PLEASE NOTE:
*
CCNet 70/2002 - 19 June 2002
----------------------------
Exoplanets
Their numbers must be legion -
a hundred found in one short glance
with crude tools made for other work!
What's coming isn't hard to see;
an embarrassment of worlds from which
we'll pick and choose the ones we want.
Too hot? Too big? Not green enough?
Who cares -there's plenty more
out there for us to make our choice!
Getting there, of course, remains a problem,
but we'll find a way to do it as we
always have. Those who set off first
(decades sleeping under sail, or thrust by
puny push of ion blasts) , will probably arrive
to find their children's children there already.
Well, even if we never learn to jump the gap
but have to traverse every mile in
normal space, we'll still fill worlds
unless some killer impact comes too soon.
18.6.2002
Malcolm Miller
stellar2@cyberone.com.au
(1) ASTEROID 2002MN GIVES EARTH ITS CLOSEST SHAVE IN YEARS
Kevin Yates <keviny@spacecentre.co.uk>
(2) A CLOSE ASTEROID FLYBY
Sky & Telescope, 19 June 2002
(3) ASTEROIDS LOST IN SPACE
Steve Koppes <s-koppes@uchicago.edu>
(4) JUPITER'S BROTHER JOINS THE FAMILY
Andrew Yee <ayee@nova.astro.utoronto.ca>
(5) SUN-LIKE STAR ECLIPSED BY DUST, ROCKS AND ASTEROIDS
Andrew Yee <ayee@nova.astro.utoronto.ca>
(6) SUPERERUPTIONS AS A THREAT TO CIVILIZATIONS ON EARTH-LIKE
PLANETS
Michael R. Rampino
(7) FRED HOYLE'S UNIVERSE
Peter Bond <PeterRBond@aol.com>
(8) NASA SATELLITE CONFIRMS URBAN HEAT ISLANDS INCREASE RAINFALL
AROUND
CITIES
Mark Hess <mhess@pop100.gsfc.nasa.gov>
===============
(1) ASTEROID 2002MN GIVES EARTH ITS CLOSEST SHAVE IN YEARS
>From From Kevin Yates <keviny@spacecentre.co.uk>
Near Earth Object Information Centre
National Space Centre, Exploration Drive, Leicester
Press Release, Thursday 20th June 2002: Asteroid 2002MN
For immediate release
Asteroid 2002MN gives Earth its closest shave in years
On Friday 14 June, an asteroid the size of a football pitch made
one of the
closest ever recorded approaches to Earth. Astronomers working on
the LINEAR
search programme, near Socorro, New Mexico first detected the
giant rock on
17 June, a few days after its close approach.
The Near Earth Object, known to astronomers as '2002MN', was
travelling at
over 10 km/s (23,000 miles per hour) when it passed Earth at a
distance of
around 120,000 km (75,000 miles), bringing it well inside the
Moon's orbit.
The last time a known asteroid passed this close was back in
December 1994.
Asteroids are typically too small and distant to measure their
size directly
from Earth, so scientists use the amount of light they reflect,
along with a
basic understanding of the materials they are made of, to
estimate their
size. With a diameter between 50-120 metres, 2002 MN is a
lightweight among
asteroids and incapable of causing damage on a global scale, such
as the
object associated with the extinction of the dinosaurs.
However, if it had hit the Earth, 2002MN may have caused local
devastation
similar to that which occurred in Tunguska, Siberia in 1908, when
2000
square kilometres of forest were flattened. Whilst the vast
majority of NEOs
discovered do not come this close, such near misses do highlight
the
importance of detecting these objects. This reminder comes in a
week when
the UK telescopes on La Palma are being tested to search for
NEOs.
Brief Description of Object
Object Designation: 2002MN
Date of First Observation: 17/06/02
Number of Observations: 14
Search Team: LINEAR (Lincoln Near Earth Asteroid Research)
Date of Closest Approach: 14/06/02
Closest Approach Distance: 0.000797 AU or 119,229 km (0.3
Lunar Distances)
Asteroids Velocity Relative to Earth at Closest Approach: 10.58
km/s (23,667 miles per hour)
Estimated Diameter of Asteroid: 50-120 metres
Orbital Period: 894.9 days
For further information contact: Kevin Yates (Project Officer)
Near Earth
Object Information Centre. +44(0)116 2582130 or 07740 896141;
email: keviny@
==============
(2) A CLOSE ASTEROID FLYBY
>From Sky & Telescope, 19 June 2002
http://skyandtelescope.com/news/current/article_641_1.asp
June 19, 2002 | On June 17th, astronomers from the Lincoln
Laboratory Near
Earth Asteroid Research project (LINEAR) discovered a new
Earth-crossing
asteroid. Designated 2002 MN, the object is approximately 100
meters across
and flew by us on June 14th.
What is most shocking is just how close it came to Earth. This is
only the
sixth known asteroid to penetrate the Moon's orbit, and by far
the biggest.
According to Brian G. Marsden (Harvard-Smithsonian Center for
Astrophysics),
the object came within 120,000 kilometers (0.0008 astronomical
unit) of
impacting Earth.
Though the exact details of an impact scenario depend on the
rock's
composition, had it hit Earth the event would have been been
"Tunguska-like," with a force rivaling the largest
H-bombs. The object was
too small, however, to be classified as a potentially hazardous
asteroid
(PHA). Nor does it qualify for the Torino scale used to predict
the
devastation caused by an impacting asteroid.
A disturbing detail is that 2002 MN was discovered three days
after its
closest approach. Though we are almost certainly out of harm's
way from this
near Earth object (no potential impacts are forecast until at
least 2050),
its late detection may be telling. Currently there is no
dedicated Southern
Hemisphere NEO search program, and NASA is currently focused on
finding
bodies greater than 1 kilometer across.
Regardless of whether or not it should have been seen, "it
was a close
shave," says Marsden.
Copyright 2002 Sky Publishing Corp.
============
(3) ASTEROIDS LOST IN SPACE
>From Steve Koppes <s-koppes@uchicago.edu>
>From PHYSICAL REVIEW FOCUS, 17 June 2002
http://focus.aps.org/v9/st31.html
Where asteroids and comets are concerned, the solar system is
like a giant
roller coaster in space. Figuring out how the orbits of these
rocks twist
and turn around just the sun and one other planet is so hard that
brute-force computation is usually the only solution. But in the
1 July
print issue of PRL, a team reports an analytical method for
describing an
asteroid's likelihood of escaping orbit around a planet. The
result,
inspired by work on transitions between chemical species during
reactions,
may eventually give researchers a new tool for analyzing the
orbits of the
flotsam of the solar system, the authors suggest.
Consider the comet Oterma. Every now and then, it switches from a
complicated trajectory outside the orbit of Jupiter to one lying
within.
Jerry Marsden of the California Institute of Technology and
colleagues found
they could describe this transition between orbits mathematically
in terms
of a boundary between initial and final states. To make the
transition, the
comet passed through a bottleneck near two of Jupiter's libration
points--where objects maintain a fixed distance relative to the
planet and
the Sun.
When Charles Jaffé, a chemical physicist at West Virginia
University in
Morgantown, saw the paper reporting the comet theory, he was
astonished. "It
looks like he stole some of our figures," Jaffé recalls
thinking. He had
recently published results using a similar approach for ionized
atoms, where
he had extended the conventional theory of the transition state a
molecule
adopts during its switch from reactant to product in a chemical
reaction.
Realizing they had taken the same approach to solve different
problems, the
two teams of authors joined forces to apply it to more
complicated
astrophysical scenarios.
Now they have reported their first step in this direction, using
a highly
idealized picture of asteroids distributed evenly around Mars and
getting
stuck in an orbit 200 Martian radii out. Their statistical theory
predicts
the rate at which rocks eject from this orbit over time. After 40
revolutions, the theory matched numerical simulations to within
1%. "I just
found that amazing," Marsden says. "From a dynamical
systems point of view
it's a relatively simple theory."
The researchers think this mechanism could apply to all sorts of
objects
orbiting in space, from comets to asteroids to space probes.
Marsden points
out that spacecraft such as the ongoing Genesis mission--which
collects
particles from the solar wind--make use of the same kinds of
libration
points implicated in the Oterma bottleneck. So a simpler
description of
their trajectories might be beneficial to NASA planners. The team
would also
like to better understand the process that brings rocks from Mars
to Earth.
Martin Duncan of Queen's University, in Kingston, Canada, is
skeptical that
the theory in its current state could handle highly complicated
regions full
of debris, such as the asteroid belt or the Kuiper belt outside
Neptune. But
if it can predict the escape rate from these areas, "that
would be very
important for predicting the flux of near-Earth asteroids and
Jupiter-family
comets," he says.
The team agrees that the technique isn't yet ready for such
real-world
problems but believes it will be in the future. Compared with
simulations,
Marsden says, theory is starting to produce "much deeper
insight into the
movement of comets and asteroids and all sorts of stuff that's
floating
around through the solar system."
--JR Minkel
Statistical Theory of Asteroid Escape Rates
Charles Jaffé, Shane D. Ross, Martin W. Lo, Jerrold Marsden,
David Farrelly,
and T. Uzer
Phys. Rev. Lett. 89, 011101
(print issue of 1 July 2002)
Link to the paper: http://link.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v89/e011101
© 2002, The American Physical Society. All rights reserved.
===========
(4) JUPITER'S BROTHER JOINS THE FAMILY
>From Andrew Yee <ayee@nova.astro.utoronto.ca>
[Extracted from ScienceNOW, AAAS
http://sciencenow.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/2002/617/1]
Monday, 17 June 2002
Jupiter's Brother Joins the Family
By RICHARD A. KERR
Astronomers at a meeting in Washington, D.C., will announce on 18
June the
discovery of a near twin of Jupiter orbiting another star. Last
week, a
"first cousin" of our solar system made front-page
news, but the new find
looks to be a much closer relation: An exoplanet resembling
Jupiter in a
planetary system like our own. The find is the most promising
discovery of a
planetary system where Earth-like planets may be hiding.
Before last week's announcement, 76 exoplanets had been
discovered. Most
were "hot Jupiters" orbiting closer to their stars than
Mercury does to the
sun. All the latest discoveries came as astronomers searched for
telltale
stellar wobbling, a sign that the gravity of a massive unseen
planet tugs
the parent star back and forth.
Last week researchers led by Geoffrey Marcy of the University of
California,
Berkeley, described a "near analog" of Jupiter
(ScienceNOW, 13 June). Now
astronomer Michel Mayor of the Geneva
Observatory in Sauverny, Switzerland, and his colleagues report
what they
feel is a true Jupiter. Orbiting the star HD190360, this new
exoplanet has a
minimum mass just 1.1 times that of Jupiter and orbits at 3.7
times Earth's
distance from the sun (astronomical units, or AU)
[http://obswww.unige.ch/~udry/planet/gl777A.html]. In the solar
system, that
would put it nearer Jupiter than Mars.
The new planet's strongest claim to Jupiter-likeness lies in its
familiar
surroundings: In Doppler-shift observations, its planetary system
looks
nearly identical to ours. In contrast, the Berkeley team had
already found
one hot Jupiter orbiting their star, 55 Cancri, before they
announced a
second last week. Like all hot Jupiters, these must have formed
farther out
and drifted inward, driving everything before them into the star
and
vaporizing any inner, Earth-like planets.
Astronomers are welcoming both discoveries as the vanguard of a
coming
Jupiter bonanza. "I think it's great," says astronomer
David Trilling of the
University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia. "In the next few
years, there
will be dozens and dozens more."
THE JUPITERS
55 Cancri's HD190360's
Our Jupiter
Minimum mass 4 x Jupiter's
1.1x
1.0
Mean orbital
distance 5.9
AU 3.7
AU 5.2 AU
Eccentricity
0.16
Less than 0.1 0.05
Orbital period 13
years 7.1
years 11.9 years
CREDIT: G. MARCY ET AL./M. MAYOR ET AL.
Copyright © 2002 by the American Association for the Advancement
of Science.
===============
(5) SUN-LIKE STAR ECLIPSED BY DUST, ROCKS AND ASTEROIDS
>From Andrew Yee <ayee@nova.astro.utoronto.ca>
Office of University Communications
Wesleyan University
Middletown, Connecticut
Contact Information:
Dr. William Herbst, John Monroe Van Vleck Professor of Astronomy
Wesleyan University, Middletown, CT 06459
860-685-3672, wherbst@wesleyan.edu
Prof. Herbst can be reached at the conference in Washington
through the
Extrasolar Planets Conference Press Room, telephone numbers (202)
939-1123
and 939-1139.
Release date: Wednesday, June 19, 2002
Sun-Like Star, Dust Eclipse Offers Clues to Origins of Our Solar
System
WASHINGTON, D.C. -- Astronomers are announcing today the
discovery of a
sun-like star which is eclipsed in a way never before seen -- not
by another
star, planet or moon, but by dust grains, rocks and maybe even
asteroids
orbiting it in a clumpy circumstellar disk.
The international team making the observation was led by William
Herbst and
Catrina Hamilton of Wesleyan University in Middletown, Conn. The
results are
being presented to the Scientific Frontiers on Research in
Exo-Solar Planets
meeting sponsored by NASA and the Carnegie Institution of
Washington in
Washington, D.C.
This discovery is enabling first-time study of the detailed
structure of a
disk and to see the evolution of features on time scales of
months and
years. It is believed that disks such as this formed Earth and
our solar
system. Scientists hope that this discovery will shed new light
on our
origins.
The star, named KH 15D, is in the constellation of Monoceros and
located
about 2,400 light years from the Earth. It is part of a well
known cluster
of young stars called NGC 2264 and inhabits a nebulous region of
space close
to the famous "Cone Nebula" (recently imaged in
spectacular fashion with the
new Advanced Camera System on the Hubble Space Telescope.) Such
regions are
known to be the birthplaces of stars and KH 15D has all the
markings of
youth. It is estimated to be about 3 million years old,
qualifying it as a cosmic toddler.
Attention was drawn to the star in 1997 by its discoverers,
Kristin Kearns,
then a graduate student at Wesleyan and Herbst. It was star
number 15 in an
image which they designated the "D" field, hence the
name. "If we knew it
was going to become famous, we would have given it a better
name," Herbst
now laments.
Observations, mostly by undergraduate students, at Wesleyan's Van
Vleck
Observatory during the late 1990's led Kearns and Herbst to
realize that
this was a potentially unique and important object.
"Basically, the star
winked at us," reports Herbst. On most nights it was at its
standard
brightness but sometimes it would be nearly gone -- shining by
only a tiny
fraction of its normal luminosity. After several years of study,
the pair
recognized a pattern to the star's behavior -- it fades out every
48.3 days
and stays faint for about 18 days. The strict repetitiveness and
other
characteristics led to the realization that something was
orbiting the star
and blocking its light on a regular timetable. This is not
uncommon in
astronomy -- there are many known examples of eclipsing binary
stars. What
is uncommon -- unique, actually -- in the case of KH 15D is the
length of
the eclipse as well as its depth. The star was essentially
totally blocked
for more than 1/3 of the period of the orbiting matter. No single
object
such as a star, planet or moon could do such a thing, since it
would require
an object much too large to fit in the space available. Only a
collection of
smaller objects -- dust grains, rocks or perhaps asteroids --
orbiting
together in a strung out, clumpy arc, could possibly explain such
a lengthy
eclipse.
To examine this unprecedented phenomenon in greater detail,
Herbst and
Wesleyan physics graduate student Catrina Hamilton, who is also a
senior
lecturer at Connecticut College in New London, Conn., organized
an
international observing campaign during the fall, winter and
spring of
2001/2002. The goal was to keep an eye on this amazing star for
as much of
the time as was practical. Astronomers from Uzbekistan, Germany,
Israel,
Spain, and at several universities in the United States took part
in the observations.
The extensive data set obtained in the past year has confirmed
the basic
pattern seen previously and provided tantalizing new facts for
astronomers
to study.
[NOTE: Images supporting this release are available at
http://www.astro.wesleyan.edu/kh15d/
]
============
(6) SUPERERUPTIONS AS A THREAT TO CIVILIZATIONS ON EARTH-LIKE
PLANETS
Michael R. Rampino: Supereruptions as a Threat to Civilizations
on
Earth-like Planets
Icarus 156, 562-569 (2002)
The largest explosive volcanic eruptions (supereruptions) produce
>1000 km 3
of ejected material and =1000 Mt (10 15 g) of sub-micron
atmospheric
aerosols and dust. These eruptions may be capable of creating
global
climatic disturbances sufficient to cause severe problems for
world
agriculture and modern civilization. Supereruptions are estimated
to occur
on average about every
50,000 years, which is about twice the frequency of impacts by
comets and
asteroids =1 km diameter predicted to cause similar climatic
effects.
Prediction, prevention, and mitigation of global volcanic
climatic disasters
may be potentially more difficult than planetary protection from
the threat
of large impacts, so that explosive volcanism might limit the
longevity of
technological civilizations. c 2002 Elsevier Science (USA)
Address: Earth & Environmental Science Program, New York
University, 100
Washington Square East, Room 1009, New York, New York 10003; and
NASA,
Goddard Institute for Space Studies, 2880 Broadway, New York, New
York
10025. E-mail: michael.rampino@nyu.edu
==========
(7) FRED HOYLE'S UNIVERSE
>From Peter Bond <PeterRBond@aol.com>
THIS RELEASE IS FORWARDED BY PETER BOND, ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL
SOCIETY PRESS
OFFICER (SPACE SCIENCE) ON BEHALF OF THE UNIVERSITY OF CARDIFF.
FORWARDING
DOES NOT IMPLY ENDORSEMENT BY THE ROYAL ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY.
**************************************************************
19 June 2002
For immediate release
Contact details are listed at the end of this release.
FRED HOYLE'S UNIVERSE
Throughout a long and distinguished career stretching over six
decades, the
astronomer Sir Fred Hoyle FRS sought to answer some of the
biggest questions
in science. How did the Universe originate? How did life begin?
What are the
eventual fates of planets, stars and galaxies?
Hoyle believed that, as a general rule, solutions to major
unsolved problems
had to be sought by exploring radical hypotheses, whilst at the
same time
not deviating too far from well-attested scientific tools and
methods. His
scientific work served as an inspiration to three generations of
astronomers. He also became one of the greatest popularisers of
science in
the 20th century, never failing to captivate huge audiences on
radio, on
television, in public lectures as well as through his popular
books.
To celebrate his contributions to astronomy, astrophysics and
astrobiology,
former colleagues and students of Hoyle will gather at Cardiff
University
(where he was an Honorary Research Professor from 1975 until his
death in
2001) from 24-26 June 2002, to highlight the important aspects of
his life
and work.
Topics under discussion include:
Fred Hoyle's World View · Stellar Nucleosynthesis and the
Life and Death of
Stars Big-Bang vs Steady-State Cosmology · Quasi-Steady State
Cosmology ·
The role of the creation field from Mach's principle · Origin of
Chemical
Elements · Anomalous redshifts of Quasars · Interstellar
molecules ·
Interstellar dust · Stellar evolution · Cosmical
electrodynamics ·
High-energy astrophysics · Iron whiskers in space ·
Extragalactic dust ·
Origin of Microwave Background · The nature of dark matter ·
Fred Hoyle's
contributions to biology · The modern theory of panspermia ·
Search for
micro-organisms in the atmosphere · Evolution of species
according to Hoyle
· Science fiction as a vehicle of scientific communication ·
Fred Hoyle as a
science populariser
Speakers at the event include:
· Eight Fellows of the Royal Society
· The Astronomer Royal, Sir Martin Rees
· Sir John Maddox, Emeritus Editor of Nature
· Geoffrey and Margaret Burbidge, whose work with Hoyle led to
our
present-day understanding of the origin of chemical elements in
stars.
· Arthur C Clarke (via video link in Sri Lanka)
· Hermann Bondi, former Chief Scientific Advisor to the
Government and Chair
of the European Space Agency, with whom Hoyle founded the theory
of
accretion (the mechanism by which stars "suck in"
nearby interstellar
matter) and the Steady State Theory of the Universe.
CONTACT DETAILS:
For booking enquiries:
Contact Samantha Emmotts, Tel: +44 (0)29 2087 5117, email:
Emmotts@cardiff.ac.uk
For academic enquiries:
Contact Professor Chandra Wickramasinghe, Tel: +44 (0)29 2087
4201,
email: Wickramasinghe@cardiff.ac.uk
or visit www.astrobiology.cf.ac.uk
===============
(8) NASA SATELLITE CONFIRMS URBAN HEAT ISLANDS INCREASE RAINFALL
AROUND
CITIES
>From Mark Hess <mhess@pop100.gsfc.nasa.gov>
Cynthia M. O'Carroll / Krishna
Ramanujan
Goddard Space Flight Center, Greenbelt,
Md. June 18, 2002
(Phone: 301/614-5563 or 301/286-3026)
Cynthia.M.OCarroll.1@gsfc.nasa.gov
Krishna.S.Ramanujan.1@gsfc.nasa.gov
Stephanie Kenitzer
American Meteorological Society
(Phone: 425/432-2192)
RELEASE: 02-96
NASA SATELLITE CONFIRMS URBAN HEAT ISLANDS INCREASE RAINFALL
AROUND CITIES
NASA researchers have for the first time used a
rainfall-measuring satellite
to confirm that "urban heat-islands" create more summer
rain over and
downwind of major cities, including Atlanta, Dallas, San Antonio
and
Nashville.
Dr. J. Marshall Shepherd and colleagues at NASA's Goddard Space
Flight
Center, Greenbelt, Md., found that urban areas with high
concentrations of
buildings, roads and other artificial surfaces retain heat and
lead to
warmer surrounding temperatures, and create urban heat-islands.
This
increased heat may promote rising air and alter the weather
around cities.
"Cities tend to be one to 10 degrees Fahrenheit [.56 to 5.6
Celsius] warmer
than surrounding suburbs and rural areas and the added heat can
destabilize
and change the way air circulates around cities," said
Shepherd. Rising warm
air may help produce clouds that result in more rainfall around
urban areas.
Using the world's first space-based rain radar aboard NASA's
Tropical
Rainfall Measuring Mission (TRMM) satellite, Shepherd and
colleagues found
that mean monthly rainfall rates within 30-60 kilometers (18 to
36 miles)
downwind of the cities were, on average, about 28 percent greater
than the
upwind region. In some cities, the downwind area exhibited
increases as high
as 51 percent.
It was also found that, on average, maximum rainfall rates in
downwind
regions often exceeded the maximum values in upwind regions by 48
percent -
116 percent. These results are very consistent with earlier
related
experiments in St. Louis, Missouri and near Atlanta.
Mostly during the warmer months, the added heat creates wind
circulations
and rising air that can produce clouds or enhance existing ones.
Under the
right conditions, these clouds can evolve into rain-producers or
storms. It
is suspected that converging air due to city surfaces of varying
heights,
like buildings, also promotes rising air needed to produce clouds
and
rainfall.
"A recent United Nations study estimates that 80 percent of
the world's
population will live in cities by 2025, so a better understanding
of the
impact of urban land use change on Earth's water cycle system is
vital,"
Shepherd said.
The study appears in the July 2002 issue of the American
Meteorological
Society's Journal of Applied Meteorology.
Earlier research has used ground-based instruments, including
rain gauge
networks, ground-based radar, or model simulations, to show that
urban heat
islands can impact local rainfall around cities like St. Louis,
Chicago,
Mexico City and Atlanta.
Although useful, many of these studies were limited to specific
cities that
had access to relevant data from special observation networks or
computer
model simulations. But satellites broaden the scope of such
research by
monitoring changes in rainfall patterns over urban areas on
global scales
over long periods of time.
"For example, we can now investigate cities around the world
simultaneously
that have been identified as producing urban heat island-induced
rainfall
rather than focusing resources on one location," said
Shepherd.
By showing how space-borne platforms can be used to identify
rainfall
changes linked to cities and urban sprawl, the research may help
land
managers and engineers design better drainage systems, plan
land-use, and
identify the best areas for agriculture. Also, it highlights the
need for
scientists to account for impacts of urbanization when they
design computer
models that forecast the weather or predict regional climates.
This study was funded by the TRMM Project Science Office and NASA
Headquarters.
TRMM is a joint NASA/Japanese Space Agency mission to study
tropical
rainfall and its implications for climate. Each day, the TRMM
spacecraft
observes the Earth's equatorial and tropical regions, including
the
southernmost United States and all of Africa.
TRMM is part of NASA's Earth Science Enterprise.
The mission of NASA's Earth Science Enterprise is to develop a
scientific
understanding of the Earth System and its response to natural or
human-induced changes to enable improved prediction capability
for climate,
weather and natural hazards.
The American Meteorological Society (http://www.ametsoc.org/ams)
is the
nation's leading professional society for scientists in the
atmospheric and
related sciences.
For more information and images, please see:
http://www.gsfc.nasa.gov/topstory/20020613urbanrain.html
For more information on TRMM, go to:
http://trmm.gsfc.nasa.gov/
--------------------------------------------------------------------
CCNet is a scholarly electronic network. To
subscribe/unsubscribe, please
contact the moderator Benny J Peiser < b.j.peiser@livjm.ac.uk
>. Information
circulated on this network is for scholarly and educational use
only. The
attached information may not be copied or reproduced forany other
purposes
without prior permission of the copyright holders. The fully
indexed archive
of the CCNet, from February 1997 on, can be found at
http://abob.libs.uga.edu/bobk/cccmenu.html.
DISCLAIMER: The opinions,
beliefs and viewpoints expressed in the articles and texts and in
other
CCNet contributions do not necessarily reflect the opinions,
beliefs and
viewpoints of the moderator of this network.