NASA report due on alcohol, astronauts By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer

NASA report due on alcohol, astronauts By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer
1 hour, 11 minutes ago



WASHINGTON - NASA is set to release results of an internal investigation into whether a couple of astronauts were drinking heavily just before launch, but no one expects new details to emerge.

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In recent weeks, top NASA officials said they could find no proven instances of drunken astronauts about to fly. They said they had examined what happened before launches in the past decade. As of late Tuesday, officials were still confident that no big embarrassments would emerge in the report due out Wednesday.

In July, an independent panel said there were at least two unverified and unidentified instances of astronauts drinking heavily before a flight. The panel was formed to look at astronaut health issues because of the bizarre case of astronaut Lisa Nowak, who was arrested and charged with attempted kidnapping of a romantic rival.

The panel's 12-page report last month said: "Interviews with both flight surgeons and astronauts identified some episodes of heavy use of alcohol by astronauts in the immediate preflight period, which has led to safety concerns."

One instance involved a shuttle astronaut that a colleague claimed had had to much too drink; the colleague alerted others only after the launch was delayed because of mechanical instances.

The other involved an astronaut drinking alcohol before flying on a Russian Soyuz capsule to the international space station. Drinking, especially toasts, are common in the Russian space program.

In both cases — in which no names were given — the report said that flight surgeons and/or fellow astronauts raised safety worries with nearby officials in charge, yet "the individuals were still permitted to fly."

The panel didn't have the ability to investigate further, so NASA's safety chief, Bryan O'Connor, a former astronaut and shuttle accident investigator, was asked to investigate. O'Connor spent much of his time in Houston, where astronauts work, said NASA spokesman David Mould.

NASA administrator Michael Griffin this month pronounced pre-launch preparations for astronauts to be so visible that it is nearly impossible to sneak a drink.

"They would have to really want to drink and hide it really well," Griffin said before the launch of the shuttle Endeavour. He called the charges "uncredible."

Little has changed since then, Mould said Tuesday.

Astronomers find a hole in the universe By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer

Astronomers find a hole in the universe By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer
1 hour, 12 minutes ago



WASHINGTON - Astronomers have stumbled upon a tremendous hole in the universe. That's got them scratching their heads about what's just not there. The cosmic blank spot has no stray stars, no galaxies, no sucking black holes, not even mysterious dark matter. It is 1 billion light years across of nothing. That's an expanse of nearly 6 billion trillion miles of emptiness, a University of Minnesota team announced Thursday.

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Astronomers have known for many years that there are patches in the universe where nobody's home. In fact, one such place is practically a neighbor, a mere 2 million light years away. But what the Minnesota team discovered, using two different types of astronomical observations, is a void that's far bigger than scientists ever imagined.

"This is 1,000 times the volume of what we sort of expected to see in terms of a typical void," said Minnesota astronomy professor Lawrence Rudnick, author of the paper that will be published in Astrophysical Journal. "It's not clear that we have the right word yet ... This is too much of a surprise."

Rudnick was examining a sky survey from the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, which essentially takes radio pictures of a broad expanse of the universe. But one area of the universe had radio pictures indicating there was up to 45 percent less matter in that region, Rudnick said.

The rest of the matter in the radio pictures can be explained as stars and other cosmic structures between here and the void, which is about 5 to 10 billion light years away.

Rudnick then checked observations of cosmic microwave background radiation and found a cold spot. The only explanation, Rudnick said, is it's empty of matter.

It could also be a statistical freak of nature, but that's probably less likely than a giant void, said James Condon, an astronomer at the National Radio Astronomy Observatory. He wasn't part of Rudnick's team but is following up on the research.

"It looks like something to be taken seriously," said Brent Tully, a University of Hawaii astronomer who wasn't part of this research but studies the void closer to Earth.

Tully said astronomers may eventually find a few cosmic structures in the void, but it would still be nearly empty.

Holes in the universe probably occur when the gravity from areas with bigger mass pull matter from less dense areas, Tully said. After 13 billion years "they are losing out in the battle to where there are larger concentrations of matter," he said.

Retired NASA astronomer Steve Maran said of the discovery: "This is incredibly important for something where there is nothing to it."

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On the Net:

Rudnick paper: http://xxx.lanl.gov/pdf/0704.0908

National Radio Astronomy Observatory: http://www.nrao.edu/pr/2007/coldspot/

NASA weighs risk of shuttle launches By MARCIA DUNN, AP Aerospace Writer

NASA weighs risk of shuttle launches By MARCIA DUNN, AP Aerospace Writer
1 hour, 24 minutes ago



CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - A 3 1/2-inch-long gouge in Endeavour's belly did not endanger astronauts in the shuttle's safe landing, but NASA is looking ahead to three more launches at risk for the same kind of damage.

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Endeavour touched down Tuesday for an early homecoming prompted by a hurricane — ending a nearly two-week orbital drama that centered on the gouge.

The gouge in Endeavour, carrying Christa McAuliffe's backup for the doomed Challenger flight in 1986, helped keep NASA officials acutely aware of past shuttle disasters.

Back before Columbia flew its last mission four years ago, NASA knew it had a foam problem with its fuel tanks but never imagined a piece of the airy insulation could severely wound a space shuttle.

Columbia shattered during re-entry to Earth's atmosphere, just five days before engineers were to propose possible repairs.

This time, NASA knew it had a foam problem with brackets on its fuel tanks but never imagined a stray piece would ricochet off the tank and smash into the shuttle.

Retired Navy Adm. Harold Gehman Jr., who headed the 2003 Columbia investigation, was reluctant to comment this week on the troublesome brackets, which support the fuel feed line on the tank. He said he didn't have enough information.

But he observed: "You have to assume things are going to happen and you have to mitigate the consequences, that's what our report was all about."

Endeavour's gash, although deep, was too small for scorching atmospheric gases to penetrate and cause serious damage, mission managers said during the flight. It was also on the belly, a more benign area than the nose or wings, which are subjected to much higher heat. The platesize hole that brought down Columbia pierced the left wing.

Commander Scott Kelly said he was "a little bit underwhelmed" when he saw the gouge for himself after touchdown. "We knew how big it was conceptually. We were told the dimensions. But to see it, it looked rather small," he told reporters.

Officials who checked out Endeavour on the runway said there was no apparent charring to the exposed felt fabric, the last barrier before the aluminum frame.

But now NASA finds itself playing catch-up. It's analyzing a variety of temporary bracket solutions, which may or may not be in place before the next space station construction mission in late October.

Making the brackets with titanium, which would require far less foam insulation than the aluminum version, is the permanent solution ordered after the problem first cropped up last summer.

But that won't happen until next spring. By then, NASA will be just two years from retiring its three remaining space shuttles after wrapping up a demanding schedule for finishing construction of the international space station.

Engineers are considering several short-term options: shaving some foam from the brackets or possibly applying an oil to the foam to reduce condensation and ice buildup.

Because the bracket problem has intensified for the launches since Columbia, engineers theorize it might be due to the one-hour earlier start of fueling — a new rule intended to provide more time for ice checks. That extra hour that the super-cold fuel is in the tank could be allowing more undetected ice to form, which then can cause the neighboring foam to pop off.

NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said after Endeavour's landing that he will need to be satisfied that any change "is necessary and, in fact, beneficial" before ordering modifications. The last thing the space agency wants to do is to change something and make it worse.

NASA still doesn't know whether the debris that smacked Endeavour was foam, ice or a combination of both. Whatever it was, it broke off the bracket, fell nearly 25 feet onto a strut lower on the external fuel tank, then shot into Endeavour's belly.

Each fuel tank is covered with 4,000 pounds of foam and each bracket has only ounces of foam on it, NASA's space operations chief Bill Gerstenmaier said. "We've really taken this huge complex problem ... and we've really shrunk it down to just very, very few areas, essentially ounce-size pieces of foam that we need to go work with."

A NASA veteran who now chairs the mission management team, John Shannon, is quick to point out that once the problem was discovered, the difference in the way the Columbia and Endeavour flights were handled was "night and day."

Columbia's damage was not seriously addressed by mission managers and worried engineers did not speak up.

Endeavour's much smaller damage was analyzed for a full week using every resource available. A group of engineers went against the tide and argued it would be better to fix the gouge than return with it unmended — because of concerns about damage to the returning shuttle. By that time, the experts had ruled out risks to the crew.

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On the Net:

NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov

Endeavour prepares for midday landing By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON, Associated Press Writer

Endeavour prepares for midday landing By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON, Associated Press Writer
39 minutes ago



HOUSTON - With their work in orbit completed, the crew of the space shuttle Endeavour prepared to land a day early Tuesday because of the threat NASA had once feared Hurricane Dean would pose to Mission Control.

The weather outlook in Cape Canaveral, Fla., was fairly good, although forecasters were keeping an eye on the crosswind.

Endeavour's first landing path would take the crew over the Pacific Ocean, Central America and Cuba before touching down at Cape Canaveral in Florida.

If bad weather forces NASA to scrub that landing attempt, the shuttle's second opportunity would include flying over Mexico's Yucatan Peninsula, which was battered Tuesday morning by Hurricane Dean. If the shuttle crosses above the hurricane, it will be too high to feel its effects, NASA said.

Endeavour's seven crew members woke early Tuesday to Simon and Garfunkel's "Homeward Bound," a tribute from all of their families.

"That's very nice of them to think of that," commander Scott Kelly told Mission Control. "Although it's been a short two weeks, we've accomplished a lot and we still look very much forward to coming home today."

Endeavour's two-week mission wasn't supposed to end until Wednesday, but over the weekend mission managers decided to cut its space station visit short. At the time, it was uncertain whether Hurricane Dean might threaten Houston, home to Mission Control.

The forecast Monday afternoon had Houston out of harm's way. But with the shuttle astronauts already packed up, NASA held to a Tuesday landing.

NASA cleared Endeavour for landing after engineers finished evaluating the latest laser images of the shuttle's wings and nose and concluded there were no holes or cracks from micrometeorites or space junk.

The astronauts inspected the especially vulnerable areas Sunday, after undocking from the international space station.

NASA reiterated Monday that the unrepaired gouge in Endeavour's belly posed no danger to the shuttle or its crew. A week of thermal analyses and tests also indicated that no lengthy postflight repairs should be required, said flight director Steve Stich.

Stich noted, however, that re-entering the Earth's atmosphere is always risky.

A piece of foam insulation or ice from a bracket on the external fuel tank broke off at liftoff Aug. 8. It fell onto a strut lower on the tank, then bounced into Endeavour and gashed it.

Brackets have shed debris in previous launches, but it wasn't until Endeavour's flight that such debris caused noticeable damage.

NASA does not plan to launch another space shuttle until the problem is solved.

During the mission, the astronauts delivered 5,000 pounds of cargo to the space station, attached a new truss segment to the outpost and replaced a gyroscope which helps control the station's orientation.

The crew completed four spacewalks, two of which were cut short. One was halted after a spacewalking astronaut noticed a cut in his glove. The other was abbreviated to give the crew enough time to prepare for an early departure from the space station.

Teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan spent time answering questions from students in Idaho, Virginia and Canada. Morgan, who was Christa McAuliffe's backup for the doomed Challenger flight in 1986, is the first teacher to train as a full-fledged astronaut.

The rest of the crew includes pilot Charles Hobaugh and mission specialists Alvin Drew, Tracy Caldwell, Dave Williams and Rick Mastracchio.

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AP Aerospace Writer Marcia Dunn contributed to this report from Cape Canaveral, Fla.

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On the Net:

NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov

Iowa museum mummies to undergo CT scans 1 hour, 25 minutes ago

Iowa museum mummies to undergo CT scans 1 hour, 25 minutes ago



DAVENPORT, Iowa - The Putnam Museum is sending two of its mummies on a field trip in hopes of learning more about their history.

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The mummies, described as among the Davenport museum's most prized and popular possessions, will be carefully removed from their cases on Tuesday and taken by ambulance to Genesis Medical Center's West Central Park Avenue Campus, where they will undergo CT scans.

The scans, being donated by the hospital, are expected to reveal new information about the mummies, such as their ages, genders and maybe even how they died.

"I've never seen them out of their cases," said Eunice Schlichting, the museum's chief curator. "We're so excited. The stars must be aligned or something."

One of the mummies, believed to be 3,000 years old, is named Isis and rests in the museum's lower gallery. Another unnamed mummy rests beside Isis and also will be tested.

The museum hopes to post new information about their history by November, when the mummies will be placed in new humidity controlled cases and their displays updated with new interactive features.

That would coincide with the opening of a new interactive exhibit about Egypt and mummification.

The mummy named Isis was donated to the museum in 1965 by the estate of B.J. Palmer, who purchased the mummy, which is unwrapped in his case, on a trip to Egypt in or around the 1920s. The unnamed mummy remains wrapped, so Schlichting hopes the scans will provide new information about its origin.

Curators will carefully open the cases and wrap the mummies in a plastic-like sheet, meant to capture any salts or pollen samples that can be used for later analysis. The mummies will then be padded with rolls of ethafoam to protect them from bumps along the way.

Once they are wrapped, the mummies will be carefully loaded onto stretchers and taken to the hospital for the scans.

"We have done a lot of research about how best to handle the move," Schlichting said. "We think the benefits far outweigh the risks."

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Information from: Quad-City Times, http://www.qctimes.com

Shuttle Endeavour undocks from station By RASHA MADKOUR, Associated Press Writer

Shuttle Endeavour undocks from station By RASHA MADKOUR, Associated Press Writer
1 minute ago



HOUSTON - Space shuttle Endeavour undocked from the international space station a day early on Sunday, as NASA kept a wary eye on Hurricane Dean.

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Space agency managers worried that the storm would move toward Houston and force them to evacuate to a smaller-staffed makeshift control center at Cape Canaveral, Fla. The Endeavour crew prepared to land on Tuesday as a precaution.

"Endeavour departed," space station commander Fyodor Yurchikhin said as the shuttle pulled away.

The shuttle crew, which includes teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan, had been at the orbiting outpost since Aug. 10. In that time, they attached a new truss segment to the station, delivered cargo and replaced a failed gyroscope, which controls the station's orientation.

They have had to compress their schedule to get ready for the early undocking. Morgan, who was Christa McAuliffe's backup on the tragic 1986 Challenger mission, was scheduled to talk to students in Massachusetts on Sunday but that event was canceled. A spacewalk on Saturday was shortened so the astronauts could wrap up their work at the station. During that jaunt, the spacewalkers saw the eye of the enormous hurricane swirling in the Caribbean and expressed their amazement at the sight.

The astronauts also skipped flying around the station after undocking to take pictures of the complex, an exercise NASA likes shuttles to do if the schedule and fuel supply permit.

Although it was uncertain whether Dean, a Category 4 storm, might strike the Texas coastline later this week, NASA managers said it would be irresponsible not to cut the mission short, especially since most of the tasks had been completed.

"I would defy just about anybody to tell me at this point that there's zero or even extremely low probability or possibility that the storm is going to come here," said LeRoy Cain.

NASA is ready to rush a skeleton crew of flight controllers to Cape Canaveral, but only if the shuttle cannot land Tuesday for some reason and the hurricane is bearing down on Houston and threatening the city for several days, Cain said.

"That's a fairly, I hope, unlikely scenario simply because all those things have to line up," he said.

In 26 years of space shuttle flight, NASA never has had to call up an emergency Mission Control, although it has been practiced.

NASA's hurricane deliberations followed a decision to forgo shuttle repairs.

Mission managers concluded earlier this week that a deep gouge on Endeavour's belly posed no Columbia-like threat to the seven crew members during re-entry and also would not lead to lengthy postflight shuttle repairs.

For several days, managers had considered sending two astronauts out with black protective paint and untested goo to patch the 3 1/2-inch-long, 2-inch-wide gouge that dug all the way through the thermal tiles.

The gouge was caused by debris that broke off a bracket on Endeavour's external fuel tank during liftoff Aug. 8. Engineers still do not know whether it was foam insulation, ice or a combination of both. In any case, NASA said it will not launch another shuttle until the longtime troublesome brackets are fixed.

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On the Net:

NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/

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AP Aerospace writer Marcia Dunn contributed to this report from Cape Canaveral, Fla.

NASA nears decision on shuttle fix By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON, Associated Press Writer

NASA nears decision on shuttle fix By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON, Associated Press Writer
30 minutes ago



HOUSTON - NASA managers remained "cautiously optimistic" that a deep gouge in the shuttle Endeavour's belly wouldn't require spacewalking repairs but wanted to run one last test and double-check their data Thursday before making a decision.

Officials also were studying a rip in astronaut Rick Mastracchio's glove that brought Wednesday's spacewalk to an early end, and they were loathe to authorize another jaunt until they knew more. But they said those concerns wouldn't stand in the way of crucial repairs.

"If we decided we needed to go do this, I would feel very comfortable doing it. We've done a lot of spacewalks without any glove problems," said John Shannon, the mission management team's chairman.

Mission Control told Endeavour commander Scott Kelly early Thursday that a repair decision was expected by mid-day.

Endeavour's crew spent early Thursday learning what to do if NASA orders the repairs. Astronauts on the ground have been practicing the techniques so they can send the crew precise instructions and answer any questions.

Teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan also planned to spend time Thursday speaking with students at the Challenger Center for Space Science Education in Virginia, which was founded by the families of the doomed shuttle's crew. Morgan was Christa McAuliffe's backup for the 1986 flight.

The chat was to be moderated by the commander's widow, June Scobee-Rodgers.

In a similar chat with Idaho students on Tuesday, Morgan demonstrated what it's like to exercise and drink in space and talked about what the stars look like from the shuttle.

NASA has spent nearly a week agonizing over the 3 1/2-inch-long, 2-inch-wide gouge that resulted from a debris strike at liftoff. Part of the gouge, a narrow 1-inch strip, cuts all the way through the tiles, exposing the thin felt fabric that serves as the final thermal barrier to the ship's aluminum frame.

The exposed area and the gouge itself are so small that NASA is not worried about a Columbia-type catastrophe at flight's end. They are concerned, however, that the underlying aluminum structure might be damaged enough by the searing heat of re-entry to warrant lengthy post-flight repairs.

Officials have to balance those fears with the risk that astronauts wearing 300-pound spacesuits and carrying 150 pounds of tools could bang into the shuttle and cause more damage as they try to fix the gouge.

Putting the wrong amount of the caulk-like repair goo into the gash or failing to put it in exactly the right spot could make the problem worse, Shannon said.

The unprecedented patching job on Endeavour, if approved, would be performed on the next spacewalk, now set for Saturday, a day later than originally planned to give engineers more time to analyze the situation. That could keep Endeavour and its crew of seven at the space station at least an extra day.

Mastracchio likely would be assigned to the repair spacewalk, and he could use a spare glove he brought on board Endeavour.

Astronaut Clay Anderson, who joined Mastracchio on Wednesday's spacewalk, was taking digital pictures on Thursday of all the gloves on board so NASA could make sure they were in good shape.

"We want to clear the fact that it might have been a generic problem with gloves before we go back out the door," Mission Control told Kelly.

The repair job would not be anywhere near where Mastracchio was Wednesday, when he and Anderson moved two rail carts and an antenna base into new positions on the orbiting outpost. They also added new antenna parts to improve voice communications.

The next spacewalk will be trickier if shuttle repairs are ordered. Under the latest scenario, Mastracchio and another astronaut would apply black paint to the white gouge and squirt in the caulk-like goo, while balancing themselves on the end of the shuttle's 100-foot robot arm and extension boom.

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AP Aerospace Writer Marcia Dunn contributed to this report from Cape Canaveral, Fla.

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On the Net:

NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov

NASA studies gouge on Endeavour's belly By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON, Associated Press Writer

NASA studies gouge on Endeavour's belly By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON, Associated Press Writer
1 hour, 24 minutes ago



HOUSTON - If astronauts have to venture into the void of space to fix a deep gash on the shuttle Endeavour's belly, they'll get plenty of help from a team of experts assembled to help pick and perfect the best repair technique.

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NASA put together the team of engineers, astronauts and spacewalk gurus on Monday as other specialists scrambled to determine whether the crew needed to fix the gouge to avoid extensive post-flight repairs. A decision was expected by Wednesday.

The gouge is relatively small — 3 1/2 inches by 2 inches — and the damage is benign enough for Endeavour to fly safely home. But part of it penetrates through the protective thermal tiles, leaving just a thin layer of coated felt over the space shuttle's aluminum frame to keep out the more than 2,000-degree heat of re-entry. Fixing any resulting structural damage could be expensive and time-consuming.

To patch the gouge, spacewalking astronauts would have to perch on the end of the shuttle's 100-foot robotic arm and extension boom, be maneuvered under the spacecraft, and either apply protective black paint or squirt in a caulk-like goop.

Mission Control told the crew late Monday that officials had ruled out a third repair technique involving a protective plate that could be screwed over the damage.

All three techniques were developed following Columbia's catastrophic re-entry, and NASA has never attempted this type of repair on an orbiting shuttle. Only the black paint has been tested in space.

Astronauts Rick Mastracchio and Dave Williams have trained extensively on the ground and could perform any necessary repairs during the mission's fourth spacewalk set for Friday. Their last tile-repair class was just three or four weeks before launch.

"I think that regardless of what repair method is chosen over the next day or so, we could execute it if required," said John Shannon, chairman of the mission management team.

Covering the exposed white coated felt with black protective paint would keep heat from building up in the cavity, Shannon said.

For extra heat protection, the astronauts could also squirt in the caulk-like goop from a tank attached to their spacesuit's backpack. In that case, they would apply the paint first to make sure the goop stuck.

If the repairs are ordered, astronauts on the ground will practice repairing a replica of the gouge underwater so they can create precise instructions for the spacewalkers and their crewmates.

When an astronaut from the shuttle Atlantis' June mission had to staple up a thermal blanket that had peeled back during launch, the ground crew sent him 60 pages of instructions and four videos, Shannon said.

Mastracchio and Williams have already completed two spacewalks in three days. On Monday, they removed a 600-plus-pound gyroscope from the space station's exterior that failed last October. They installed a new one in its place that was carried up aboard Endeavour. The space station has four gyroscopes to keep it steady and pointed in the right direction.

Teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan — Christa McAuliffe's backup for Challenger's doomed mission in 1986 — helped monitor the spacewalk from inside the joined shuttle-station complex.

On Tuesday, Morgan will speak with students in Idaho, where she taught elementary classes before moving to Houston in 1998 to become the first teacher to train as a full-fledged astronaut.

A list of topics Mission Control sent her on Monday included questions from children about what it's like to be weightless, how the crew gets clean air aboard the shuttle, and what stars look like from space.

Morgan and her crewmates will spend the rest of Tuesday using Endeavour's robotic arm to help install a new storage platform on the space station. After pulling the platform from the ship's cargo bay, they will pass it off to the station's robotic arm for installation.

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On the Net:

NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov

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AP Aerospace Writer Marcia Dunn contributed to this report from Cape Canaveral, Fla.

Astronauts zoom in on shuttle gash By MARCIA DUNN, AP Aerospace Writer

Astronauts zoom in on shuttle gash By MARCIA DUNN, AP Aerospace Writer
1 hour, 21 minutes ago



CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - A close-up laser inspection by Endeavour's astronauts Sunday revealed that a 3 1/2-inch-long gouge penetrates all the way through the thermal shielding on the shuttle's belly, and had NASA urgently calculating whether risky spacewalk repairs are needed.

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A chunk of insulating foam smacked the shuttle at liftoff last week in an unbelievably unlucky ricochet off the fuel tank and carved out the gouge.

The unevenly shaped gouge — which straddles two side-by-side thermal tiles and the corner of a third — is 3 1/2 inches long and just over 2 inches wide. Sunday's inspection showed that the damage goes all the way through the 1-inch-thick tiles, exposing the felt material sandwiched between the tiles and the shuttle's aluminum frame.

Mission managers expect to decide Monday, or Tuesday at the latest, whether to send astronauts out to patch the gouge. Engineers are trying to determine whether the marred area can withstand the searing heat of atmospheric re-entry at flight's end. Actual heating tests will be conducted on similarly damaged samples.

"We have really prepared for exactly this case, since Columbia," said John Shannon, chairman of the mission management team. "We have spent a lot of money in the program and a lot of time and a lot of people's efforts to be ready to handle exactly this case."

The damaged thermal tiles are located near the right main landing gear door. In a stroke of luck, they're right beneath the aluminum framework for the right wing, which would offer extra protection during the ride back to Earth.

This area is subjected to as much as 2,300 degrees Fahrenheit during re-entry. A hole, if large and deep enough, could lead to another Columbia-type disaster. Columbia was destroyed in 2003 when hot atmospheric gases seeped into a hole in its wing and melted the wing from the inside out. A foam strike at liftoff caused the gash.

Teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan — who was the backup for Challenger's Christa McAuliffe in 1986 — conducted the slow and painstaking survey, along with crewmate Tracy Caldwell. They used the 100-foot robotic arm and extension boom that flew up on Endeavour, steering the instrument to a spot just above the gouge and keeping it hovered there.

Laser sensors and cameras zoomed in on the damage, white and easily visible against the black tiles, from a variety of views.

Four other damaged areas also were scanned. Engineers believe the piece of foam struck the shuttle's underside, creating the big gouge, then skimmed along the bottom and nicked it in at least three spots. Those smaller gouges pose no threat, Shannon said.

The foam came off a bracket on the external fuel tank 58 seconds after Wednesday's launch, fell down onto a strut on the tank, then bounced up, right into Endeavour's belly. Ice apparently formed before liftoff near the bracket, which helps hold the long fuel feed line to the tank, and caused the foam to pop off when subjected to the vibrations of launch.

It's possible some ice was attached to the foam, which would have made the impact even harder. The debris that came off is believed to have been grapefruit-sized.

These brackets have lost foam in previous launches, a concern for NASA, Shannon said. A switch to titanium brackets, eliminating foam, will not occur before next year.

Shannon said he did not know whether the recurring foam problem would delay the next shuttle flight, currently scheduled for October.

"We have a lot of discussion to have before we decide to fly the next tank," he said.

The inspection consumed much of the astronauts' day. On Monday, two of them will go back out for the second spacewalk of the mission to replace a broken gyroscope at the international space station.

Endeavour has been docked at the space station since Friday. It will remain there until Aug. 20 for a record 10-day stay. Mission managers on Sunday approved the prolonged visit based on the successful testing of a new power transfer system flying on Endeavour. The system is drawing power from the station and converting it for use aboard the shuttle.

On the space station, meanwhile, two cosmonauts continued repairs to a Russian computer system that failed during shuttle Atlantis' visit in June. Condensation from an air conditioning unit apparently is collecting behind the panels where the computer equipment is located.

And a U.S. command-and-control computer that shut down during Saturday's spacewalk was working again Sunday.

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On the Net:

NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov

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Rasha Madkour and Liz Austin Peterson contributed to this report from Houston.

to another Columbia-type disaster. Columbia was destroyed in 2003 when hot atmospheric gases seeped into a hole in its wing and melted the wing from

to another Columbia-type disaster. Columbia was destroyed in 2003 when hot atmospheric gases seeped into a hole in its wing and melted the wing from the inside out. A foam strike at liftoff caused the gash.

Teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan — who was the backup for Challenger's Christa McAuliffe in 1986 — conducted the slow and painstaking survey, along with crewmate Tracy Caldwell. They used the 100-foot robotic arm and extension boom that flew up on Endeavour, steering the instrument to a spot just above the gouge and keeping it hovered there.

Laser sensors and cameras zoomed in on the damage, white and easily visible against the black tiles, from a variety of views.

Four other damaged areas also were scanned. Engineers believe the piece of foam struck the shuttle's underside, creating the big gouge, then skimmed along the bottom and nicked it in at least three spots. Those smaller gouges pose no threat, Shannon said.

The foam came off a bracket on the external fuel tank 58 seconds after Wednesday's launch, fell down onto a strut on the tank, then bounced up, right into Endeavour's belly. Ice apparently formed before liftoff near the bracket, which helps hold the long fuel feed line to the tank, and caused the foam to pop off when subjected to the vibrations of launch.

It's possible some ice was attached to the foam, which would have made the impact even harder. The debris that came off is believed to have been grapefruit-sized.

These brackets have lost foam in previous launches, a concern for NASA, Shannon said. A switch to titanium brackets, eliminating foam, will not occur before next year.

Shannon said he did not know whether the recurring foam problem would delay the next shuttle flight, currently scheduled for October.

"We have a lot of discussion to have before we decide to fly the next tank," he said.

The inspection consumed much of the astronauts' day. On Monday, two of them will go back out for the second spacewalk of the mission to replace a broken gyroscope at the international space station.

Endeavour has been docked at the space station since Friday. It will remain there until Aug. 20 for a record 10-day stay. Mission managers on Sunday approved the prolonged visit based on the successful testing of a new power transfer system flying on Endeavour. The system is drawing power from the station and converting it for use aboard the shuttle.

On the space station, meanwhile, two cosmonauts continued repairs to a Russian computer system that failed during shuttle Atlantis' visit in June. Condensation from an air conditioning unit apparently is collecting behind the panels where the computer equipment is located.

And a U.S. command-and-control computer that shut down during Saturday's spacewalk was working again Sunday.

___

On the Net:

NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov

___

Rasha Madkour and Liz Austin Peterson contributed to this report from Houston.

DVD formats square off for holidays By GARY GENTILE, AP Business Writer

DVD formats square off for holidays By GARY GENTILE, AP Business Writer
25 minutes ago



LOS ANGELES - People who own an HD DVD player can forget about watching "Spider-Man 3" in high definition when it goes on sale during the holiday season. The movie from Sony Pictures will only be available in the Blu-ray DVD format.

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Likewise, people with Blu-ray players won't be able to enjoy the action-thriller "The Bourne Ultimatum," which Universal Pictures will release only in HD DVD.

These exclusive arrangements, plus aggressive price cuts for high-def DVD players, are designed to persuade consumers to finally embrace one format or the other.

But analysts wonder if the moves will anger consumers, just as the studios and consumer-electronics companies are hoping to boost high-def DVD sales as growth in standard DVDs stalls.

"The frustration for consumers is not knowing what format is going to win," said Chris Roden, an analyst at Parks Associates.

Consumers, many of whom are still smarting from the VCR format battle between VHS and Betamax, need to know their expensive equipment won't become obsolete if the competing format wins, said Steven J. Caldero, chief operating officer of Ken Crane's, specialty electronics chain in Southern California.

"People are still frustrated there is a format war to begin with," he said. "The studios are making people choose. What consumers want is something that will play everything so they don't have to choose."

Until recently, many consumers were able to defer the choice because players have been so expensive. But prices have been slashed by about half — Sony Corp.'s Blu-ray player now sells for $499 and Toshiba Corp.'s cheapest HD DVD player sells for $299, with both likely to include as many as five free movies as an incentive. (Players that read both formats remain expensive.)

Both sides are also releasing blockbuster titles such as the new "Pirates of the Caribbean" movie aimed squarely at the demographic most likely to upgrade to high-def.

The stakes couldn't be higher for Hollywood, which has seen sales of traditional DVDs, once a reliable profit engine, slow to a trickle. Direct digital delivery online, while promising, is still years away from profitability because current Internet capacity simply can't handle the enormous high-definition files.

Yet consumers remain profoundly confused by the two formats, both of which deliver crisp, clear pictures and sound but are completely incompatible with each other and do not play on older DVD players. Many haven't even heard of either format.

HD DVD, developed by Toshiba and backed by powerful companies like Microsoft, has the lead in standalone players sold because they are cheaper and hit the market first.

In the United States, standalone HD DVD players have 61 percent market share, while Blu-ray players have 36 percent share and the few dual-format players have a 3 percent share, according to market research company The NPD Group Inc.

But Blu-ray, backed by Sony and a majority of Hollywood studios, got a big boost when Sony introduced its PlayStation 3 game console, which comes standard with a Blu-ray drive. Counting those machines, there are more Blu-ray players out there.

Although Microsoft's Xbox 360 can play HD DVD movies, the drive has to be bought separately. Only 160,000 drives have been sold so far, compared with 1.5 million PS3 consoles, according to NPD.

In terms of discs sold, Blu-ray has always had the lead. Time Warner Inc.'s Warner Bros. and Viacom Inc.'s Paramount Pictures release movies in both formats, and in such cases Blu-ray has outsold HD DVD by nearly 2-to-1.

Blu-Ray is getting an even bigger boost as Blockbuster Inc. announced it would stock only Blu-ray titles when it expands its high-def DVD offerings this year. Target Inc., the nation's second-largest retailer, said it will only sell Blu-ray DVD players in its stores in the fourth quarter.

Sony Pictures, News Corp.'s Twentieth Century Fox, The Walt Disney Co., and Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer are releasing only in Blu-ray. Universal, owned by General Electric Co., is the only major studio to back HD DVD exclusively.

Nonetheless, Warner Bros. believes both formats can coexist and has been urging Blu-ray backers to begin supporting HD DVD as well. The studio has developed a dual-format disc and has said it would license the technology to other studios willing to back both.

"The fourth quarter is critical for the formats to show growth and momentum," said Steve Nickerson, Warner Home Video's senior vice president of marketing. "It's more than about winning or losing. If you can continue to show growth (in both formats), that's a positive in a situation where standard DVD sales aren't growing."

To counter Blu-ray's recent gains, the HD DVD camp is planning an advertising campaign touting the interactive elements of the format, which allow users to connect to the Internet to download special features.

"This is not about a high-def movie on a disc," said Craig Kornblau, president of Universal Studios Home Entertainment. "It's about a fully immersive experience, connected interactivity. That's what is going to separate these high-def formats."

Kornblau said he isn't worried about Blu-ray's momentum and doesn't believe there's a need for one to knockout the other.

"To call this market nascent is to a degree to pay it a complement," he said. "The people who have bought so far aren't early adopters, they are early, early adopters."

Analysts said even lower prices for players could be the key to determining a format winner. Some believe that until prices hit the $200 range, consumers simply won't upgrade from their current machines, many of which cost less than $100.

Chinese-made HD DVD players selling for $199 are expected to hit store shelves by December, while Sony is widely expected to cut the cost of its Blu-ray machine to as low as $299 by year's end.

"When that occurs, the studios and Sony are going to pull out the big guns," said Phillip Swann, president of the technology-oriented Web site TVpredictions.com. "They are going to release more titles, big titles, and really go for the kill this holiday season."

___

On the Net:

HD DVD camp: http://www.thelookandsoundofperfect.com

Blu-ray camp: http://www.blu-raydisc.com

Research reports good environmental news By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID, AP Science Writer

Research reports good environmental news By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID, AP Science Writer
41 minutes ago



WASHINGTON - For a change, there's some good news from the world of the environment. Several rare and vulnerable birds are rebounding in Europe. Conservation efforts in Peru are reducing damage to the Amazon rain forest. And black-footed ferrets are making a comeback in Wyoming.

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The three positive trends are reported Thursday in a series of papers in the journal Science.

Researchers led by Paul F. Donald, of Britain's Royal Society for the Protection of Birds, report that European Union policies designed to protect vulnerable species and their habitat seem to be working.

In 15 European countries studied, there was a significant increase in population trends for protected birds between 1990 and 2000, compared to 1970-1990, the team found.

They said the protected birds also showed an increase compared to birds not on the list.

Species doing particularly well include the barnacle goose, white stork, spoonbill, little egret Slavonian grebe and white-tailed eagle.

On this side of the Atlantic Ocean, the once endangered black-footed ferret is repopulating its Wyoming homeland, according to researchers led by Martin B. Grenier of the University of Wyoming.

The last seven known ferrets of this type were removed from the wild in 1987 and placed in a captive breeding program. They have produced 4,800 juveniles, many of which were returned to the wild.

At first they continued to suffer losses and extinction seemed likely when they were down to five animals, but by 2003 the wild population had grown to 52 ferrets and researchers estimate the current wild total at more than 200.

And in South America, satellite monitoring indicates that the rate of deforestation is declining in the Peruvian rain forest.

Researchers led by Paulo J. Oliveira of the Carnegie Institution report that while deforestation is continuing, it is occurring mostly in designated logging areas and not in protected regions set aside by the government.

They concluded that the government's program intended to set aside land for indigenous people is also having an effect in protecting the forest.

The European bird research was supported by the European Bird Census Council and the European Union. The ferret study was funded by the Wyoming Game and Fish Department and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service. The Peruvian forest analysis was funded by the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation.

___

On the Net:

Science: http://www.sciencemag.org

Humans leave sooty footprint in Arctic By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID, AP Science Writer

Humans leave sooty footprint in Arctic By RANDOLPH E. SCHMID, AP Science Writer
40 minutes ago



WASHINGTON - Around the middle of the 19th century the Arctic took a sooty turn for the worse, according to researchers studying how humans have affected the climate.

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Soot can darken the snow, causing it to absorb sunlight, warm up and melt. That, in turn, can add to local climate warming by exposing darker ground which absorbs energy from the sun that the white snow would have reflected.

Ice cores from before about 1850 show most soot came from forest fires. But since then, black soot in the snow has increased several times over and most now comes from industrial activities, according to a paper in Thursday's online edition of the journal Science.

In a separate paper in that journal, a team of British researchers forecast that climate warming will slow for about a decade, then bound back to record-setting temperatures.

That group added new detail to improve the accuracy of complex computer models that calculate changes in weather and climate to come up with their new outlook.

The soot study was done by a team led by Joseph R. McConnell of the Desert Research Institute in Reno, Nevada.

The researchers analyzed black carbon levels in ice from Greenland, covering the last 215 years.

They found that the older soot samples contained vanillic acid, an indicator of burning conifer trees.

In the more recent years the soot was seven times more common and contained a larger concentration of non-ocean sulfur, an indicator of industrial emissions.

Soot concentrations peaked in 1906-1910 and remained high for decades. Sulfur emissions declined following the Clean Air Act in 1970, they noted.

In the early 20th century the Arctic warmed more than anywhere else on Earth, Richard B. Alley of the California Institute of Technology observes in a commentary on the report, noting a "broad correspondence between the soot peak and the observed warming."

Doug M. Smith and colleagues at the British Meteorological Office produced the improved climate model.

They added the effects of natural climate changes, such as the El Nino phenomenon in the Pacific Ocean, fluctuations in ocean circulation and anomalies in ocean heat content to their computer models. In general, climate models have focused on the impact of outside factors such as solar radiation, atmospheric aerosols and greenhouse gases.

The new outlook calls for a slowdown in warming for the next few years, but then an increase again.

They forecast that at least half of the years after 2009 will be warmer than 1998, the warmest year to date according to the Met Office. The U.S. National Climate Data Center ranked 2005 in a virtual tie with 1998.

The arctic soot research was supported by the U.S. National Science Foundation, the Desert Research Institute, Office of Naval Research and NASA. The climate forecasters were supported by the United Kingdom Department of Environment, Food and Rural Affairs and the U.K. Government Meteorological Research Programme.

___

On the Net:

Science: http://www.sciencemag.org

Lab linked to foot-and-mouth outbreak By MARIA CHENG, AP Medical Writer

Lab linked to foot-and-mouth outbreak By MARIA CHENG, AP Medical Writer
26 minutes ago



LONDON - Foot-and-mouth disease is so highly contagious — and such a threat to farm economies — that the United States won't allow researchers to work with the virus on the mainland. But in Britain, a lab making foot-and-mouth vaccines was located near herds of cattle and may have been the cause of a new outbreak.

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Foot-and-mouth disease does not typically infect humans, but its appearance among farm animals can have a swift and far-reaching economic impact — several countries, including the United States, have banned imports of British livestock, and Britain has suspended exports of livestock, meat and milk products and destroyed more than 100 cows since the outbreak was discovered last week.

Britain's health and safety agency says there was a "strong probability" the outbreak originated at the Pirbright laboratory southwest of London and was spread by human movement. The laboratory houses both a government Institute for Animal Health research center and vaccine-maker Merial Animal Health.

Lab accidents have resulted in human cases of everything from meningitis to Ebola, but are rare and most are self-contained. Still, diseases that can kill humans have made it out of labs.

"With the amount of virus there is in laboratories around the world, I'm surprised that this kind of thing doesn't happen more often," said Dr. Juan Lubroth, head of infectious diseases at the Food and Agriculture Organization.

Foot-and-mouth disease is the most contagious disease among mammals. In the United States, which has been free of the disease since 1929, it is illegal for anyone to possess the virus outside of a single research laboratory on Plum Island, New York. Germany employs the same policy. Some experts think that by restricting the virus' use to an island, even in the event of an outbreak, it would be self-contained.

But others say that isn't necessary. In Canada, Switzerland, Spain, South Africa, Botswana, China and Egypt, the virus is regularly handled in laboratories on the mainland without major problems.

"With today's technology, you can do very safe work without having to be on an island," Lubroth said.

Dr. Andrea Morgan, associate deputy administrator in the veterinary services department at the U.S. Department of Agriculture, agreed. "Regardless of whether the virus is on an island or on the mainland, it all comes down to respecting the proper biosecurity measures," Morgan said.

According to a 2002 government review, parts of the research center suspected in the British outbreak were deemed to be "shabby," though no biosecurity concerns were raised. The National Farmers' Union has for years expressed concern that the center was vulnerable to a lab accident. Plans are in place to rebuild it by 2011, at a cost of $245 million.

The drug company being investigated in the foot-and-mouth outbreak insisted there had been no violation of its biosecurity procedures.

"To date, we have not been able to establish any evidence that the virus may have been transported out of our center by humans," said Merial Animal Health, the British arm of U.S.-French Merial Ltd.

Experts believe a laboratory connection is likely.

"It seems a little bit too coincidental that the strain of the foot-and-mouth virus causing the outbreak was the same one being used in a laboratory five miles away," said Dr. Freda Scott-Park, former president of the British Veterinary Association.

"This would not be the first time that we've had an event linked to a virus escaping from a lab," said Dr. Bernard Vallat, director-general of the World Organization for Animal Health. He noted that Britain's rapid response should ensure the outbreak is properly contained.

Though agencies like the Food and Agriculture Organization, the World Health Organization and the World Organization for Animal Health make recommendations for handling dangerous viruses and bacteria, they are just that: recommendations. Countries are free to either respect or ignore them.

The World Organization for Animal Health says foot-and-mouth warrants the highest containment level possible. Among its recommendations are that sewage be treated to ensure infectious material is destroyed and that staff shower and change clothes before leaving the lab. Experts also recommend that labs working with the virus be isolated from animals that could be infected.

Concerns about biosafety were triggered after three laboratory-related outbreaks of Severe Acute Respiratory Syndrome in Singapore, Taiwan and China in 2003 and 2004. In Singapore and Taiwan, lab workers inadvertently infected themselves. That was also the case in China, where the infection spread from two lab workers to seven family members and contacts outside the lab.

In 2005, scientists worldwide scrambled to avert a possible global flu outbreak by destroying samples of the 1957 flu pandemic virus that were accidentally sent to 5,000 labs in 18 countries.

Though WHO says many laboratory practices have improved since the SARS accidents, much remains to be done.

"We can try to mitigate the risk, but zero risk is probably one of things we can never achieve," said Dr. Nicoletta Previsani, project leader of WHO's global biosafety and biosecurity program.

"It's like when you work in your own kitchen preparing dinner," Previsani said. "You do your best, but sometimes you still cut yourself with a knife."

Teacher-astronaut helps inspect shuttle By MARCIA DUNN, AP Aerospace Writer

Teacher-astronaut helps inspect shuttle By MARCIA DUNN, AP Aerospace Writer
24 minutes ago



CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Schoolteacher-turned-astronaut Barbara Morgan tended to the space shuttle on her first full day in space Thursday, helping to operate a 100-foot robot arm and extension boom as the crew inspected Endeavour for launch damage.

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Working from Endeavour's cockpit, Morgan and crewmate Tracy Caldwell slowly swept the laser and camera-tipped boom just above the shuttle's nose cap. Engineers on the ground scrutinized the images, looking for any cracks or holes that might have occurred during liftoff from flying fuel-tank foam insulation or other debris.

Then Morgan was joined by Rick Mastracchio for a similar inspection of Endeavour's left wing. The right wing was checked earlier in the day.

The meticulous survey has been standard procedure ever since a gashed wing led to Columbia's catastrophic re-entry in 2003. The 50-foot boom, attached to the shuttle's 50-foot robot arm, was created expressly for the job.

NASA said at least four or five pieces of debris broke off Endeavour's external fuel tank shortly after liftoff Wednesday, but it was too late in the launch to pose any threat. One of the pieces appeared to originate from around one of struts that attaches the shuttle to its external fuel tank, an area that was redesigned after the Columbia disaster.

With every circling of Earth, Endeavour sailed ever closer to a Friday afternoon linkup with the international space station. The shuttle was in fine shape, except for a problem with one of the five on-board oxygen tanks that feed the ship's fuel cells.

Endeavour's seven astronauts had their sleep interrupted early Thursday when an alarm went off, alerting them to the tank trouble. They later managed to work around the problem by manually turning the tank's heaters on and off to control pressure. Mission Control described the failed pressure-control sensor as an inconvenience.

NASA hopes to keep Endeavour in orbit for a full two weeks. The shuttle is equipped with a new system for drawing power from the space station. If it works, mission managers plan to extend the flight from 11 days to 14 days.

Morgan, 55, a former elementary schoolteacher from Idaho, was Christa McAuliffe's backup for the inaugural teacher-in-space flight aboard Challenger in 1986. McAuliffe never made it to space; she was killed along with her six crewmates just over a minute after liftoff.

NASA invited Morgan into the astronaut corps in 1998. She was supposed to fly aboard Columbia at the end of 2003, but found herself waiting again after her ship was destroyed and the remaining fleet was grounded.

Now, finally in orbit, Morgan plans to answer questions next week from schoolchildren in at least one state — Idaho — and is flying 10 million basil seeds for eventual distribution to students and teachers.

___

On the Net:

NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov

Endeavour carries teacher into space By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON, Associated Press Writer

Endeavour carries teacher into space By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON, Associated Press Writer
39 minutes ago



HOUSTON - After Endeavour launched into the clear blue sky and reached orbit with teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan aboard, Mission Control announced that class was in session.

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Morgan, zooming with the other crew members toward the international space station, was finally fulfilling the space program's quest to send an educator into space — a dream that could have died in 1986 with the Challenger explosion that killed teacher Christa McAuliffe and six astronauts.

On Wednesday, once Endeavour was safely past the 73-second mark of the flight, the moment when Challenger exploded, Mission Control exclaimed that Morgan — McAuliffe's backup for Challenger — was "racing toward space on the wings of a legacy."

Immediately after the shuttle reached orbit, Mission Control announced: "For Barbara Morgan and her crewmates, class is in session."

Morgan and the shuttle crew woke up Thursday to Russell Watson's "Where My Heart Will Take Me" and prepared for a busy day of checking for possible damage from debris shaken loose during the launch.

Shortly after the crew awoke Thursday, Morgan worked inside the shuttle's cockpit alongside other astronauts.

An alarm involving an instrumentation glitch on an oxygen tank briefly awoke the astronauts overnight, but NASA officials did not think it was serious and said they would try to fix it Thursday.

Endeavour was scheduled to dock with the space station on Friday afternoon.

Midway through the flight, Morgan will speak with students in Idaho, where she taught elementary classes before moving to Houston in 1998 to become the first teacher to train as a full-fledged astronaut. If the mission is extended from 11 days to 14 days as planned, thanks to a new station-to-shuttle power converter, she'll also have a chance to answer questions from students in Virginia and Massachusetts.

But Morgan's primary responsibility in orbit will involve helping to operate Endeavour's robot arm and overseeing the transfer of cargo from the shuttle to the station.

The rest of the crew will be busy installing a huge square-shaped beam to the exterior of the station and replacing a broken gyroscope. Three spacewalks are planned; a fourth is possible.

Late Wednesday, Morgan, 55, was all-business as she periodically updated Mission Control on the activation of the shuttle's cargo-carrying module.

The astronauts were to spend much of Thursday using a 50-foot laser boom on the end of the robot arm to inspect the shuttle's wings and nose. The scan for damage from fuel-tank insulating foam and other debris from launch, or micrometeorites in space, has been standard procedure ever since Columbia's catastrophic re-entry in 2003.

Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA's space operations chief, said early checks showed four or five small pieces of debris from the external fuel tank came off during launch. He said it happened too late to cause concern.

NASA is hoping a successful flight will draw attention from the rash of embarrassments it has faced this year. Most recently, a NASA-commissioned medical panel's report suggested astronauts were intoxicated on launch day on at least two occasions.

NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said the televised preparations for Wednesday's launch demonstrated how difficult it would be for an astronaut to drink before takeoff.

"I would defy anyone to find an opportunity they had to do any drinking from the time they woke up this morning," Griffin said. "They would have to really want to drink and hide it really well."

Endeavour's liftoff had been scheduled for Tuesday, but last week NASA delayed the flight by a day because a leaky valve in the crew cabin needed to be replaced.

This is Endeavour's first flight since 2002. The shuttle underwent a massive overhaul and was outfitted with complete satellite navigation, improved main engine monitoring equipment and a new system for transferring power from the station to the shuttle. The extra power will allow the shuttle to remain docked at the space station longer than ever before.

Besides Morgan, the crew includes Navy Cmdr. Scott Kelly, the commander; Marine Lt. Col. Charles Hobaugh, the copilot; Rick Mastracchio, Tracy Caldwell, Air Force Col. Alvin Drew and Canadian physician Dave Williams.

___

AP Aerospace writer Marcia Dunn contributed to this report from Cape Canaveral.

___

On the Net:

NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov

IBM launches system to track medications By BARBARA ORTUTAY, AP Business Writer

IBM launches system to track medications By BARBARA ORTUTAY, AP Business Writer
2 hours, 57 minutes ago



NEW YORK - To help the pharmaceutical industry combat drug counterfeiting, IBM is launching an electronic pedigree system Thursday that tracks medications through the supply chain until they reach consumers.

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The system employs radio-frequency identification, or RFID tags, which are already used to track packages of drugs, especially ones popular with counterfeiters. Pfizer, for example, uses RFID chips to track packs of its erectile dysfunction drug Viagra, and Purdue Pharma LP has been using them since 2004 to track its pain reliever OxyContin.

IBM's ePedigree system helps drug companies create electronic certificates of authenticity for medications — down to the individual bottle — as they move from manufacturers and distributors to pharmacies and hospitals.

"The whole time, the system is watching what's happening, it records (the drug's) life history," said Chris Clauss, director of sensor information management at IBM Software.

While there is no guarantee that RFID tags will get rid of all counterfeits, he added, "what we can do is raise the bar," and make it substantially more difficult.

Drug companies' prior attempts at fighting fakes — such as holograms, watermarks and the like — were often reproduced within months, to the point where even their brand managers could not tell the difference between the counterfeit and the real thing.

IBM, which first worked with RFID more than 10 years ago, said its ePedigree system will help companies comply with a slew of new regulations, such as ones going into effect in California in 2009.

California's ePedigree law will require that any medication distributed in the state have its life history attached to it — starting at the drug manufacturer until it ends up in the pharmacy.

In recent years, much of the market has focused on the hardware of RFID — how the data is scanned and collected in the chips — said Michael Liard, research director of RFID and Contactless at ABI Research. IBM's ePedigree system, however, focuses on how that information is distributed along the supply chain.

The ePedigree system is useful not just for battling fakes, Clauss said, but for keeping track of expiration dates, batch numbers in case a drug is recalled, and so on.

International Business Machines Corp. is based in Armonk, N.Y.

Endeavour carries teacher into space By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON, Associated Press Writer

Endeavour carries teacher into space By LIZ AUSTIN PETERSON, Associated Press Writer
14 minutes ago



HOUSTON - After Endeavour launched into the clear blue sky and reached orbit with teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan aboard, Mission Control announced that class was in session.

ADVERTISEMENT


Morgan, zooming with the other crew members toward the international space station, was finally fulfilling the space program's quest to send an educator into space — a dream that could have died in 1986 with the Challenger explosion that killed teacher Christa McAuliffe and six astronauts.

Once Endeavour was safely past the 73-second mark of the flight, the moment when Challenger exploded, Mission Control exclaimed that Morgan — McAuliffe's backup for Challenger — was "racing toward space on the wings of a legacy."

Immediately after the shuttle reached orbit, Mission Control announced: "For Barbara Morgan and her crewmates, class is in session."

Endeavour was scheduled to dock with the space station on Friday afternoon, after astronauts spend a day checking for possible damage from debris shaken loose during Wednesday's launch.

Midway through the flight, Morgan will speak with students in Idaho, where she taught elementary classes before moving to Houston in 1998 to become the first teacher to train as a full-fledged astronaut. If the mission is extended from 11 days to 14 days as planned, thanks to a new station-to-shuttle power converter, she'll also have a chance to answer questions from students in Virginia and Massachusetts.

But Morgan's primary responsibility in orbit will involve helping to operate Endeavour's robot arm and overseeing the transfer of cargo from the shuttle to the station.

The rest of the crew will be busy installing a huge square-shaped beam to the exterior of the station and replacing a broken gyroscope. Three spacewalks are planned; a fourth is possible.

Late Wednesday, Morgan, 55, was all-business as she periodically updated Mission Control on the activation of the shuttle's cargo-carrying module.

The astronauts were to spend much of Thursday using a 50-foot laser boom on the end of the robot arm to inspect the shuttle's wings and nose. The scan for damage from fuel-tank insulating foam and other debris from launch, or micrometeorites in space, has been standard procedure ever since Columbia's catastrophic re-entry in 2003.

Bill Gerstenmaier, NASA's space operations chief, said early checks showed four or five small pieces of debris from the external fuel tank came off during launch. He said it happened too late to cause concern.

NASA is hoping a successful flight will draw attention from the rash of embarrassments it has faced this year. Most recently, a NASA-commissioned medical panel's report suggested astronauts were intoxicated on launch day on at least two occasions.

NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said the televised preparations for Wednesday's launch demonstrated how difficult it would be for an astronaut to drink before takeoff.

"I would defy anyone to find an opportunity they had to do any drinking from the time they woke up this morning," Griffin said. "They would have to really want to drink and hide it really well."

Endeavour's liftoff had been scheduled for Tuesday, but last week NASA delayed the flight by a day because a leaky valve in the crew cabin needed to be replaced.

This is Endeavour's first flight since 2002. The shuttle underwent a massive overhaul and was outfitted with complete satellite navigation, improved main engine monitoring equipment and a new system for transferring power from the station to the shuttle. The extra power will allow the shuttle to remain docked at the space station longer than ever before.

Besides Morgan, the crew includes Navy Cmdr. Scott Kelly, the commander; Marine Lt. Col. Charles Hobaugh, the copilot; Rick Mastracchio, Tracy Caldwell, Air Force Col. Alvin Drew and Canadian physician Dave Williams.

___

AP Aerospace writer Marcia Dunn contributed to this report from Cape Canaveral.

___

On the Net:

NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov

Fossils challenge old evoluton theory By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer

Fossils challenge old evoluton theory By SETH BORENSTEIN, AP Science Writer
45 minutes ago



WASHINGTON - Surprising research based on two African fossils suggests our family tree is more like a wayward bush with stubby branches, challenging what had been common thinking on how early humans evolved.

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The discovery by Meave Leakey, a member of a famous family of paleontologists, shows that two species of early human ancestors lived at the same time in Kenya. That pokes holes in the chief theory of man's early evolution — that one of those species evolved from the other.

And it further discredits that iconic illustration of human evolution that begins with a knuckle-dragging ape and ends with a briefcase-carrying man.

The old theory is that the first and oldest species in our family tree, Homo habilis, evolved into Homo erectus, which then became human, Homo sapiens. But Leakey's find suggests those two earlier species lived side-by-side about 1.5 million years ago in parts of Kenya for at least half a million years. She and her research colleagues report the discovery in a paper published in Thursday's journal Nature.

The paper is based on fossilized bones found in 2000. The complete skull of Homo erectus was found within walking distance of an upper jaw of Homo habilis, and both dated from the same general time period. That makes it unlikely that Homo erectus evolved from Homo habilis, researchers said.

It's the equivalent of finding that your grandmother and great-grandmother were sisters rather than mother-daughter, said study co-author Fred Spoor, a professor of evolutionary anatomy at the University College in London.

The two species lived near each other, but probably didn't interact, each having its own "ecological niche," Spoor said. Homo habilis was likely more vegetarian while Homo erectus ate some meat, he said. Like chimps and apes, "they'd just avoid each other, they don't feel comfortable in each other's company," he said.

There remains some still-undiscovered common ancestor that probably lived 2 million to 3 million years ago, a time that has not left much fossil record, Spoor said.

Overall what it paints for human evolution is a "chaotic kind of looking evolutionary tree rather than this heroic march that you see with the cartoons of an early ancestor evolving into some intermediate and eventually unto us," Spoor said in a phone interview from a field office of the Koobi Fora Research Project in northern Kenya.

That old evolutionary cartoon, while popular with the general public, is just too simple and keeps getting revised, said Bill Kimbel, who praised the latest findings. He is science director of the Institute of Human Origins at Arizona State University and wasn't part of the Leakey team.

"The more we know, the more complex the story gets," he said. Scientists used to think Homo sapiens evolved from Neanderthals, he said. But now we know that both species lived during the same time period and that we did not come from Neanderthals.

Now a similar discovery applies further back in time.

Susan Anton, a New York University anthropologist and co-author of the Leakey work, said she expects anti-evolution proponents to seize on the new research, but said it would be a mistake to try to use the new work to show flaws in evolution theory.

"This is not questioning the idea at all of evolution; it is refining some of the specific points," Anton said. "This is a great example of what science does and religion doesn't do. It's a continous self-testing process."

For the past few years there has been growing doubt and debate about whether Homo habilis evolved into Homo erectus. One of the major proponents of the more linear, or ladder-like evolution that this evidence weakens, called Leakey's findings important, but he wasn't ready to concede defeat.

Dr. Bernard Wood, a surgeon-turned-professor of human origins at George Washington University, said in an e-mail Wednesday that "this is only a skirmish in the protracted 'war' between the people who like a bushy interpretation and those who like a more ladder-like interpretation of early human evolution."

Leakey's team spent seven years analyzing the fossils before announcing it was time to redraw the family tree — and rethink other ideas about human evolutionary history. That's especially true of most immediate ancestor, Homo erectus.

Because the Homo erectus skull Leakey recovered was much smaller than others, scientists had to first prove that it was erectus and not another species nor a genetic freak. The jaw, probably from an 18- or 19-year-old female, was adult and showed no signs of malformation or genetic mutations, Spoor said. The scientists also know it isn't Homo habilis from several distinct features on the jaw.

That caused researchers to re-examine the 30 other erectus skulls they have and the dozens of partial fossils. They realized that the females of that species are much smaller than the males — something different from modern man, but similar to other animals, said Anton. Scientists hadn't looked carefully enough before to see that there was a distinct difference in males and females.

Difference in size between males and females seem to be related to monogamy, the researchers said. Primates that have same-sized males and females, such as gibbons, tend to be more monogamous. Species that are not monogamous, such as gorillas and baboons, have much bigger males.

This suggests that our ancestor Homo erectus reproduced with multiple partners.

The Homo habilis jaw was dated at 1.44 million years ago. That is the youngest ever found from a species that scientists originally figured died off somewhere between 1.7 and 2 million years ago, Spoor said. It enabled scientists to say that Homo erectus and Homo habilis lived at the same time.

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On the Net:

Nature: http://www.nature.com

Teacher-astronaut prepares for liftoff By MARCIA DUNN, AP Aerospace Writer

Teacher-astronaut prepares for liftoff By MARCIA DUNN, AP Aerospace Writer
43 minutes ago



CAPE CANAVERAL, Fla. - Flashing a big smile, teacher-astronaut Barbara Morgan climbed aboard the space shuttle Endeavour on Wednesday for liftoff on a mission she hopes will realize the unfulfilled dreams of her predecessor, Christa McAuliffe.

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Good weather was forecast for the planned early evening launch.

Morgan beamed and waved at the cameras and crowd as she boarded the van that transported the shuttle crew to the launch pad. She stood at the base of the pad, looking up at the towering Endeavour, before riding the elevator up with her six colleagues.

Before crawling into the shuttle, Morgan sipped water from a bottle and tapped the shoulder of a crewmate who was waiting to board. She took the center seat in the cabin's lower compartment, the same seat occupied by McAuliffe in 1986.

"Welcome aboard, Barbara," a launch controller said.

Morgan was McAuliffe's backup for Challenger's doomed flight and, despite two space shuttle tragedies, never gave up in her quest to carry out McAuliffe's mission.

"Barbara deserves a lot of recognition for her interest, her toughness, her resiliency, her persistence in wanting to fly in space and eventually doing so," NASA Administrator Michael Griffin said Wednesday afternoon. "I'm glad she's on this flight."

Just over an hour before liftoff, NASA successfully worked through a pair of problems.

Microswitches on the shuttle hatch were not indicating a good seal, so two technicians entered Endeavour and confirmed from inside that the hatch was closing properly.

At the same time, engineers analyzed a small crack in the foam insulation of a liquid oxygen feedline bracket and concluded it would pose no debris danger to the shuttle at liftoff.

Seven astronauts are assigned to this latest mission to the international space station, but it's Morgan who is stealing the show.

More than half of NASA's 114 Teacher-in-Space nominees in 1985 gathered at the launch site, along with hundreds of other educators eager to see Morgan fly.

Also on hand was the widow of Challenger's commander, who said she would be praying and pacing at liftoff and would not relax until Morgan was safely back on Earth in two weeks.

"The Challenger crew — my husband, Dick Scobee, the teacher Christa McAuliffe — they would be so happy with Barbara Morgan," said June Scobee Rodgers. "It's important that the lessons will be taught because there's a nation of people waiting, still, who remember where they were when we lost the Challenger and they remember a teacher was aboard."

Griffin met Tuesday night with several members of the Challenger astronaut families in town for the launch — although not the McAuliffe family — and said they did not seem worried.

"They didn't act like they came to see another tragedy," he told The Associated Press. "They're here to celebrate her having a chance to fly."

Griffin knows better than most that NASA could lose another teacher in flight, and he's well aware of what an awful tragedy that would be.

"Every time we fly I know that we can lose a crew," Griffin said Wednesday afternoon. "That occupies a large portion of my thoughts. Unless we're going to get out of the manned space flight business, that thought is going to be with me every time we fly."

Endeavour's commander, Navy Cmdr. Scott Kelly, and his crew are delivering a new beam to the space station as well as a replacement gyroscope. Three and possibly four spacewalks are planned to attach all the new parts.

A week into the flight, Morgan, 55, will speak with schoolchildren in Idaho, where she lived and taught before joining NASA in 1998 as the first teacher to undergo full astronaut training. She'll also answer questions from students in two other states if the mission is extended from 11 days to 14 days as planned. The crew will test a new power converter that should allow the shuttle to remain docked to the station longer than ever before.

Endeavour is fresh from an overhaul that's kept it grounded for nearly five years. Besides the power transfer system, the shuttle has been equipped with complete satellite navigation and improved main engine monitoring equipment.

Liftoff had been scheduled for Tuesday, but last week NASA delayed the flight by a day because of a leaky valve in the crew cabin that needed to be replaced.

NASA is hoping a successful flight will draw some attention away from the rash of embarrassments it's faced this year, most recently a NASA-commissioned medical panel's report suggesting astronauts were intoxicated on launch day on at least two occasions.

Griffin said Wednesday that NASA is investigating the anonymous allegations. The space agency's top safety official has gone back 10 years through every shuttle flight and can find no flight surgeon, astronaut or document hinting at launch day drinking by a crew member, he said.

"This is not a credible scenario. They're on TV. We just watched them having breakfast," Griffin said, referring to the Endeavour astronauts.

"The charges seem uncredible, and it also seems uncredible that somebody would just make it up. That's why it's so puzzling and that's why it's serious and that's why we will investigate."

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On the Net:

NASA: http://spaceflight.nasa.gov