World's Largest Model Rocket Launch Is Blazing Success

At nearly four stories tall, the world's largest model rocket was only a tenth the size of a real rocket. But the craft's April 25 launch in Price, Maryland, was no small feat.

A replica of a NASA Saturn V rocket, the massive model broke the world record for the tallest and heaviest model rocket that's ever been launched and recovered—36 feet (11 meters) and 1,648 pounds (750 kilograms), respectively.

After soaring to 4,441 feet (1,354 meters), the machine broke into several parts, as planned, and deployed parachutes before landing about a half mile (0.8 kilometer) from the launchpad, amid loud clapping from spectators.

The model's designer, Ohio auto-body specialist Steve Eves, is a child of the space race—"something that's stuck in my mind all these years," he said.

But Eves, 51, didn't get into high-power rocketry until the early 1990s. And when he did, he had no inkling how big his pet project would get, he said.

The giant model and Saturday's launch—attended by about 5,000 spectators—cost U.S. $30,000, much of it covered by donations.

Eves planned the project as a tribute to the upcoming 40th anniversary of the Apollo 11 mission, the first manned trip to the moon, which launched on July 16, 1969.

During 13 NASA missions in the 1960s and '70s, the original Saturn V rockets—still the most powerful in history—never failed. In Eves's eyes, that makes the Saturn V class "the greatest rocket that mankind has ever built."

Remembering seeing a Saturn V in person, Eves said: "Until you stood at the base of one those rockets, [you can't] imagine the courage it took" for people to take them into space. "It's mind-boggling."

Courtesy: NGC

Fatty Foods May Boost Memory

Feeling forgetful? Munch on a fatty snack.

A hormone released during the digestion of certain fats triggers long-term memory formation in rats, a new study says.

Researchers found that administering a compound produced in the small intestine called oleoylethanolamide (OEA) to rats improved memory retention during two different tasks.

When cell receptors activated by OEA were blocked, the animals' performance decreased.

Though the study involved rats, OEA's effects should be similar in other animals, including humans, said study team member Daniele Piomelli, a neuroscientist at the University of California, Irvine.

Follow the Fat

The team suspects OEA's memory-enhancing activity likely evolved to help animals remember where and when they ate a fatty meal, so they could return to that spot later.

Fats are crucial for a variety of biological functions and structures. While the modern human diet is now rich in fats, such foods are actually rare in nature.

"It makes sense that nature evolved a system for strengthening memories associated with the places and context where fats are gathered," Piomelli told National Geographic News.

While Piomelli doesn't recommend that people binge on fast food to improve memory, his team's findings could explain why kids who eat breakfast and mid-morning snacks generally perform better in school.

"Studies show that it's not because they learn better, but because they remember better," Piomelli said.

In the future, scientists could use OEA or OEA-like compounds as medicines to boost memory or treat diseases that affect memory.

"One idea would be to [use drugs] to activate the same receptor that OEA activates, or perhaps give nutrition that produces enough OEA to cause the same [memory] effect," Piomelli said.

The research is detailed this week in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

First 3-D Pictures of Solar Explosions Created

 

 

Ionized helium rises from the sun on September 29, 2008, in an image from the STEREO stereo spacecraft.

Other STEREO pictures are being used to create the first 3-D images of solar storms, NASA said in April 2009. The 3-D images should help shorten warning times for harmful space weather headed for Earth.

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Twin satellites have captured the first 3-D pictures of solar storms, NASA announced today.

The new technology will allow for earlier warnings about solar storms that can disrupt GPS signals and power grids, damage satellites, and bombard astronauts with solar radiation, experts said.

The new data come from the Solar Terrestrial Relations Observatory (STEREO), a pair of spacecraft deployed in fall 2006. Not unlike human eyes, the satellites' two points of view allow for combination images that render scenes in three dimensions.

So far, the STEREO siblings have imaged solar storms, aka coronal mass ejections, aka CMEs. (See solar storm pictures from the STEREO craft.)

"Before this unique mission, measurements and the subsequent data of a CME observed near the sun had to wait until the ejections arrived at Earth, three to seven days later," said Angelos Vourlidas, a solar physicist at the Naval Research Laboratory in Washington and a STEREO project scientist, in a statement.

"Now we can see a CME from the time it leaves the solar surface until it reaches Earth, and we can reconstruct the event in 3-D directly from the images," added Vourlidas, who presented the new findings during a teleconference with other mission scientists. Their work will be published in an upcoming special issue of the journal Solar Physics.

Image courtesy NGC, NASA