Jan 20 1977
From The Space Library
The Netherlands had "finally decided" at the end of 1976 to join the U.S. and ESA in financing a second astronomy satellite (IRAS, the infrared astronomy satellite), but not all its citizens were enthusiastic over the anticipated expense, said a report in Nature magazine. Starting with a preliminary definition study in Jan. 1975, followed by 13 proposals for experiments in response to a NASA announcement, a U.S. study team of 11 astronomers had begun discussion with Dutch colleagues on the scientific program and had reached agreement at the beginning of 1976.
NASA had expected signing of a memorandum of understanding between the U.S. and the Netherlands by July 1976; the Dutch government had agreed in principle in July, but it had taken 6mo to find the money for the project. The U.S. and the Netherlands would each pay about 110 million guilders, and the United Kingdom Science Research Council, which had taken active part in the U.S.-Dutch negotiations, would contribute 10 million guilders. Plans were to launch IRAS from the Western Test Range in the spring of 1981, to trace and map about 10 million infrared sources. Dutch associations of scientific workers had protested in 1974 against further space activity, especially in behalf of underdeveloped countries lacking means to take advantage of such effort. (Nature, Jan 20/77, 202)
The Max Planck Institute of Astronomy announced that, for the first time, astronomers had observed the presence of water outside earth's galaxy, indicating the possibility of life in outer space, the NY Times reported. Astronomers from the U.S., France, and West Germany, using the 32.91m Effelsberg radiotelescope, largest in the world, found rotating molecules of water at the edge of nebula IC 133, 2.2 million light-years from earth. The water molecules, when struck ,by light, apparently emit excess energy and (like laser beams) vibrate in unison, giving off radio signals. The discovery meant that other solar systems with the same physical conditions as earth's might exist, along with planets and stars also formed by condensation of dust and gas, with the same type of lifespan.
"What is decisive," according to Otto Hachenberg; director of the Bonn Institute for Radio Astronomy, "is that we find the same conditions of physical matter one billion light years away from earth as on earth." Discovery of water vapor in another galaxy was expected to inspire scientists to look for such vapor in other galaxies. (NYT, Jan 20/77, 23)
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