What's News - Friday, April 16, 2004 - Bob Park


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Topic: Science > Physics
User: "Sam Wormley"
Date: 16 Apr 2004 03:56:59 PM
Object: What's News - Friday, April 16, 2004 - Bob Park
What's News - Friday, April 16, 2004 - Bob Park
1. HAFNIUM-178: JUST WHEN YOU THINK LIFE CAN'T GET ANY SILLIER.
The cover of Popular Mechanics for May proclaims the dawn of the age
of atomic airplanes powered by miniature nuclear reactors. These are
not old-fashioned fission reactors. These are the new "quantum
nucleonic reactors," a.k.a. hafnium-178 isomer reactors. The problem
with fission reactors was that they required too much shielding. The
problem with the hafnium-178 reactor is that it doesn't exist. Carl
Collins at U. of Texas, Dallas, claimed to be able to trigger decay of
the hafnium-178 nuclear isomer with x-rays. That would be a miracle,
but several other groups found it just doesn't happen. That detail was
left out of the Popular Mechanics story, which contains nothing beyond
the New Scientist story a year ago (WN 15 Aug 03). The hafnium-178
isomer avalanche now seems destined to join hydrinos, zero-point
energy, gravity shields, cold fusion and all the other free-energy
fantasies that only work for believers. In the paranormal world this
is known as "the investigator effect."
2. EXPLORATION: PRESIDENT'S COMMISSION ON MOON, MARS AND BEYOND.
We haven't heard much about President Bush's space-exploration
initiative lately, but his Moon-Mars Commission is holding public
meetings in San Francisco. Yesterday it was spring break, but few
students, or anyone else, showed up. The panel talked to Ray Bradbury
by satellite. He told them about Columbus (yawn). A television
producer who followed Bradbury explained that, "You get them pumped up
through MTV, video games and The Simpsons." They will convene another
public meeting in New York before making recommendations to NASA and
to the President in June.
3. PEER REVIEW: "IMPROVED" OMB GUIDELINES ARE MERELY OUTRAGEOUS.
Faced with challenges from science on everything from missile defense
to the environment, the White House Office of Management and Budget
wants to control the flow of scientific information within the federal
system. OMB proposed "peer review" guidelines to prevent release of
"junk science." How can scientists object to peer review? Or to
blocking junk science? In the name of conflict of interest, however,
academic experts who received federal grant money were excluded from
peer-review panels, with no similar restrictions on industry experts.
Industry loved it; scientists declared war. So OMB modified the
guidelines to eliminate a few of the bad parts. Everyone agreed it was
"much improved." It's the oldest ploy in Washington.
4. GENERAL RELATIVITY: GRAVITY PROBE B LAUNCH IS MONDAY 10:01 AM.
However, the satellite launch window is one second, and it could be
delayed to Tuesday four minutes earlier. But everything is relative,
it took 45 years to get this far.
Bob Park can be reached via email at

THE UNIVERSITY OF MARYLAND
Opinions are the author's and are not necessarily shared by the
University, but they should be.
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