gary
16-02-2011, 12:28 PM
How time does seem to fly!
In October and November 1997 and then again in the period May to August 1998,
NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) provided a couple of opportunities
for people connected to the Internet from around the world to submit their names
which were then engraved on a set of microchips and then flown on-board
the Stardust comet mission.
Undoubtedly there will be many readers here, who, like me, vividly remember
typing in their own names and that of family members as if it were only yesterday.
However, the reality is that only yesterday Stardust made a fly-by of Comet Tempel 1,
some twelve years since its launch.
If you submitted your name to fly on Stardust, you can look it up here from
the links provided from this page -
http://stardust1.jpl.nasa.gov/overview/microchip/
Microchip #1 contained 136,000 names and Microchip #2 contains over a million.
Duplicate copies of the chips returned to Earth in the sample return capsule
and are now on display in the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. The other
set are still on the space probe which will orbit the Sun for what is estimated
to be perhaps a million years or more. A sizable period of time when compared to
the hominid evolutionary time line.
It would be interesting to know how many IceInSpace members names are
on board Stardust? Feel free to post. :thumbsup:
In October and November 1997 and then again in the period May to August 1998,
NASA and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) provided a couple of opportunities
for people connected to the Internet from around the world to submit their names
which were then engraved on a set of microchips and then flown on-board
the Stardust comet mission.
Undoubtedly there will be many readers here, who, like me, vividly remember
typing in their own names and that of family members as if it were only yesterday.
However, the reality is that only yesterday Stardust made a fly-by of Comet Tempel 1,
some twelve years since its launch.
If you submitted your name to fly on Stardust, you can look it up here from
the links provided from this page -
http://stardust1.jpl.nasa.gov/overview/microchip/
Microchip #1 contained 136,000 names and Microchip #2 contains over a million.
Duplicate copies of the chips returned to Earth in the sample return capsule
and are now on display in the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum. The other
set are still on the space probe which will orbit the Sun for what is estimated
to be perhaps a million years or more. A sizable period of time when compared to
the hominid evolutionary time line.
It would be interesting to know how many IceInSpace members names are
on board Stardust? Feel free to post. :thumbsup: