Aspartic acid racemization and age-depth relationships for organic carbon in Siberian permafrost

We have analyzed the degree of racemization of aspartic acid in permafrost samples from Northern Siberia, an area from which microorganisms of apparent ages up to a few million years have previously been isolated and cultured. We find that the extent of aspartic acid racemization in permafrost cores increases very slowly up to an age of approximately 25,000 years (around 5 m in depth). The apparent temperature of racemization over the age range of 0-25,000 years, determined using measured aspartic acid racemization rate constants, is -19 degrees C. This apparent racemization temperature is significantly lower than the measured environmental temperature (-11 to -13 degrees C) and suggests active recycling of D-aspartic acid in Siberian permafrost up to an age of around 25,000 years. This indicates that permafrost organisms are capable of repairing some molecular damage incurred while in a "dormant" state over geologic time.     

Influence of ionic inorganic solutes on self-assembly and polymerization processes related to early forms of life: implications for a prebiotic aqueous medium

A commonly accepted view is that life began in a marine environment, which would imply the presence of inorganic ions such as Na+, Cl-, Mg2+, Ca2+, and Fe2+. We have investigated two processes relevant to the origin of life--membrane self-assembly and RNA polymerization--and established that both are adversely affected by ionic solute concentrations much lower than those of contemporary oceans. In particular, monocarboxylic acid vesicles, which are plausible models of primitive membrane systems, are completely disrupted by low concentrations of divalent cations, such as magnesium and calcium, and by high sodium chloride concentrations as well. Similarly, a nonenzymatic, nontemplated polymerization of activated RNA monomers in ice/eutectic phases (in a solution of low initial ionic strength) yields oligomers with > 80% of the original monomers incorporated, but polymerization in initially higher ionic strength aqueous solutions is markedly inhibited. These observations suggest that cellular life may not have begun in a marine environment because the abundance of ionic inorganic solutes would have significantly inhibited the chemical and physical processes that lead to self-assembly of more complex molecular systems.     

Eye light flashes on the Mir space station

The phenomenon of light flashes (LF) in eyes for people in space has been investigated onboard Mir. Data on particles hitting the eye have been collected with the SilEye detectors, and correlated with human observations. It is found that a nucleus in the radiation environment of Mir has roughly a 1% probability to cause an LF, whereas the proton probability is almost three orders of magnitude less. As a function of LET, the LF probability increases above 10 keV/micrometer, reaching about 5% at around 50 keV/micrometer.     

Beam-Park-Experiment-1/2000 with TIRA

A monostatic 24-h debris observation campaign (BPE-1/2000) has been prepared and conducted using FGAN's TIRA L-Band system. Based on experiences from previous Beam-park experiments a similar largely automated data processing is applied on an extended range window of 300–2000km. More than 1500 detections are encountered, 471 of them are verified as being real objects in Low-Earth-Orbit (LEO). PROOF's observation forecasting of catalogued objects is evaluated against the observed objects, and the difficulties obtaining radar cross-sections (RCSs) and object sizes from Beam-park experiments are discussed. Sidelobe detections are identified by using background information like two-line element (TLE) sets and/or catalogued RCSs.In comparison with previous experiments, the statistics show similarities confirming the concept of Beam-park experiments for space debris observations, despite the snapshot character of 24-h experiments. The comparison with MASTER/PROOF'99 and ORDEM2000 leads to a reasonable agreement between models and observations.     

The image/poetry education and public outreach program

Education and public outreach are viewed by NASA as significant undertakings for all of its space missions. The IMAGE satellite is one of the first missions to explicitly include `E&PO in its original proposal to NASA in 1996. We will discuss what IMAGE has accomplished in this area to date, and what new activities it will conduct following a successful launch.     

Study of cosmic rays and light flashes on board Space Station MIR: the SilEye experiment.

The SilEye experiment aims to study the cause and processes related to the anomalous Light Flashes (LF) perceived by astronauts in orbit and their relation with Cosmic Rays. These observations will be also useful in the study of the long duration manned space flight environment. Two PC-driven silicon detector telescopes have been built and placed aboard Space Station MIR. SilEye-1 was launched in 1995 and provided particles track and LF information; the data gathered indicate a linear dependence of FLF(Hz) ( 4 2) 10(3) 5.3 1.7 10(4) Fpart(Hz) if South Atlantic Anomaly fluxes are not included. Even though higher statistic is required, this is an indication that heavy ion interactions with the eye are the main LF cause. To improve quality and quantity of measurements, a second apparatus, SilEye-2, was placed on MIR in 1997, and started work from August 1998. This instrument provides energetic information, which allows nuclear identification in selected energy ranges; we present preliminary measurements of the radiation field inside MIR performed with SilEye-2 detector in June 1998.     

Cognitive performance aboard the life and microgravity spacelab

The impact of microgravity and other stressors on cognitive performance need to be quantified before long duration space flights are planned or attempted since countermeasures may be required. Four astronauts completed 38 sessions of a 20-minute battery of six cognitive performance tests on a laptop computer. Twenty-four sessions were preflight, 9 sessions were in-orbit, and 5 sessions were postflight. Mathematical models of learning were fit to each subject's preflight data for each of 14 dependent variables. Assuming continued improvement, expected values were generated from the models for in-orbit comparison. Using single subject designs, two subjects showed statistically significant in-orbit effects. One subject was degraded in two tests, the other was degraded in one test and exceeded performance expectations in another. Other subjects showed no statistically significant effects on the tests. The factors causing the deterioration in the two subjects can not be determined without appropriate ground-based control groups.     

Cellular responses to gravity: extracellular, intracellular and in-between.

Our understanding of gravitational effects (inertial effects in the vicinity of 1 x g) on cells has matured to a stage at which it is possible to define, on the basis of experimental evidence, extracellular effects on small cells and intracellular effects on eukaryotic gravisensing cells. Yet undetermined is the nature of response, if any, of those classes of cells that are not governed solely by extracellular physical events (as are prokaryotes) and are devoid of obvious mechanical devices for sensing inertial forces (such as those possessed by certain plant cells and sensory cells of animals). This "in-between" class of cells needs to be understood on the basis of the combination of intracellular and extracellular gravity-dependent processes that govern experimentally-measurable variables that are relevant to the cell's responses to modified inertial forces. The forces that certain cell types generate or respond to are therefore compared to those imposed by approximately 1 x g in the context of cytoskeletal action and symmetry-breaking pathways.     

Local-time variations of geomagnetic disturbances during intense geomagnetic storms and possible association with their interplanetary causes

In the present paper the local-time variations in the disturbance of the geomagnetic-field horizontal component (H) for eight intense geomagnetic storms that occurred during the descending phase of solar cycle 23 have been analyzed. The study was based on the plot of contour lines of the H-depletion intensity in the plane local time versus universal time (LT–UT maps) with the objective of observing how the morphology and evolution of the ring current is mapped into the surface of the Earth in presence of intense geomagnetic storms.