Fighting to Launch Cosmic-Ray Detector

By Dennis Overbye

February 29, 2008, 8:54 am

Dennis Overbye is a science correspondent for The Times. His most recent book is ‘’Einstein in Love: A Scientific Romance.'’

The Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer. (Photo: Photographs by The AMS Collaboration) In a recent report to Congress (pdf), NASA offered two contradictory statements: a $1.5 billion physics experiment intended for the International Space Station was on track for a 2009 launch, but it had no intention of actually launching the device into space.

Once upon a time the Alpha Magnetic Spectrometer, as it is known, was to be the scientific centerpiece of the space station. By sifting cosmic rays from outer space, the 15,000 pound detector would look for evidence of antimatter or the mysterious dark matter that accounts for 25 percent of creation.

The brainchild of MIT physicist and Nobel laureate Sam Ting, the detector was built by a collaboration of scientists from 16 countries, including China and Taiwan, mostly with their own money. NASA agreed in 1995 to give it a ride to the space station and then reneged 10 years later after the loss of the space shuttle Columbia, saying the remaining flights between now and 2010 when the shuttles are to be retired were all spoken for. This dismayed many physicists who thought the space agency should keep its word and was being a bad international partner.

“It’s a pity that NASA is living up to its commitment to finish the Space Station, but not to its commitment to use it for something scientifically interesting,” said Steven Weinberg, himself a Nobel physicist at the University of Texas, in Austin.

But Dr. Ting has supporters in Congress, including Sen. Bill Nelson, the chairman of the Space, Aeronautics, and Related Sciences Subcommittee who rode the shuttle into space in 1986. In December, he vowed to file legislation adding a shuttle flight for the detector if Michael Griffin, NASA’s administrator did not change his mind.

In a speech on February 8, the day after Atlantis lifted off on the most recent mission to the space station, Sen. Nelson said of Dr. Ting’s experiment, “What it does is it identifies the origin of cosmic rays, and that means it can help us understand the origin of the universe. This is not just an American experiment; this is an international experiment of countries around the world. This is a part of us wanting to understand our beginnings. This is a part of our nature, as a people, to want to explore the heavens and understand the universe.”

Full article here:

http://thelede.blogs.nytimes.com/2008/02/29/fighting-to-launch-cosmic-ray-detector/?hp