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News briefs: July 11
Posted: Fri, Jul 12, 2002, 8:09 AM ET (1209 GMT)
- The White House formally nominated Frederick Gregory to be the Deputy Administrator of NASA on Thursday. Gregory, currently associate administrator for space flight, was tapped for the post several months ago, but was not formally nominated by the Bush Administration until now. His nomination must be approved by the Senate, which is prepared to expedite the process with few problems expected.
- Observations by a European spacecraft suggest that the universe may be older than expected. Observations of a distant quasar by the XMM-Newton x-ray observatory turned up higher concentrations of iron than expected. Unless there is a currently-unknown way to generate large amounts of iron early in the universe's history, then astronomers say the only way to explain the findings would be if the universe is older than its current age of about 13 billion years.
- A new study has linked an increase in satellite insurance rates to an increase in on-orbit problems with spacecraft. The Futron Corporation study found that satellite anomalies have increased 146 percent in the last four years, while insurance rates have gone up 129 percent in the same period. While part of the increase in anomalies is due to an increase in the number of satellites in orbit, increases in technical complexity of spacecraft and a shortening of the production cycle have also contributed.
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