Interdisciplinary Odysseys: The ESF/ESA/ESPI Vienna Conference on Humans in Outer Space

An interdisciplinary approach to discussing the human presence in outer space was undertaken on 11–12 October 2007 by the European Science Foundation (ESF), ESA and the European Space Policy Institute (ESPI). At the ‘Humans in Outer Space—Interdisciplinary Odysseys’ conference space experts and scholars from the area of humanities as well as social sciences discussed the roles disciplines such as law, philosophy, ethics, culture, art and psychology will increasingly play in space exploration. Conference output took form in the ‘Vienna Vision’, which provides a unique European perspective on the various needs and interests of humanities and social sciences linked with space exploration. This report presents the goals and outcome of the conference, as well describing the analysis leading to the creation of the Vienna Vision.     

Time dependent accretion onto a black hole in a disk plus corona system

Hard X-ray lightcurves exhibit delays of 1 s with respect to the soft X-ray lightcurves when the microquasar GRS 1915+105 is in the state of frequent, regular outbursts. Such outbursts are supposed to be driven by the radiation pressure instability of the inner disk parts. The hard X-ray delays are then caused by the time needed for the adjustment of the corona to changing conditions in the underlying disk. We support this claim by the computation of the time evolution of the disk, including a non-stationary evaporation of the disk and mass exchange with the corona.