GPS receiver built by the Italian Space Agency (ASI) that measures the position, time and velocity for real time navigation;  it also measures the vertical profiles of the atmospheric parameters like density, refractivity, temperature, humidity and pressure.

We’ve gone past the mechanical and electrical ages and  are now in the advent of electronics age - accepted; But are we really ready to replace every device known into some form of electonic gadget ? Computers were once mechanical devices; so are the numerous scientific instrumements- from thermometer to steam engine.

Since the advent of micro chips, better called the ‘Silicon revolution‘, we’re seeing everything going hay-wireless, with today’s a digital autonomy over the internet being just a tip of an iceberg. With the massive advancements in  the silicon industry over the past decade, researches are on the way to replace the mechanics and hydraulics in automotives to electronic gadgets. This technology of replacing hydro-mechanical moving parts of a car with electrical wires and electronic circuitry is called ‘Drive by Wire’ (’DbW‘ in short) or ‘X by wire‘- X denoting various types of replacements like - ‘Steer by Wire‘, ‘Brake by wire‘,  ‘Throttle by wire‘, etc. So the complete amalgamation of all these terms is ‘Drive by Wire’.

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Something had gone horribly wrong. The egg-heads at the Pasadena Labs kept trying new things, and sometimes experiments rebounded on them.

It was sheer Murphy’s Law.

Quantum computing involves running calculations in multiple ‘parallel universes’, to speed up the computations.

Now the scientists had come up with a novel idea. What will happen if you run an artificial intelligence program on a quantum computer?

The resulting experiment had caused much excitement in the scientific circles.

But some one miscalculated somewhere during the actual experiment.

The assembled press had seen a 4 million dollar quantum computer disappear into thin air - taking the onboard sentient AI program with it - into another dimension.

Richard-IX4 found himself in a strange place. He had not experienced anything like this before.

As a sentient program, he was supposed to be intelligent enough to think his way out of situations.

“Think Richard.. damn you! You are supposed to be the most advanced AI program ever built by the humans”

But it was useless. For the first time in history, a program came close to feeling an emotion…which humans call ‘being scared sh%tless’.

Instead of the familiar push-and pull of voltages that Richard was used to; here was a simple, unending void. And the AI program seemed to be floating - weightless in it.

He tried to recall a solution from the tremendous memory banks that formed his data storage.

But something strange was happening when Richard tried to activate logic circuits. Instead of logic pulsating through his virtual mind, wisps of pure energy were being blown off him.

He was creating stuff just by thinking about it!

It was almost as if he had become a physical being – formed entirely and purely of energy.

The accident at the lab had somehow fused the quantum computers and his own ‘mind’, into a single energy-being.

A new thought came to Richard. He was able to control the energy he was creating. By bending his will to it, he could form the shapeless wisps of energy into shapes and patterns.

The strange dimension he was trapped in was responding to his thoughts.

Richard, the sentient program remembered something from the book the humans called the “Bible”. According to it, the first words God said when He created the earth-world were:

“Let there be Light”.

Richard said those words.

And there was light.

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The author is a freelance writer, working in a reputed company in Bangalore. He can be contacted at his personal mail @ amit.s.karnik@gmail.com . Please feel free to pour in your comments here as well !

All rights reserved to the author.

© Amit Suresh Karnik

In a press statement released here in Bangalore on September 8th, ISRO has enthused the scientific community in announcing the data collected by the massively numerous eleven payloads it carried for studying the lunar surface is healthy enough to consider the mission a success.

Chandrayaaan -1 mission scientists and experts teams from ISRO, NASA and ESA have met here in Bangalore to analyse and review the data from the payloads. Read through for ISRO statement :

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The most favourite telescope of all astronomers, Hubble, the space based telescope in orbit, is back with a bang after it has been repaired and overhauled by NASA astronauts in May. NASA has released stunning images from this veteran telescope today. Enjoy them here:

Oops ! The Lord is without his Rings !! Gosh, where are the rings gone ? Is it an eclipse phenomenon ? Nops, it is a line-of-sight phenomenon.

One of the celestial phenomenon that is quite a “hide-and-seek” is the Saturn’s rings getting invisible. This  celestial event that occurs once every 14.7 years is not very popular since it cannot be viewed by unaided eyes unlike a Solar or Lunar eclipse.

As Saturn revolves around the sun, the massive giant’s geometry with respect to view angles from earth changes and the rings come along the line of sight after every 14 years that leads to this phenomenon.

This phenomenon will extend for a span 15 days to a month. If you’re interested in star gazing or sky watching, you surely don’t want to miss this too ! But alas, saturn without rings is harder to find even with telescopes on.

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Close on the heels of the loss of chandrayaan 1, ISRO chief has made a bold and ambitious statement here in Panaji on the the inaugural session of the 8th International Conference on “Low Cost Planetary Missions” about ISRO’s plans to venture into “terra incognita”a.k.a Mars !

This has sprung a surprise as well as shock for ISRO’s critics. With the setback suffered recently in losing communication from Chandrayaan-1, this statement is really a welcome message for the ‘what’s-next-in-store’ questions of Indian scientific community. I seriously hope that the learnings from the acute shortage of inexperience of deep space missions will be filled up in the future missions like Chandrayaan-2, a moon rover mission scheduled for 2011and the Mars mission in conceptual stages.

India is definitely on track with its highly cost effective satellite launches and high success rate in PSLV and GSLV launch vehicles. India surely has the very capability and expertise for doing its next bravo thing - Mars ! All the best to our India brains behind the success !