Broadcast 1195 (Special Edition)

Guests: First Hour: Dr. Klaus Dannenberg, John Karas, Jeff Hamstra; Second Hour: Open Lines: Topics: propulsion, breakthrough propulsion, NASA, AIAA, Open Lines, Space Show guests, bone loss, microgravity, acceleration, NASA. The first hour of this two hour program was dedicated to discussing the coming AIAA Joint Propulsion Conference which will be in Denver, Colorado at the Colorado Convention Center from August 3-5, 2009. For more information about the conference and registration, please visit www.aiaa.org. During Segment 1, our two guests, Dr. Dannenberg and John Karas introduced us to the Joint Propulsion Conference. We talked about many of the sessions at the conference including those focusing on green propulsion technologies, human spaceflight, nuclear thermal propulsion, and even breakthrough propulsion theories. Our guests noted that there would be a portion of the conference devoted to accurate history in honor of the 40th anniversary of Apollo 11. One set of issues that was brought up by listeners as well as me was what was needed to human rate an EELV. As you will hear during this segment, its not that easy to do, it involves lots of testing, redundant systems, an abort system and an engine shutoff. This came up in terms of a response to a listener asking about the difference between a military, civil, and human spaceflight rocket. During Segment 2, John Karas left us and Jeff Hamstra took his place along with Klaus. Jeff talked some more about the conference registration and pointed out that the conference was joined with the International Energy Conversion Engineering Conference and that there would be some overlapping programming as well as joint programming. You can find out more about this conference on the AIAA website per the above URL. We also talked about low cost space access, air breathing engines, two stage rockets and the AIAA membership which totals about 37,000 members. This brought us to the topic of networking opportunities at the conference, even career possibilities, especially for students. NewSpace issues were discussed along with hybrid rocket motors. We also talked about writing papers and peer review with AIAA conferences, publications and other conferences. K-12 education was an important discussion topic for this conference and AIAA in general. The second hour of this program was devoted to OPEN LINES, primarily to offer Space Show listeners that self-invite themselves to be a guest on the program to call in and let us hear what they have to say and how they say it. I set this hour up as an audition hour based on the number of self-inviting emails for the show I have received over the past several months. As you will hear, not one person called to talk to us and let us hear if there was a reason for them to be a guest on the other than their saying so in an email to me despite having told me they would do so. However, the offer still stands. For anyone who wants to be a guest on the show, call us during an Open Lines program and let's hear what you have to say and how you say it. Despite no audition calls, in Segment 3 we did receive a call about a bone loss theory expressed by Joe in Houston. You can read his ideas at http://artificialgravityideas.blogspot.com/?psinvite=ALRopfUii2KeMfnrzn…. I ran his idea by some space docs and human factors experts that said he did not really understand bone loss, etc, and I mentioned this to the caller (not Joe) but as you will hear, despite being given a new set of facts by people who know this stuff, the desire to hold onto the theory is just too strong sometimes. In the meantime, I pointed Joe to some specialists in the field and strongly urged him to do the hard core medical research but that he needed more training in the discipline to be able to make assumptions that were relevant. As you will hear, I applied this across the board in space development, not just in bone loss and gravity. As we all agreed, getting a centrifuge on the ISS for needed and essential experiments is important. A listener also asked about using Open Source for developing a low cost rocket and cheap space access and wondered why it was not being used. I corrected the listener by telling them about the Google Lunar X Prize entry, Team FREDNET who was just on the show as their entire program is open source. I directed this listener to visit the Team FREDNET website and to listen to their archived show from July 20, 2009. In the final segment of the show, Segment 4, I was asked for my opinion about the NASA future given the new Administrator as well as Lori Garver. I said we all hoped for the best and expected a lot and we wait and see. You will want to hear my full comments on the new NASA Administration. We also talked about the retirement of the shuttle and would that event and the gap cause congress to be anti-human spaceflight and kill human spaceflight programs. I said no but again, you will want to hear my full and lengthy response to this question asked by the listener. Toward the end of the segment, a listener asked about doing space studies in the U.S. and what were the university opportunities out there for space related studies. If you are interested in space studies of any kind, you will want to hear what I said because I broke the field down into several disciplines and specialty schools. If you have any comments for our three AIAA guests or for me during Open Lines, please send them to me at drspace@thespaceshow.com and I will forward your note as necessary. You can find conference and contact information at the AIAA website regarding anything additional you might want to know regarding the Joint Propulsion Conference.