Mar 2 1976
From The Space Library
Discovery of a new kind of photosynthesis-a bacterial system using purple instead of green pigment to convert sunlight into chemical energy and food-was announced by a team of scientists from NASA's Ames Research Center and the Univ. of Calif. medical center at San Francisco. Contained in cell membranes of Halobacterium halobium, found in salty waters, the pigment when energized by sunlight could transfer protons across the membrane. It appeared to increase the evaporation rate of salt, with possible applications in desalination of sea water; it also seemed to resemble rhodopsin, the little-understood visual pigment of the eye, and might aid in understanding the evolution and operation of vision. The purple pigment, which acted as a proton pump, might also explain the key process of ion transport in all cells. Deposited on a film and exposed to sunlight, it had already been tried out in crude solar cells. Scientists were excited by the possibility of practical uses of the purple pigment because-although less efficient than chlorophyll-it could be purified and was stable over a broad range of temperatures and activities. The newly discovered process was the first instance of a system other than the one based on green chlorophyll in which cells could use light energy to survive, said Dr. Walter Stoeckenius of the University of Calif., chief researcher. Bacteria used in the research came from salt flats near the Mediterranean, where they had been known for a century to cause pinkeye in salted fish and red herrings to become red. The study in which the discovery was made was part of research into earth organisms living in extreme environments like those expected to exist on other planets. (NASA Release 76-30 ARC Release 76-12; W Post, 3 Mar 76, A-1; B Sun, 3 Mar 76, A-3)
A cooperative use of spaceflight techniques by U.S. and USSR scientists might verify the existence of "gravitational waves" that could be used to probe quasars and other explosive cosmic events, said an article in the Astrophysical Journal. The new technique-proposed by Dr. Kip S. Thorne of Calif. Institute of Technology and Prof. Vladimir B. Braginsky of Moscow State University-would use a net of radio signals between earth and interplanetary spacecraft to monitor sudden unexplained fluctuations in the returned radio frequencies. Analysis of changes in the length and shape of the waves would reveal what had happened to the matter that generated the wave, according to the theory. The idea of gravitational waves had grown by analogy with the three types of manifestations of electrical force; the static electric field, static magnetism, and radiated waves that took form as visible light, radio waves, x-rays, etc. As the extremely precise clocks needed for the experiments had only recently become available, the search for gravity waves might not be successful for another decade, the scientists said. (NYT, 2 Mar 76, 17)
2-9 March: Comet West, one of the few such objects visible to the unaided eye in daylight, reached maximum visibility in the eastern sky before sunrise this week. Having skirted the sun a week ago, the comet had become less brilliant as its distance from the sun increased, but was more easily seen as it moved away from the sun. The comet was said to be the brightest such object since Comet Bennett's appearance in 1970. The comet had appeared in photographs taken in August 1975 at an observatory in the Chilean Andes, but was not identified until Richard West, a Dane working in Geneva, studied the photographs. Comets are of special interest because they are thought to be composed of materials from the outer fringes of the solar system. Reports from Italy, Switzerland, and elsewhere described the comet's tail as 2 to 4 times the apparent diameter of the moon, unusually short for so bright a comet. NASA reported extensive observations of the comet using rockets, highflying aircraft, and ground-based instruments; smog or clouds might make ground observation difficult. (NYT, 2 Mar 76, 17; 9 Mar 76, 43; B :Sun, 3 Mar 76, A-3)
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