WHAT'S NEW Friday, 15 Aug 03

WHAT'S NEW   Robert L. Park   Friday, 15 Aug 03   Washington, DC

(Andrew Essin contributed to this week's issue of What's New.)

1. THE POINDEXTER FILE: HE STILL DOESN'T GET IT.  In his letter
of resignation as head of the Pentagon's Office of Information
Awareness, John Poindexter says it was a misunderstanding.  His
"innovative approaches" to intelligence, he explains, were
"victims of ignorance."  A PhD physicist from Caltech, Poindexter
has been involved in innovative approaches before (WN 27 Feb 87),
(20 Mar 87),(WN 1 Jan 88).  As National Security Advisor to
President Reagan he was at the center of the innovative Iran-
Contra scandal and was convicted of lying to Congress about it. 
With that background, it was hardly surprising some members of
Congress didn't trust him.  His resignation is effective Aug 29.  

2. THE HUBBLE TROUBLE: ASTRONOMERS ARGUE FOR EXTENDING ITS LIFE. 
NASA turned to an outside panel of experts to study whether the
Hubble Space Telescope should be retired in 2010 as currently
planned.  At issue is how to allocate resources given that the
launch of the James Webb Space Telescope is planned for 2011. 
The panel, chaired by John Bahcall, proposed extending Hubble's
life with an extra shuttle service mission beyond the one
currently planned.  Good idea, but there is no budget for a
second shuttle mission.  There may not even be a shuttle.  A
better plan might be to keep Hubble and get rid of the space
station, since it's not doing anything.

3. THE ISOMER BOMB: HOW A DENTIST'S X-RAY MACHINE WENT TO WAR. 
Well, maybe not quite.  A news story in this week's issue of New
Scientist magazine reports that the Department of Defense is
currently pursuing an isomer bomb, which would supposedly release
its energy in the form of gamma rays from the decay of a nuclear
isomer of Hf-178.  Indeed, such nuclear isomers are on the
Militarily Critical Technologies List. The claim is that decay
can be accelerated by irradiation with low-energy x-rays.  We're
told that the scientist who did the research used an x-ray
machine borrowed from a dentist friend.  A JASON panel determined
that the idea is theoretically implausible and the evidence shaky
at best.  A group that attempted to reproduce the effect in a
carefully controlled study at the Advanced Photon Source found
nothing.

4. CALIFORNIA: GUESS WHAT THIS STORY IS ABOUT.  Nope, it's
nothing to do with Ahnold.  California is undoubtedly the source
of a lot of hot air, but this week it was announced that the
state has won a round in its fight against global warming.  On
Monday, General Motors and DaimlerChrysler dropped their lawsuit
against the state over its "zero emissions" law, which requires
auto makers to sell vehicles that release little or no carbon
dioxide into the atmosphere, phasing them in over the next two
decades.

THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND and THE AMERICAN PHYSICAL SOCIETY.  
Opinions are the author's and are not necessarily shared by the
University or the American Physical Society, but they should be.
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