NASA's Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter has begun the final portion of its "aerobraking" process of using friction with the top of Mars' atmosphere to shrink its orbit. "We are in the end-game part of aerobraking from now until August 30, when we will fire our thrusters to move the spacecraft out of an atmosphere-grazing orbit," said Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter Project Manager Jim Graf, of NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, Pasadena, Calif.

There is a cool multimedia simulation of this process at this website at JPL.

Career success for an engineer or an IT professional involves more than just technical knowledge. To do really well you must be able to: (1) become expert and remain expert in your field; (2) successfully get jobs that are being offered; (3)understand what is really needed and wanted to get ahead where you are working; (4) plan your work so that it can get done; (5) manage your work so that it actually gets done; and (6) let people know about what you have done and what you could do in the future. The first step is a weak point for some, particularly remaining expert in a technical field. Self-directed study is essential to expand as a professional. One resource to assist anyone who wants to improve on their ability to study is the Technology of Study booklet. I recommend it to anyone.
Bob

Sept 14 Web cast: Beyond Pluto: The Discovery of 2003 UB313, by Caltech Professor Michael Brown. Go to this site by 7 pm PDT on Thursday, September 14.

Ulysses is a sun-observing spacecraft that is a joint effort between the European Space Agence (ESA) and NASA. It launched in 1990 and it is still orbiting the Sun. It’s orbit over the solar poles gives unique insight into the forces behind space weather. Magnetic storms can disable wireless telephone calls, satellite communications and electric power grids. Predicting when such solar activity will strike is a fundamental goal of space weather research. The first pass of the south pole of the sun occured in 1994, the first pass of the north pole in 1995.

I recommend the Sci Fi book "To the Stars". It is a classic.

What's a Planet? and How many are there? This is being debated right now, and a decision may be reached this Thursday. The International Astronomical Union is meeting in Prague, where national representatives will give thumbs up or down to IAU’s latest planet definition proposal. Here is a link to more details.

Want to participate in a Space Mission? Stardust@home is a space science project in which volunteers from the general public help scientists locate particles from distant stars. The particles were captured by the spacecraft Stardust and are embedded in collector plates made of aerogel, which were carried by the spacecraft. The aerogel plates, and the particles within them, were returned to Earth in a sample return capsule on January 15, 2006. The purpose of Stardust@home is to find the particles within the aerogel plates. For more data, see this website.

Stress at work can be a serious problem. People can get so absorbed, that work goes undone or gets poorly done. There are 7 easy things that anyone can do to reduce the harm that stress can cause. I have helped a number of people at work with these techniques.

Voyager 1, the most distant human-made object in the cosmos, reached 100 astronomical units from the sun on Tuesday, August 15. That means the spacecraft, which launched nearly three decades ago, will be 100 times more distant from the sun than Earth is. Voyager 1 will be about 15 billion kilometers (9.3 billion miles) from the sun. Voyager 1 is now at the outer edge of our solar system, in an area called the heliosheath, the zone where the sun's influence wanes. This region is the outer layer of the 'bubble' surrounding the sun, and no one knows how big this bubble actually is. Voyager 1 is literally venturing into the great unknown and is approaching interstellar space. Traveling at a speed of about one million miles per day, Voyager 1 could cross into interstellar space within the next 10 years.

NASA's Planetary Photojournal is really cool. Check it out.

The ability to study and learn is essential for active professionals. Here are some resources that can improve these skills, even for the highly educated professional.

Mars Rovers are still active. A slide show was recently released that shows recent images. Enjoy!

I saw a wonderful presentation by a group of summer students on how to conduct a space mission to one of the moons of Saturn. I was struck by the fact that some of these students had very good role models on how to speak to an audience -- and they were from mostly second or third generation "professional" families. Other students lacked confidence and skills.
This is a vital career skill, which will distinguish leaders from other people. I highly recommend the Success Through Communication course to anyone who wants to upgrade their communication skills. This is the training that helped me get my first job at a major aerospace institution.
Bob

When human rights are not well known by people, abuses such as discrimination, intolerance, injustice, oppression and slavery can arise.

Born out of the atrocities and enormous loss of life during World War II, the Universal Declaration of Human Rights was created by the United Nations to provide a common understanding of what everyone’s rights are. It forms the basis for a world built on freedom, justice and peace.

Dr. James Van Allen, who helped usher in the space age as the scientist in charge of the instrument on JPL's Explorer 1 satellite in 1958, died Wednesday, August 9, at the age of 91. On the left, Dr. Van Allen (image courtesy Univ. of Iowa); on the right, a model of Explorer 1, held by JPL's Director William Pickering, scientist James Van Allen and rocket pioneer Wernher von Braun.

Today, Saturn and Earth find themselves almost directly opposite each other with the Sun in between, an event called conjunction. This year, conjunction occurs on August 7.
NASA's Solar and Heliospheric Observatory, known as SOHO (http://sohowww.nascom.nasa.gov/), keeps close watch on the Sun. SOHO images show Saturn on the left moving toward the Sun, which is shielded from view but represented by a white circle in the image center. When Saturn emerges from conjunction, it will appear in SOHO images heading toward the right and away from Sun.
As Earth and Saturn play peekaboo with each other, radio communications with Cassini get very noisy, so most of Cassini's science operations are temporarily suspended. "We'll still be in constant communication," says David Doody, Cassini flight operations lead, "and we'll see the quality degrading as it nears the Sun. The last high-rate science data playback, at 14,220 bits per second, will occur Aug. 4, after which Cassini switches to low-rate telemetry downlink, at 1896 bps."
Note for sky watchers: The first time that Saturn will be visible again to the unaided eye from here on Earth will be about two weeks after conjunction. On the morning of Aug. 20, Saturn will rise in the east an hour before the sun does. Early birds in the United States will be able to spot swift Mercury one degree above Saturn. The next morning, they can spot Mercury one degree to the lower left of the planet. On Aug. 26 and 27 Saturn pairs with much brighter Venus.

You can have a great career if you know what condition you are in and are applying the steps of the right condition formula. There are twelve conditions, with confusion at the bottom and power at the top. You normally start a new job or a new project at "Non-Existence". If you apply the four steps of the Non-Existence formula correctly, you move up to a higher condition. If you do not, you drop to a lower condition. Every professional, every project, and every organization is in one of these twelve conditions. Lucky managers make wild guesses about their condition and what they should do next (often they discover that they are actually unlucky with this approach). Smart managers know their conditions and condition formulas cold. There is a booklet that describes all the specifics, at this location.

10th Planet? There's a Webcast on the discovery of "2003 UB313" will take place on Thursday, September 14 at 7 pm, PDT.
Click here on Thursday at 7 p.m. PDT for the webcast.

I completed jury duty the other day. The people involved were very interesting. The ability to communicate was what distinguished the people who could run things (the Judge, the lawyers, the jury foreman), the people who were being led, and the person who got convicted of criminal activity. Anyone who wants to be a leader will need good or excellent communication skills. The best way to get those skills is the Success Through Communication course. This course is available now at these organizations.
Bob