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Friday, July 15, 2022

On Monday, NASA Administrator Bill Nelson and US President Joe Biden presented the first image (see left) obtained by the Near-Infrared Camera (NIRCam), an instrument on the James Webb Space Telescope.

The image, named Webb’s First Deep Field, shows thousands of galaxies in the SMACS 0723 galaxy cluster, about 4.6 billion light-years away from Earth. However, the area shown by the image is only a small portion of the Southern Hemisphere sky. The blended image (at left) resulted from the stitching together of numerous smaller images obtained at multiple wavelengths with far greater depth than achieved by the Hubble Space Telescope, the predecessor to James Webb.

The telescope entered its current orbit around the L₂ Lagrange point from January 24, about 1,500,000 kilometers (932,057 mi) from Earth, on the opposite side of Earth from the Sun. This followed a month-long journey that began in late December 2021, following years of delays and several cost overruns. For its expected five- to ten-year service life, it is intended to study the most distant, and therefore the earliest galaxies formed after the Big Bang.

During its journey, dubbed “30 days of terror” by Sky & Telescope, the telescope successfully unfurled its 21 feet (6 m) wide mirror, deployed its sunshield and cooled down to below 50 degrees Kelvin as it traveled to the L₂ Lagrange point.

L₂ is a secure location for spacecraft where the gravitational pull of the Sun and the Earth is balanced. Full scientific operations will involve thirteen teams of scientists. The primary mission is to find the most distant and earliest galaxies formed after the Big Bang to help study the origins of the Universe. The nominal mission time is five years, with a goal of ten. The location of its orbit is very different to the Hubble Space Telescope, which orbits much closer to Earth. James Webb’s instruments face away from the Sun, giving a greater clarity to the images it will obtain compared to Hubble.

An Ariane 5 launch vehicle carried the telescope to space on December 25 from the Guiana Space Centre in French Guiana, after arriving at the launch site in October. The launch date was delayed by a week due to unfavorable weather.

The United States National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) began project development in 1996, planning for a launch in 2007 at a cost of USD550 million. After NASA contracted Northrop Grumman to build the telescope, mission managers estimated a 2010 launch would cost between one and 3.5 billion USD. Redesigns to reduce technical requirements pushed launch plans to 2013 for an estimated cost of USD4.5 billion. The US Congress ordered a project review in 2010 which delayed the launch again to 2015.

Due to an estimated cost of USD6.5 billion, the United States House Appropriations Subcommittee on Commerce, Justice, Science, and Related Agencies proposed canceling the telescope altogether in 2011. After a plan was made for a 2018 launch at a cost of USD8.8 billion, technical errors found in the telescope and the subsequent COVID-19 pandemic pushed the launch date to 2021.

Monday, May 9, 2005

Workers at Newport Chemical Depot in Indiana have completed a successful test-run of a chemical reactor designed to dispose of Cold War stockpiles of VX nerve agent.

After encountering initial difficulties when the temperature in the reactor grew too high, workers were able to adjust the speed of the device. 180 gallons of VX and water were turned into a caustic but far less lethal compound, that can be further reprocessed into an inert substance.

A residue of 14 parts VX per billion remained; the Army’s eventual goal is less than 20 parts. One drop of VX can kill a grown man.

The conversion of the VX stockpiled at the facility is projected to take two years. Then the drain cleaner-like waste product with its small residue of VX will need to be sent to another facility for reprocessing into a safer, biodegradable compound.

A controversial plan has Dupont doing the reprocessing at their facility in New Jersey, and dumping the compound into the nearby Delaware River.

Tuesday, October 10, 2006

The upcoming 2006 Brampton municipal election, to be held November 13, features an array of candidates looking to represent their wards in city council or the council of the Peel Region.

Wikinews contributor Nick Moreau contacted many of the candidates, including Derek Begley, asking them to answer common questions sent in an email. This ward’s incumbent is John Sprovieri; also challenging Sprovieri is Sherdaljit Dhillon, Mahen Gupta, Satpaul Johal, Dalbir S. Kathuria, and Vahid Saadati-Khanshir.

Monday, September 24, 2007

Russ Aegard is running for the Green Party of Ontario in the Ontario provincial election, in the Thunder Bay-Atikokan riding. Wikinews’ Nick Moreau interviewed him regarding his values, his experience, and his campaign.

Stay tuned for further interviews; every candidate from every party is eligible, and will be contacted. Expect interviews from Liberals, Progressive Conservatives, New Democratic Party members, Ontario Greens, as well as members from the Family Coalition, Freedom, Communist, Libertarian, and Confederation of Regions parties, as well as independents.

Wednesday, March 9, 2005Google has today launched the final version of its Google Desktop Search program. Google Desktop is a search engine for Windows which allows the user to search their computer’s files’ contents for a specified phrase, and includes support for many different file types, including audiovisual media, web pages stored in the local cache, e-mail, and various kinds of document files.

In Beta since last Autumn, version 1.0 adds the ability to search PDFs, Netscape/Mozilla/Firefox browser histories, and Thunderbird emails. The software also has an added a plugin facility to allow third-party developers to add support for additional file formats. A registry for a small initial set of plugins is currently available, as well as incentives such as T-shirts and free advertising for developers who submit new plugins.

Competing Windows desktop search products have also been released by Yahoo!, Microsoft, and Copernic. Mac OSX Tiger is planned to offer similar functionality through “Spotlight“, and future Linux distributions are expected to include “Beagle” desktop search.

Thursday, September 13, 2007

A resident of Bruce-Grey-Owen Sound his whole life, Correctional Services officer Paul Johnstone is running for the Ontario New Democratic Party in the Ontario provincial election. Wikinews’ Nick Moreau interviewed him regarding his values, his experience, and his campaign.

Stay tuned for further interviews; every candidate from every party is eligible, and will be contacted. Expect interviews from Liberals, Progressive Conservatives, New Democratic Party members, Ontario Greens, as well as members from the Family Coalition, Freedom, Communist, Libertarian, and Confederation of Regions parties, as well as independents.

Monday, May 1, 2006

Bolivian President Evo Morales has ordered that all foreign-owned natural gas fields be turned over to the national government of Bolivia.

President Morales signed a decree that orders troops to seize the fields “immediately” to ensure gas production. The decree also says that companies have 180 days to sign over their fields or leave the country.

The fields are owned by such companies as the United States‘ Exxon-Mobil Corporation, Brazil‘s Petroleo Brasileiro SA, Spanish-Argentine Repsol YPF SA, and Great Britain‘s BG Group PLC and BP PLC.

“The looting by the foreign companies has ended. We are not a government of mere promises, we follow through on what we propose and what the people demand. We want to ask (the Armed Forces) that starting now, they occupy all the energy fields in Bolivia along with battalions of engineers,” said Mr Morales after signing the decree.

“The time has come, the awaited day, a historic day in which Bolivia retakes absolute control of our natural resources,” added President Morales.

One of Morales’ vows in his presidential campaign was to “recover” the country’s natural resources by renationalizing them. President Morales explained, on a visit to Brazil in January, that renationalising the industry would not mean expelling foreign companies or expropriating foreign property. “Foreign companies have every right to recover investments and make profits, but profits should be balanced”.

Bolivia has the second largest supply of natural gas in South America after Venezuela.