April 1963

From The Space Library

NASA Manned Spacecraft Center issued requests for proposals for preliminary study contracts on (1) rotating manned space station to house 18 crewmen; (2) non-rotating, zero-gravity station to house 25-30 crewmen; (3) reusable logistics vehicle. (M&R, 4/29/63, 18)

NASA Manned Spacecraft Center completed eighth of series of drop tests on storable gliding parachute. (M&R, 4/22/63, 13)

Dr. John V. Harrington of MIT Lincoln Laboratory was selected to direct new MIT space research center, to be completed in 1965. Dr. Harrington was also named professor in departments of electrical engineering and aeronautics and astronautics. (Boston Eve. Globe, 4/23/63)

Writing in Hypnosis Quarterly, Frank M. Frazitta said astronaut trained in self-hypnosis could alleviate pain and discomfort dur­ing space flights. In event of air-conditioning unit's failure, self­ hypnosis could be used to lessen astronaut's perspiration rate or make him feel cooler or warmer. (M&R, 4/8/63, 21)

NASA awarded four-month study contracts for Synchronous Mete­orological Satellite to Radio Corp. of America and Hughes Air­craft. RCA would study camera resolution requirements in syn­chronous-orbit weather satellite and ways to modify Tiros satel­lite launched into highly eccentric orbit (about 22,000 mi. apogee and 200-300-mi. perigee). Hughes would study way in which a Syncom communications satellite could be modified for installa­tion of weather satellite cameras. (M&R, 4/22/63, 10)

Wind-tunnel studies to evaluate aerodynamic drag and jet engine mass air-flow characteristics with 3/10-scale model of free-flight lunar landing test vehicle were begun at NASA Langley Research Center. Model was built at NASA Flight Research Center. Data from Langley tests would be supplied to Bell Aerosystems Co., building two full-scale lunar landing research vehicles under con­tract from Flight Research Center. (Av. Wk., 4/22/63, 77)

Preliminary results of the first. lunar contact with the new Lincoln Laboratory high-resolution radartelescope were reported at the 44th annual meeting of the American Geophysical Union by Ver­non L. Lynn. The report was jointly authored with M. D. Sohi­gian and E. A. Crocker, also of Lincoln Laboratory. Lynn said that the first radar reflections from the lunar surface obtained at a frequency of 35,000 me., more than four times that of previous radar probes, suggest that the moon's surface is fairly rough with respect to the dimensions of the 8.6-mm. waves employed. In addition to the advantage of being able to view a smaller area than previously possible, the new radartelescope would provide data on the absorption and reflection characteristics of the lunar surface at a new wavelength, offering additional clues to its com­position and roughness. (Av. Wk., 5/6/63, 94)

Alexander Kakunin, Soviet Vice-Minister for Com­munications, was quoted as saying U.S.S.R. would soon launch synchronous system of communications satellites for transmitting television worldwide. Using Cosmos satellites, the service would be called "cosmosvision." (M&R, 4/8/63, 9)

Gaston Palewski, French Minister for Scientific Research, said in meeting of Space Council of France that France had fired more than 30 rockets in two-year period 1959-61. (AP, NYT, 4/24/ 63, 7)

Space orbital simulator, designed to simulate conditions 200-mi. high with temperature as low as -320° F, was shipped from manu­facturer, Tenney Engineering, Inc., to University of Rome. De­ vice was believed to be first such available to Western European scientists. (NYT, 4/7/63)

RAND Corp. report on communications satellites estimated that world­wide revenues from international communications would reach $210 million by 1965, $350 million by 1970, and $620 million by 1975. Large part of these revenues would come from undersea cables. (NYT, 4/24/63)

F. J. Krieger, RAND Corp. specialist on Soviet astronautics, said in report for USAF Project Rand that Soviet Cosmos satellites prob­ably are "para-military" spacecraft of two types: (1) recoverable vehicle as large as Vostok spacecraft and (2) 4,400-lb., non-re­coverable vehicle launched from another site and with different booster. Krieger also stated his belief that U.S.S.R. had six attempted probe launchings end in failure between August 25 and January 4 caused by inability to get fourth stage out of park­ing orbit. First three were attempted Venus probes; next two, Mars T 7 probes; last one, moon probe. (RAND Memorandum RM­-3595-PR in Av. Wk. 4/29/63,22)

Vice President. Lyndon B. Johnson, speaking editorially in Astro­nautics and Aerospace Engineering magazine, April 1963, em­phasized that.: "As satellites extend man's vision into new dimen­sions, weather forecasting will make major advances as a science, until we see reliable predictions a season ahead. "This will have far-reaching economic benefits for all. Follow­ing are some estimates of cost-savings, assuming that we can predict weather accurately only five days in advance: $21/2 billion a year in agriculture; $45 million in the lumber industry malting; million in surface transportation; $75 million in retail marketing; and $3 billion in water-resources management. These estimates of savings are for just the United States. Worldwide benefits would be many times as great." (A&AE, Apr., 1963)

Dr. Barry Commoner, Prof. of Plant Physiology at Washington Univ., St. Louis, said in speech before convention of National Science Teachers Association in Philadelphia that U.S. scientific research was becoming too "mission oriented." "In 1962 about one-third of the total federal obligation for basic research-and federal funds are now the major source of support for basic science-came from a single agency, the National Aeronautics and Space Administration. In a total federal budget of about $900 million for basic research, NASA was obligated to provide $350 million, while the National Science Foundation pro­vided under $90 million. . . . "We are engaged in a spectacular balancing act. Education is supported by science, science by space, and space by the man on the moon . . . [The] policy of supporting education through science and science through space is dangerously unsound .... We should recognize this policy for what it is-a short-sighted, pinch­penny effort to buy a few selected fruits of the tree of knowledge, without accepting the honest responsibility of nourishing the whole living, growing organism." (NYT, 4/7/63; St. Louis Post-Dispatch, 4/7/63)

William A. Hyman, internationally known trial law­yer and author of "The Magna Carta of Space-The Legal Lode­star," speaking at the Inter-American Bar Association in Panama, said "The Space Committee of the United Nations has failed to give due consideration and take appropriate action on the im­portant question of sovereignty and security as they become in­volved in the use of space." (OR, 6/27/63, A4133-34)

Dr. John R. Pierce, executive director of research and communica­tions principles/systems divisions of Bell Telephone Laboratories, said at ceremony dedicating John Crerar Library at Illinois In­stitute of Technology that use of computers for document re­trieval "would smother the user under a flood of information and misinformation it would produce." One of first men to suggest feasibility of communications satellites, Dr. Pierce acknowledged the value of computers for library indexing but added: "If I have painted a rather gloomy picture of the relations of computers to libraries, I have done so deliberately . . . to counteract the sadly fanciful picture that has been painted by some irresponsible people." (Av. Wk., 4/29/63, 74)

The April issue of the Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists, included an article by Dr. Robert E. Marshak, entitled "Reexamining the Soviet Scientific Challenge." In this article, Dr. Marshak, chair­ man of the Department of Physics and Astronomy at the Uni­versity of Rochester, pointed out that Soviet preeminence in space does not necessarily mean that the U.S.S.R. has "achieved a decisive scientific and technological supremacy." Comparing the "closed" economic and political structure of Soviet Russia with its controlled educational system to the "open" society of the United States, he suggested that the Soviet system was geared to the more tangible results of applied science while the United States had made greater strides in pure science. "Soviet space triumphs are due to an early and precise delinea­tion of a major national goal in applied science and a most de­tailed and deliberate organization of the wherewithal to achieve it. " . I believe that our [the United States'] undoubted leader­ship in pure science will continue to be nurtured by the openness, freedom, and free enterprise spirit which characterize our society. Our accomplishments in pure science will provide a vast reservoir of ideas for important, achievements in applied science, and our in­nate good sense and good will lead to a voluntary rational measure of coordination and control in those areas which are indispensable for the achievement of our national objectives in applied science. I believe that the Soviet methods of strict Supervision and control will lead to numerous short-range breakthroughs in applied sci­ence but that the momentum will not be sustained unless there are also Significant advances in their pure Science. A great im­provement in the quality of these achievements will depend upon their ability to fully establish the conditions of scientific freedom which are essential for highly creative work in pure Science. ". . If the Soviet Government, comes to realize-and I believe that the Russian scientists already do-that scientific and political freedom go hand in hand and that it is difficult to guarantee scien­tific freedom without a major liberalization of Soviet society in all its aspects, there is bound to be a. great efflorescence of pure science in the Soviet Union. And if a large measure of political freedom is established in the Soviet Union, it is quite likely that we shall be sending our American astronauts together with their Russian counterparts on joint expeditions to the moon and other celestial objects beyond." (CR, 5/27/63, 9036-38)

Air Force launched an Atlas F with a Chrysler-built nose cone on a 5,000-mile flight from Cape Canaveral to the vicin­ity of Ascension Island in a continuation of the Advanced Ballistic Re-entry System (Abres) test program. The flight, which largely duplicated the initial Abres test of Mar. 1, was described as "highly successful." (M&R, 5/6/63, 14)

Dr. Samuel J. Rabinowitz was appointed Deputy Director for Bal­listic Missile Defense in DOD Advanced Research Project Agency. Dr. Rabinowitz was formerly with Columbia Univ. Electronic Research Laboratories. (M&R, 4/8/63, 10)

NASA Submitted the following written answer to Senate Committee on Aeronautical and Space Sciences in response to question raised by Senator Margaret Chase Smith on the contamination problem in space exploration "Present plans for lunar spacecraft are to use assembly techniques in clean rooms and under environmental conditions Similar to Surgical operating facilities. These procedures will not make the spacecraft sterile but are expected to reduce the total popula­tion of viable organisms by orders of magnitude below otherwise expected quantities. As stated earlier, the natural environment. of the Moon is believed suitably hostile to the propagation of Earth-like organisms to such an extent that any contamination will be contained in very local areas." (Committee Hearings, NASA Authorization for Fiscal Year 1964-Part I, 598)

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