Working as part of a NASA-wide team, engineers from NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., used software called Disruption-Tolerant Networking, or DTN, to transmit dozens of space images to and from a NASA science spacecraft located about more than 32 million kilometers (20 million miles) from Earth.
"This is the first step in creating a totally new space communications capability, an interplanetary Internet," said Adrian Hooke, team lead and manager of space-networking architecture, technology and standards at NASA Headquarters in Washington.
NASA and Vint Cerf, a vice president at Google, Inc., in Mountain View, Calif., partnered 10 years ago to develop this software protocol. The DTN sends information using a method that differs from the normal Internet's Transmission-Control Protocol/Internet Protocol, or TCP/IP communication suite, which Cerf co-designed.
The Interplanetary Internet must be robust enough to withstand delays, disruptions and disconnections in space. Glitches can happen when a spacecraft moves behind a planet, or when solar storms and long communication delays occur. The delay in sending or receiving data from Mars takes between three-and-a-half to 20 minutes at the speed of light.
Unlike TCP/IP on Earth, the DTN does not assume a continuous end-to-end connection. In its design, if a destination path can't be found, the data packets are not discarded. Instead, each network node keeps custody of the information as long as necessary until it can safely communicate with another node. This store-and-forward method, similar to basketball players safely passing the ball to the player nearest the basket, means that information does not get lost when no immediate path to the destination exists. Eventually, the information is delivered to the end user.
"In space today, an operations team has to manually schedule each link and generate all the commands to specify which data to send, when to send it, and where to send it," said Leigh Torgerson, manager of the DTN Experiment Operations Center at JPL. "With standardized DTN, this can all be done automatically."
Engineers began a month-long series of DTN demonstrations in October. Data were transmitted using NASA's Deep Space Network in demonstrations occurring twice a week. Engineers use NASA's Epoxi spacecraft as a Mars data-relay orbiter. Epoxi is on a mission to encounter Comet Hartley 2 in two years.
"There are 10 nodes on this early interplanetary network," said Scott Burleigh of JPL, lead software-engineer for the demonstrations. "One is the Epoxi spacecraft itself and the other nine, which are on the ground at JPL, simulate Mars landers, orbiters and ground mission-operations centers."
This month-long experiment is the first in a series of planned demonstrations to qualify the technology for use on a variety of upcoming space missions, said Jay Wyatt, manager of the Space Networking and Mission Automation Program Office at JPL. In the next round of testing, a NASA-wide demonstration using new DTN software loaded on board the International Space Station is scheduled to begin next summer.
In the next few years, the Interplanetary Internet could enable many new types of space missions. Complex missions involving multiple landed, mobile and orbiting spacecraft will be far easier to support through the use of the Interplanetary Internet. It could also ensure reliable communications for astronauts on the surface of the moon.
The Deep Impact Networking Experiment is sponsored by the Space Communications and Navigation Office in NASA's Space Operations Mission Directorate in Washington. NASA's Science Mission Directorate and Discovery Program in Washington provided experimental access to the Epoxi spacecraft. The Epoxi mission team provided critical support throughout development and operations.
Chagrin Falls, Ohio - Too much credit and easy money. Those were the biggest culprits behind this financial crisis. Yet, apallingly, the government's rescue attempt is built on more credit and even easier money. That's like giving a procrastinator a deadline extension. By choosing this course, Washington has steered us on to the "road to Weimar" – the road to runaway inflation.
It didn't have to come to this. And it still doesn't. But the proper remedy will take tremendous political courage: Bring back the gold standard. That, more than any byzantine regulations that emerge from the Bretton Woods II conference this weekend, would provide stability and safety for nations and individuals around the world.
Sadly, current policy seems to reflect a desire to weaken the dollar as quickly as possible.
The Federal Reserve's own data tells the story. The headline is the doubling of Federal Reserve credit, the main component of the US monetary base. Since Labor Day 2008, it's risen from $894 billion to $2.2 trillion.
That's the greatest monetary expansion in the Fed's 95-year history. How the Fed is doing it matters almost as much. It has nearly abandoned its traditional instrument for monetary policy, open-market operations, which involves the purchasing and selling of full-faith-and-credit US Treasury securities. With increasing frequency and amounts, it has relied primarily on "discount window operations" – lending to specific institutions for specific purposes instead of general injections of funds into an open market – since August 2007. This shift may weaken its ability to "tighten" monetary conditions should inflation reach dangerous levels.
A gold standard offers exactly the kind of discipline that's missing from the Fed. But its impact would be wider: Both in substance and in symbolism, gold provides integrity to the entire global financial system. Governments, however, have historically bridled at the constraint and accountability a gold standard brings. After all, when currency can be exchanged for gold, it's harder for governments to inflate the money supply, which they're tempted to do in order to spend beyond their means or cheat on their debts.
Before 1933, you could, generally speaking, trade a US dollar for a set amount of gold. That gave the dollar strength and stability. During World War I, when European governments abandoned gold and inflated their currencies to pay for the war effort, the US maintained its gold backing.
In 1933, however, to enable the Treasury to finance massive new government spending hailed as an economic recovery package – sound familiar? – President Roosevelt suspended domestic transactions in gold, and reduced the dollar's gold value. Finally, in 1971, President Nixon officially abandoned the gold standard. The dollar – and inflation – has fluctuated wildly ever since.
Today's Fed thus faces virtually no constraints. Were a gold standard in place, it could not possibly have doubled its balance sheet in only seven weeks without triggering a wholesale flight from the dollar analogous to the summer of 1971.
Weimar Germany experienced one of the greatest inflations in modern history in 1922 and 1923. Eventually, the official exchange rate reached 4.2 trillion marks per dollar. Some Germans heated their homes by burning cash, since it was cheaper than buying wood. The inflation finally was tamed by government bonds promising repayment in gold, backed by land taxes also payable in gold.
Today, if the US price level responded directly with the Fed's current rate of expansion of its own credit, then the technical conditions for Weimar-style hyperinflation could be upon us. Fortunately, Fed credit expansion acts on the domestic price level with a significant time lag. But could it tighten monetary conditions if it had to, having shifted its reliance to the discount window and the specific projects being financed there?
That's why a conversation about a gold standard is needed. But could it realistically make a comeback? Anna J. Schwartz, who co-wrote with Milton Friedman the highly influential book, "A Monetary History of the United States: 1867-1960," suggested at a 2004 gold conference at the American Institute for Economic Research that only a crisis of sufficient depth and magnitude would provoke the public to demand the stability of gold or a gold-linked currency. Such a crisis, which appeared remote at the time, may soon be upon us.
There's another significant point that Ms. Schwartz raised in 2004: The size of government itself would have to shrink radically to permit a complete return to gold. Before 1933, the share of gross domestic product represented by government at all levels was about 10 percent. Today, the national average of that share is about 35 percent. Any adjustment to economic shocks has to be absorbed by a proportionately much smaller private sector than was the case 75 years ago.
Some critics worry that a return to gold would make credit harder to come by. It's true that the kind of ultra-loose credit that fuels housing bubbles would be marginalized, but normal credit in a gold system would tend to be cheaper because concerns about the future value of repayments are diminished.
America faces a stark choice. The path back to a gold standard is rocky and uphill. The current inflationary path is slippery and downhill. One leads to integrity and stability. The other could lead to financial ruin. Which will we choose?
• Walker Todd, an economic consultant with 20 years' experience at the Federal Reserve Banks of New York and Cleveland, is a research fellow and conference organizer for the American Institute for Economic Research in Great Barrington, Mass.
Sprint suffers loss as customers flee, shares slump
Fri Nov 7, 2008 12:19pm EST
NEW YORK (Reuters) - Sprint Nextel Corp (S.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz),
the No. 3 U.S. mobile service, posted a third-quarter loss and a 12
percent drop in revenue as customers fled to rival services.
The shares fell 13 percent by midday on Friday, although analysts
said Sprint's announcement that it had restructured its credit
agreements helped to soothe worries about bankruptcy.
Bernstein Research analyst Craig Moffett called the amended credit
facility "a spoonful of sugar ... but the medicine is bitter indeed."
"Sprint's subscriber losses were significantly worse than consensus
expectations ... which is saying something, by the way, because
expectations had already gotten progressively worse in recent days," he
said.
Sprint lost 1.1 million customers who pay monthly bills, known as
postpaid subscribers. The average expectation was for a loss of 1.0
million postpaid users, according to five analysts surveyed by Reuters.
Their estimates ranged from losses of 950,000 to 1.1 million.
Including postpaid and prepaid customers, who pay for calls in
advance and do not commit to monthly contracts, Sprint lost 1.3 million
customers in the quarter.
The company has struggled in the past year to stem customer losses
amid service problems, weak marketing and an economic downturn that
especially hurt its low-credit customers.
"We have yet to turn the corner," Chief Executive Dan Hesse told analysts on a conference call.
WEAKER THAN EXPECTED
The company posted a net loss for the fourth-straight quarter. The
loss totaled of $326 million, or 11 cents a share, compared with a
profit of $64 million, or 2 cents per share, in the year-ago quarter.
Excluding items and amortization, Sprint broke even, compared with
Wall Street's average forecast of 3 cents in earnings per share,
according to Reuters Estimates.
Revenue fell 12 percent to $8.81 billion, slightly below the average estimate of $8.86 billion.
Wireless post-paid average revenue per user (ARPU) was $56, down nearly 6 percent from a year earlier.
Sprint said it expects continued pressure on post-paid subscribers
and "slight downward pressure" on post-paid ARPU in the fourth quarter.
Its shares fell 47 cents to $3.21 by mid-morning trade, and S&P
Equity Research cut its price target to $5. They have fallen around 60
percent over the past six months on worries about customer losses to
rivals AT&T Inc (T.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and Verizon Wireless, a venture of Verizon Communications (VZ.N: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz) and Vodafone Group Plc (VOD.L: Quote, Profile, Research, Stock Buzz).
AT&T shares rose 4.5 percent to $27.15, while Verizon shares rose 2.3 percent to $29.93.
Sprint said late last month that it had given up efforts to sell its
iDen network, which has been seeing heavy customer losses, after it
failed to find a buyer.
There have also been concerns about its debt. Sprint announced
earlier on Friday that it renegotiated the terms of its revolving
credit facility, a move that gives it more breathing space against
financial covenants.
The company also paid down $1.0 billion of the outstanding loan amount under the amended credit agreement.
Stifel Nicolaus analyst Christopher King said the move helps takes
bankruptcy concerns off the table until the credit facility expires in
2010, but noted it will be paying higher interest.
Sprint said it would pay interest of LIBOR plus a margin between
2.50 percent to 3.00 percent depending on debt ratings, compared to a
previous 0.75 percent.
(Reporting by Ritsuko Ando and Sinead Carew; Editing by Brian Moss)
I saw a headline in the paper today that said people are beginning to question whether to buy organic food because times are getting tough and they don't want to spend the money on it.
So, okay, let's go back to eating food grown conventionally. And what will you spend on health care for the problems created by the pesticides, herbicides, fungicides, chemical fertilizers, hormones, and genetically altered and denatured food that results from that way of farming?
And what will it cost you when the animal products you eat or drink contain antibiotics that promote antibiotic-resistant strains of bacteria that cause illnesses that are ever-harder to cure with the treatments we have?
And where will your dollars go when you buy conventional food, especially refined and processed products? Straight into the coffers of the big agribusiness companies. Do you think their bottom line is your good health? Think again.
I was checking out at the supermarket today behind a dad and his young son. I happened to notice the over-refined, processed, sugary and fat-laden foods he was buying for that kid. Cheaper than organic? Sure. Better for the kid? No. Cheaper in the long run? Far from it.
Turning away from organic foods because of the cost? Wait a minute. Organic agriculture is sustainable. That means you can grow food this way in perpetuity without wrecking the land and its ecosystems. What do you think is the cost of soil erosion, waterway pollution, and the depletion of topsoil under conventional agriculture? The bill may not come due today, but it will come due tomorrow.
Shop wisely, shoppers. You don't have to eat the most expensive organic products in the store. I shop regularly at an organic market. And I have discovered that there is a wide price range of organic products available for almost every item in the store.
Keep in mind a good balance of starches and carbohydrates (pastas, breads, potatoes, etc.), proteins (meats, tofu, milk, eggs, etc.), and lots of leafy and root vegetables (spinach, chard, kale, carrots, parsnips, rutabagas, etc.). If you buy them raw and unprocessed and cook them yourself at home, the cost won't be much more than you'd pay at the big conventional supermarkets.
As for fruits, stick with what's in season. Blueberries from Argentina are expensive. Blueberries from here aren't, if you buy plenty in July so you can freeze some for the winter months. Buy local, seasonal fruits and vegetables grown organically.
Frequent the farmers markets and the farm stands. Buy tomatoes at the peak of their season and for goodness sake make tomato sauce to use for spaghetti. Last year, we grew six tomato plants in a 20x 12 plot and canned 48 quarts of spaghetti sauce from their bounty.
Think ahead in the summer months. When the farmers markets shut down for the winter, make sure you've put some food by for the winter by buying organic fruits and vegetables when they're in season and canning and freezing them, plus drying some for fruit leather. Do you know that you can buy Butternut squash in the fall and store it on the floor of a cold room or garage perfectly well over winter, as long as the room doesn't freeze? It only gets sweeter.
And those organic treats, like ice cream? Invest in a home ice cream maker and use organic cream to make your own using your own frozen fruit. It's cheaper than conventional ice cream if you do it that way. Make a cake with organic flour and freeze slices. Take your organic chicken carcasses and instead of throwing them in the garbage, boil them in water with an onion to make your own chicken broth for soups and stews.
When the cherries were ripe last June, I filled a crock with sugar and brandy and cherries and covered it tightly. I put it away in the garage and will open it, with great fanfare and delight, at Christmastime.
Get creative. Have fun. But for goodness sake, stay organic, for in that way you protect yourself, your loved ones, and the earth that grows our food.
Opponents of a U.S.-Iraqi plan that would let American forces stay in Iraq through 2011 blocked debate on the issue today during a raucous session of the national Parliament.
The cost of living in the U.S. fell by the most on record and construction began on the fewest homes ever last month, evidence the economy is in the worst recession in at least a quarter century.
Senate negotiators sought on Wednesday to craft a compromise plan to bail out distressed U.S. automakers as industry chief executives again pressed their case for urgent help in a second day of hearin
On a misty mountaintop on the Indonesian island of Sulawesi, scientists for the first time in more than eight decades have observed a living pygmy tarsier, one of the planet's smallest and rarest....
A scientist is going public with his Christian belief in God and acceptance of evolution, in the wake of the Dover trial and recent, high-profile scholarly writings that have highlighted the contradic
Physicians at four European universities have completed what they say is the first successful transplant of a human windpipe using a patient’s own stem cells....
Sequoia-backed visual search engine SearchMe finally got approval on their iPhone application - it appears to have been sitting at Apple waiting for approval for over two months.
So it really does exist. The 14-minute "Carnival of Light" track, long the stuff of Beatles legend, will finally see the light of day, according to Paul McCartney, who says he's always been fond of th
Citigroup Inc. is shedding approximately 53,000 more employees in the coming quarters as the banking giant struggles to steady itself after suffering massive losses from deteriorating debt.
Genetically-modified crops could be grown by the Government in secret locations in an attempt to prevent trials being attacked by saboteurs, it has been reported.
"Carnival of Light", a 14-minute experimental track, recorded in 1967 and performed just once in public could finally be released, according to Paul McCartney.
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