Sep 28 1994
From The Space Library
NASA announced that more than a decade after affecting climate on a global scale, residual signs of a powerful El Nino were still visible from space. Oceanographers using data from the U.S.-French TOPEX/Poseidon satellite were tracking the remnant wave of the 1982-83 El Nino as it moved across the Northwest Pacific Ocean, where some scientists theorized it might still be affecting weather in the region. TOPEX/Poseidon, a joint program of NASA and the Centre Nationale d'Etudes Spatiales, the French space agency, used a radar altimeter to precisely measure sea-surface height. The study was part of NASA's Mission to Planet Earth. Launched August 10, 1992, the satellite had completed two years of its three-year prime mission. (NASA Release 94-162; W Post, Oct 3/94)
At a conference at NASA Headquarters in Washington, DC, officials of NASA and of SPACEHAB Inc., the Arlington, Virginia, company that built and leased the laboratories that fly in the Space Shuttle, described progress made in the more than 80 missions that had included research payloads. Other private and university researchers were encouraged to join in such projects. (UP, Sep 28/94)
Two groups of astronomers, one centered at Indiana University and the other at Harvard University, announced, based on findings from the Hubble Space Telescope, that the universe was billions of years younger than previously estimated. The Indiana group said the universe could be as little as 7 billion years old whereas the Harvard group estimated the age of the universe at between 9 billion and 14 billion years. The Indiana study was published in the September 29 issue of Nature and the Harvard study in the current Astrophysical Journal. According to Stephen Maran, a senior astronomer at NASA's Goddard Space Center and a spokesperson for the American Astronomical Society, the findings should lead to further research to explain the discrepancy between the oldest stars and the age of the universe. (LA Tames, Sep 29/94)
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