SCIENCE CONFERENCE (UNABRIDGED TRANSCRIPT) DECEMBER 8, 1990 10:17 P.M. CST; 6:21:28 MET PAO Commentator John Dumoulin: Crew Interface Coordinator Michelle Snyder will be hailing the crew here in just a minute, and she will enable communications with each of the science principal investigators. She will first be talking to the Broad Band X-ray Telescope team's Greg Medejski; and then the Hopkins team's Knox Long; UIT's Susan Neff, John Deily and Frank Bauer; and Principal Investigator for the Wisconsin Telescope team Art Code. Michelle Snyder: Astro Huntsville. Ron Parise: Go ahead, Michelle. Michelle: Well, we're all ready down here for this science briefing. Are you guys ready? Ron: Yeah, we're just looking out the window. Michelle: O.K. Well, BBXRT is going to go first, followed by HUT, UIT, and WUPPE. So, I will go ahead and enable BBXRT. Ron: O.K. Thanks. Greg Medejski: U.S. Astro crew, this is BBXRT planner on air-to-ground loop. And we want to thank you very much for keeping us going. I know it has been a little difficult in the beginning. But I think that we are getting fantastic results now. We have seen excellent X-rays from all the objects that we wanted to look at so far. And we appreciate the efforts. I know it was probably a little frustrating not to get everything going right according to schedule, but I think it was worth it. Your perseverance really paid off. We have absolutely great results on a lot of extra-galactic sources. And one of my favorite targets is the BL Lec object that you might be hearing about pretty soon -- PKS 2155-304. Other than that we are very much anticipating the analysis of the data that we have sitting on magnetic tapes. We simply cannot keep up; there is so much fantastic stuff coming in. We are really, really glad that we had this opportunity. And I think all those years of hard work really paid off. And again, this is really great, and I really hope this is not the last Astro mission. Michelle: Astro Huntsville. Ron: Go ahead. Michelle: Did you copy? Ron: Yeah, loud and clear. We copied that and we appreciate the comments there, and we are working hard. Michelle: O.K., well, I think HUT's ready. Ron: O.K. Go ahead. Knox Long: Hello, Astro. This is HUT down here. We are having a good, but busy time. It seems like one long rocket flight, at times. But it's great. And the data is really superb. HUT is performing above everybody's expectations. We have data on lots of different types of sources. And we are hopeful of getting more. I know, Sam, that you are interested in the spectrum of Jupiter. Warren has told me that I should tell you about it. They did detect O-plus at 834 Angstroms in the Jupiter spectrum. And it's definitely not airglow. And they said you would understand what that meant. Some of the other things that we've done: We have observed G191-B2B in second order. And as one can clearly see, the helium edge in the data looks like there is about one optical depth of absorption at the edge. Helium 1 along the line of sight between us and G191-B2B looks great! A couple of other things for Bob: We have a spectrum of the Crab Nebula that shows the continuum almost all the way down to 900 Angstroms. It's also spectacular. We are amazed that we could see it against the reddening in that direction, which you know about. And Bill Blair is truly excited about the Cygnus Loop observations. I don't know if you know this, but we looked at two filaments there. One is a non-radiative filament out on the northeast limb of the Cygnus Loop. And 0VI is just booming through in that spectrum, which comes from the region where the primary shock is running into the interstellar medium. And then there was that spectrum, which had a multitude of lines of a radiative filament. That is also in the northeast side, and also omits 0VI, which was sort of surprising to us. And then today, we got these two spectra of UX UMa. And they are pretty spectacular, even though we missed the eclipsed portion of the light curve a bit. We really don't understand the spectra. They have lines that are definitely not seen in IUE, and they look like they are double and triple. We are not quite sure what is going on. It's as if we are seeing individual blobs and the accretion. So it has been just great. I wondered if you all had any questions about any of that, and maybe I can tell you something. Sam Durrance: Uh, no Knox that is great. In fact, that sounds very fantastic. And I do know what they mean by the 0-plus ions in the Jovian spectrum. That's fantastic. We have been looking at that phenomenon for a long time. And yes, Bob was aware of the 0VI discovered in Cygnus, and he was pretty excited about it. Sounds great. It is great to hear that you discovered the helium in G192-B2B. That sounds really great. The spectra Jeff got today of UX UMa was really wild. Knox: Yes, it surely was. I should tell you that we have been kept in a good mood by Bill Blair who seems to be able to write either a poem or put words to lyrics of various things every day. One of them is called "The Night Before Astro." If you have a moment, I'll read you a little bit of it. Sam: Yes, go ahead. Sounds great. Knox: It starts out: Twas the night before Astro, and all through the POCC Not a creature was stirring; we were all in our spots. The posters were hung on the walls and the door In hopes that we'd soon hear the Astro launch roar. The blue team was nestled all snug in their beds While visions of "real data" danced in their heads. The MUM and her kerchief and the PAP in his cap Had just settled their brains from some JSC flap. When out on the loops there arose such a clatter We put on our headsets to hear all the chatter. To VT-240s we flew like a flash We signed onto OMIS, RRs to rehash. (The moon in the midst of the cluster Virgo Caused a lot of RRs in the systems below.) When what to our wondering ears should we hear, But the shuttle was fixed! There's no leak in the rear! Like wild leaves before a wild hurricane fly When they meet with an obstacle, mount to the sky, So out on the pad they were ready to sail, Thanks to their friend "Uncle Max" and his crew biting nails. The suits were hung on the crew with much care In hopes that the shuttle would launch like a flare! The little clean room at the top of the gantry Was smaller than most people's kitchen or pantry. The astronauts enter Columbia's port, They strap themselves in -- "All is well" they report. In the POCC back in Huntsville we sat and we waited (Although more than one veteran's mood was quite jaded.) The countdown went smoothly; the APU's worked. The SRB's fired, it lurched and it jerked. It cleared the launch tower, we hooted and whistled, And away they all flew on the back of that missile! The smoke it encircled the pad like a wreath And we all breathed a big heavy sigh of relief. And we heard KSC as they rose out of sight, "Happy lift-off to all, and to all a good flight!" Sam: That sounds great, Bill. You have really produced some great poetry there. Thanks a lot Knox. Knox: Roger. Out. Susan Neff: Astro, this is UIT. Ron: Go ahead, Susan. Susan: Hi Ron! We can't measure up to HUT's poetry, I'm afraid. But we figure that we are the Little Telescope That Could. We just chug along. And we're having a great time doing ground-based observing. I hope it's not too boring for you guys. We think we are getting great data. Ron: It's been a long time since I've worked as a night assistant, but I've been having a good time. Hope you guys there are enjoying it. Susan: Well, if you weren't holding on to our data up there, we'd have it back from Speedy Snap Shop already, at least some of it. I just hope your thumbs are holding up ... we're a little concerned about the new digital pointing system. Ron: We're having a good time. Susan: Let me give you a quick update on our science to date. If you've got any specific targets that you want to know about, I'll look them up for you. We are getting nice long observations on lots of our prime targets. We're greedy. We would always like more! But what we are getting should keep us off the streets for a long time. We have gotten two really good nights on M31. We've gotten four great nights on NGC-1399 -- the Fornax Cluster; we just sat and took pictures while we were working out on the ground how to do this new joint-ops business. That data is going to keep people real happy also. We just finished NGC-1851, and we think that one is good as well. We only got one long observation because of the RCS hotfire test, but what we got looks good. We are plugging away down our galaxy list and are making good progress there. Ron: Sounds good, Susan. How are we doing on globular clusters? Susan: We're doing O.K., although not as well as I'm sure you would like. Those are short pointings. And it is really hard for us to get long integrations on short pointings in this mode. Ron: Yeah, but on the other hand, they are generally pretty bright. So, it should be O.K. Susan: Ron, you've got to explain to the other shift up there what the difference is between a globular cluster and a galaxy. Ron: O.K. Susan: I personally was really thrilled about the NGC-1068, Ron, that you got. So my compliments to whoever pointed on that one. That looked good. Right now, we have only used about 40 percent of our film, so as far as we're concerned, you guys can stay up there for an extra day or two. We're ready to keep going. Ron: We would be glad to do it, as much as we can. Susan: O.K. John Deily and Frank Bauer want to give you a quick update on our IMCS now. John Deily: Hi Ron. Ron: Hi John, go ahead. John: Things looks to be going really well with UIT's jitter performance. Our servo is operating beautifully. Our response to the IMCS signal is in the .1 - .2 arc second range. So congratulations! You guys are doing a great job pointing the IPS with MPC. Here's Frank. Frank Bauer: Hello Ron! This is Frank. Yeah, we want to let you know that all you guys are doing a great job up there with that IPS, under the manual pointing control. We've seen on the order of 5 - 10 arc seconds peak pointing and standard deviations on the order of 2 arc seconds. Really outstanding! It's been a real team effort here. Great job! And we've got a "can do" attitude -- both on the ground and in the air -- and it has been fantastic! On behalf of the UIT team here, Bob, Ron, Sam and Jeff -- we want to issue our congratulations to you guys. On behalf of us, we would like to officially award you the "NASA Nintendo Champion Award" for doing such a good job with the MPC. Ron: Thanks a lot, Frank. We are all appreciative of that, and of course we could not do that great pointing without your feedback from the ground. Frank: I think like I said, it has been an outstanding team effort from everybody on the ground and everybody up there. And for you, Ron and Vance, I personally would like to wish you the best of luck with your SAREX contact with the MIR in the future here. Ron: We're going to try it! Although, I don't know if we'll get a chance or not, because it is getting towards the end of the mission. Frank: O.K. Take care. On behalf of UIT, great job guys! Ron: Thanks Frank. Art Code: Hi there! This is Art. One of the things that I have really hoped is that you've been able to get some sense of the euphoria that the WUPPE team has experienced whenever this neat data comes down on objects that are real close to their hearts. So I hope you've heard that. We've got observations on all kinds of interesting objects. One of the important WUPPE programs, as you know, is to study the interstellar dust. And we've got a number of real good interstellar probes. And among the things we see is confirmation of an identification that Ted Stecher made 25 years ago: the 2,200 Angstrom extinction bump is due to graphite. And if it were we wouldn't see any polarization across the bump. And Ted seems to be right. We got neat polarization measurements on rapid rotators, magnetic white dwarfs, Wolf-Rayet stars like Regina's EZ Canis Majoris, massive super-giant like P Cygni which throws off mass periodically. We got one of Ken's favorite reflection nebula, and we've done some interesting co-science with the other instruments. Some of it to our surprise. Of course, this is a "Ken Program," but Sam would be interested in looking at our field observations, I guess. One of the co-pointings is a quasar Q1821, which is a real good spectrum. It has several percent polarization. Seyfert galaxy 1068, that's great results. I heard UIT saying how great they thought it was. Well, you know the model for 1068, or any active galactic nucleii, depends upon polarization to establish that that is the correct model. And the ground-based polarization suggests it, but it's contaminated by the background radiation in the galaxy. And you have to make large corrections to the polarization. In the UV galaxies, all the red stars go away, and we don't have to make these corrections for the background. And we've got only 20% polarization range for the 1068, which is like you ought to get. That's a quick sample of our data up to now. And we are really greatful for the fantastic job you've done to help us get this first UV polarization in space. As an old-fashioned astronomer, I'm really pleased to see that you are doing old-fashioned astronomy by manually pointing. So thanks again Bob, Ron, Sam, Jeff. We are really grateful. We have been looking at the stars and sky for centuries from the ground here. And there is plenty left to do in space. So let's do it again! Thanks a lot. Bob Parker: Thank you Art. That is really nice to hear. We were a little worried that we were having trouble with some of the WUPPE observations. And we realized that WUPPE relied on almost all of the systems on board, IMC and everything else. And it is good to hear that everything is working out anyhow. Thanks. Ron: The only difficulty on board, at least on the Red Shift, is that I can never get the manual pointing control away from Bob. He's always having such a good time guiding the exposures, we end up fighting over who gets the next target. Art: Yeah, well, he's my kind of astronomer. Bob: We old-fashioned guys have to stick together, Art. Art: Well, O.K., great. Have fun. We're having fun down here. Bob: Thanks a lot. We are too. The Earth is beautiful from here. Michelle: Astro, that completes our science briefing. And I guess we are going to pick up again at MET 6:23:15 with Target 9305-13. Ron: O.K. We will be ready to go. Michelle, we will talk to you later, and we just crossed the equator and are north-bound to the Carolinas in the Pacific. And we see BBXRT back there moving toward the target. How about that. We haven't seen that since the first day in the mission. That's really neat to see that doing something back there. We can't see it when Astro is erected. So nice to have a view of them for a change. Michelle: Alright, that sounds terrific. Commentator: Crew Interface Coordinator signing off with the crew on orbit. Just completing a science briefing with some of the leaders on the science teams here at Spacelab Mission Operations Control Huntsville. Briefing on BBXRT was Greg Madejski, the team planner. Knox Long, a co-investigator with the Hopkins team briefed Sam Durrance and Bob Parker on the progress from the Johns Hopkins telescope. The Ultraviolet Imaging Telescope team's Susan Neff gave science briefing for UIT, and John Deily and Frank Bowers gave some updated information on the Image Motion Compensation System and the Manual Pointing Control System. And Principal Investigator Art Code, saying "let's do it again" from the Wisconsin team briefing on the progress of the Wisconsin Telescope.