AMSAT NEWS SERVICE
ANS-210

ANS is a free, weekly, news and information service of AMSAT North
America, The Radio Amateur Satellite Corporation. ANS reports on the
activities of a worldwide group of Amateur Radio operators who share an
active interest in designing, building, launching and communicating
through analog and digital Amateur Radio satellites.

Please send any amateur satellite news or reports to:



In this edition:
* NASA and ESA Prepare Columbus for Flight
* AMSAT-UK Colloquim News
* AO-51 Features SSB Uplink to FM Downlink Experiment
* AO-7 Log Page
* ARISS Status - 23 July 2007
* New Thinking on Time Travel


SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-210.01
AMSAT News Service Bulletin 210.01

From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
July 29, 2007
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-210.01

A press release from the European Space Agency reports that NASA
plans to resume testing and integration work on the ESA Columbus
Space Laboratory to prepare it for connection with the International
Space Station.

Columbus was flown to Florida back in May, 2006, to get in line for
its launch to the station. Earlier this year, it was removed from
temporary storage, and engineers equipped it with experiment racks
and orbital hardware. After a break over the summer, workers will
continue preparing it for launch. If all goes well, it will blast
into space atop the space shuttle Atlantis as early as December 6th,
2007 on the STS-122 Shuttle Flight.

Also aboard Columbus will be amateur radio equipment to support a
linear transponder with an L-band uplink and S-band downlink.

ESA information on the Columbus Space Laboratory can be found at:
http://www.esa.int/esaCP/SEMJY2HYX3F_index_0.html.

[ANS thanks ESA and Universe Today for the above information]

/EX


SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-210.02
AMSAT-UK Colloquim News

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 210.02
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
July 29, 2007
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-210.02

Satellite News From 2007 AMSAT-UK Space Colloquium

Good news about interesting amateur satellite projects has
been released upon the conclusion of the 2007 AMSAT-UK
Space Colloquium.

Amateur Radio satellite Delfi-C3 video available
http://www.southgatearc.org/news/jul...i_c3_video.htm

AMSAT-OZ Satellite on a PCB - AMSAT-UK Colloquium Paper
and PowerPoints at http://wiki.amsat.dk/

P3E Update
http://www.southgatearc.org/news/jul...p3e_update.htm

The UK to get it's first Cubesat?
http://www.southgatearc.org/news/jul...uk_cubesat.htm

[ANS thanks AMSAT-UK and Trevor, M5AKA for the above information]


/EX


SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-210.03
AO-51 Features SSB Uplink to FM Downlink Experiment

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 210.03
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
July 29, 2007
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-210.03

On July 24 AO-51 controllers enabled the satellite's SQRX
receiver to allow for operation utilizing a 145.880 MHz SSB
uplink with an FM downlink on 435.300 MHz. This experiment
also caused changes in the way that telemetry is handled.
Gould, WA4SXM, AO-51 Command Station described the config-
uration, "I turned off Transmitter A last night when I
switched modes as the schedule did not include the telemetry
downlink. If I use the SQRX receiver, then I need to decrease
the transmitter power for the batteries to make it through
eclipse." In the meantime AO-51 was collecting telemetry,
but not transmitting telemetry.

Alan, WA4SCA was active on the new mode and wrote, "It is
very obvious who has computer control of the radio. Intel-
ligibility is as with any of the passband birds, except on
AO-51 you fall completely out of the passband quickly. In
this mode the RX is relatively sensitive, but I did need a
beam to get a good uplink, though my output was only 1-2
watts."

In the period between July 27-July 31, controllers returned
AO-51 into its V/U FM Repeater mode with the uplink on 145.920
MHz and downlink on 435.300 MHz. 9k6 telemetry transmission
was re-enabled on 435.150 MHz.

[ANS thanks Gould, WA4SXM and Alan, WA4SCA for the above
information]

/EX


SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-210.04
AO-7 Log Page

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 210.04
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
July 29, 2007
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-210.04

John, LA2QAA, AO-7 Resource Web Page Administrator, reminds users
that the AO-7 log page (http://www.planetemily.com/ao7/ao7log.php)
remains operational. John asks, "Please remember this page is des-
igned to be an "activity" log. It is not designed to be a log to
see who can collect the most points. Please refrain from entering
multiple QSO's on different lines for the same orbit because this
will then give false overall results." John is available to answer
questions via e-mail at his address.

[ANS thanks John, LA2QAA for the above information]

/EX


SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-210.05
ARISS Status - 23 July 2007

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 210.05
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
July 29, 2007
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-210.05

Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) Status Report
July 23, 2007



1. Successful ARISS Contact with Hospitalized Children

On Tuesday, July 17, long term hospitalized children at the Arnold
Palmer Hospital for Children in Orlando, Florida, spoke with astronaut
Clay Anderson, KD5PLA, aboard the ISS, via the telebridge station W6SRJ
in California. Anderson answered the children's 20 questions which had
been prepared for the Amateur Radio on the International Space Station
(ARISS) event, and with extra time available, he answered an additional
13 posed to him by the 10 patients. An ARISS team member gave a
presentation to the children covering amateur radio and the ARISS
program. The audio was fed into the EchoLink AMSAT (101 377) and JK1ZRW
(277 208) servers, and into the IRLP Discovery Reflector 9010. Twenty
connections were made to EchoLink, of which 7 were repeaters, from 8
countries, including the Czech Republic and Croatia. Central Florida
News, Channel 13, ran a story with video on the event. See:
http://www.cfnews13.com/Health/YourH...get_special_ta
lk_with_astronaut.html

2. Upcoming School Contacts

The Challenger Learning Center of Lucas County, in Oregon, Ohio has been
scheduled for an Amateur Radio on the International Space Station
(ARISS) contact on Wednesday, July 25 at 11:38 UTC. The center has a
science lab that is used for the summer camp programs, and schools from
northwest Ohio and southeast Michigan participate in the programs which
reach approximately 3000 students each year. The audio from this event
will be fed into the EchoLink AMSAT (101 377) and JK1ZRW (277 208)
servers, as well as being fed into the IRLP Discovery Reflector 9010.

An Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contact has
been planned for the 21st World Scout Jamboree in Chelmsford, England. A
Special Event Station, GB100J, will operate at the Jamboree from July 27
to August 8, 2007. Approximately 40,000 scouts from 200 countries are
expected to attend this event. The audio will be broadcast on the
Jamboree FM Radio Station and will be webcast on the radio station's
website. It will also be fed into the EchoLink AMSAT (101 377) and
JK1ZRW (277 208) servers, but it is unlikely that it will be fed into
the IRLP Discovery Reflector 9010. The contact will take place on
Saturday, August 4 at 21:10 UTC.

3. ARISS International Team Meeting Held

An Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS)
International Team teleconference was held on Tuesday, July 17. Agenda
items covered included the ARISS Kenwood and Ericsson radio systems and
SuitSat-2 status. Minutes have been posted to the ARISS website. See:
http://www.rac.ca/ariss/arisstel2007-07-17.htm

4. Crew Debrief Scheduled

A crew debriefing session with Expedition 14/15 member Sunita Williams
has been tentatively scheduled for Tuesday, July 24. Williams completed
33 Amateur Radio on the International Space Station (ARISS) contacts
with school children around the world while aboard the ISS.

[ANS thanks Carol, KB3LKI, for the above information]

/EX


SB SAT @ AMSAT $ANS-210.06
New Thinking on Time Travel

AMSAT News Service Bulletin 210.06
From AMSAT HQ SILVER SPRING, MD.
July 29, 2007
To All RADIO AMATEURS
BID: $ANS-210.06

Astrophysicists pondering the subject of time travel have postulated
not only whether time travel is theoretically possible but whether
it is technically achieveable. The popular concepts using black holes,
wormholes, and cosmic strings are not practically possible because
they basically require the ability to harness energy equivalent to
an exploding star and an inconceivable amount of mass.

A more down-to-earth concept has been proposed. Physicist Ronald
Mallett is known for his expertise in general relativity, gravitation,
black holes, relativistic astrophysics, and quantum cosmology. He has
been working with Einstein's equations for years in an attempt to
design a sort of time machine. Professor Mallett has devised an
alternative to these time travel methods based on Einstein's famous
relativity equation: E=mc2.

"Einstein showed that mass and energy are the same thing," said Mallett,
who published his first research on time travel back in 2000, which
appeared in the journal Physics Letters. "The time machine we've designed
uses light in the form of circulating lasers to warp or loop time instead
of using massive objects."

In attempting to create a "time loop", Mallett is tinkering with a
device to test his time-warping theory. Using mirrors, Mallett hopes
to create a circulating light beam that can warp surrounding space,
which is part of his work called The Space-time Twisting by Light (STL)
project.

According to Einstein, whenever you do something to space, you also
affect time. Twisting space causes time to be twisted, meaning you
could theoretically walk through time as you walk through space.

Lest amateur radio operators get their hopes up for one more QSO via
AO-40 or a chance to snag the missed DXepedition, Professor Mallet has
a 'futhermore': "The Grandfather Paradox [where you go back in time
and kill your grandfather] is not an issue," said Mallett. "In a sense,
time travel means that you're traveling both in time and into other
universes. If you go back into the past, you'll go into another universe.
As soon as you arrive at the past, you're making a choice and there'll
be a split. Our universe will not be affected by what you do in your
visit to the past."

[ANS thanks the Daily Galaxy for the above information]

/EX

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President's Club. Members of the President's Club, as sustaining donors
to AMSAT Project Funds, will be eligible to receive additional benefits.
Application forms are available from the AMSAT Office.

73,
This week's ANS Editor,
Dee Interdonato, NB2F