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Satellite

More autonomy for blind people thanks to satellite navigation

“When blind people take a taxi, they will be able to give directions to the taxi driver!” says Jose Luis Fernandez Coya. The man speaking really knows what he is talking about: he is blind but also heads the R&D department of ONCE, the National Organization of Spanish Blind people. This association has always been looking for helpful innovations and has just developed a system based on GPS to guide blind people. The system called “Tormes”, named after a famous Spanish 16th century story, is a computer with a Braille keyboard and satellite navigation technology that gives verbal directions. This personal navigator was presented to the press in Madrid recently. The European Space Agency (ESA) was involved in this event because ONCE and ESA are already working on how to improve “Tormes.”

Black Water Turns the Tide on Florida Coral

A patch of “black water”spanning over 100 kilometers [60 miles] in diameter formed off southwestern Florida in early 2002 and contributed to severe coral reef stress and death in the Florida Keys. The “black water” contained a high abundance of toxic and non-toxic microscopic plants. When scientists examined the data collected by divers from the dark water area in the Florida Keys, they discovered a 70 percent decrease in stony coral cover, a 40 percent reduction of coral species, and a near-elimination of sponge colonies at two reef sites after the dark water passed. By examining satellite images and field survey data, they concluded that the coral reef ecosystem was stressed by microscopic organisms and toxins contained in the dark water.

Physicists to ‘boost’ satellite with microwaves

A California physicist will announce plans for the first known attempt to push a spacecraft into the Earth’s orbit with energy beamed up from the ground. The satellite will be called the Cosmos Sail, the first solar-sail craft to orbit Earth. The physics team developed the sail with researchers from the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Made from lightweight layers of aluminized mylar, the sail will allow a craft to be propelled from low orbit to high orbit and ultimately into interplanetary space, driven by microwave energy, similar to the way wind pushes a sailboat across the sea.