From: "Darren Brown"
To:
Sent: Wednesday, October 11, 2000 10:57 PM
Subject: [spacesettlers] Re: Radiation shielding - is it necessary in the
Outer Solar System?

> Hello again,
>

Hello again,

[snikt]
> The point here is not the amount of primary cosmic radiation but the
> secondary radiation. When a high energy cosmic ray hits a human body
> you have a very good chance of it doing little or no damage (your
> body
> is not dense enough) in that case no problem. Now put a nice
> solid/dense lump of steel or a thicker pick of aluminium in the way
> of
> the same cosmic ray you have a good chance of it being stopped. If
> that was what happened, that is it just stopped, you would not have a
> problem but that is not what happens. What you are going to get is
> the particle being stopped and in its place getting a shower of
> secondary, lower energy particles and if these then impact your body
> (and a percentage of them will) you will have a problem, they will
> cause a lot of damage. This is a bit of a paradox really, with
> respect to cosmic radiation, the human body needs either a real lot
> of
> shielding or next to none, having a medium amount is the worst
> situation. Solar radiation (all types except the most energetic -
> rare with our star) works best with more shielding, that is a little
> is better than none and a little more is better still and a lot more
> is a lot better.
>

That is really interesting, Darren! Thanks for the lesson on
primary/secondary cosmic radiation. I was not aware about this difference,
and now that you explained it I have to agree that radiation shielding *is*
a necessity *anywhere* in space. Any habitat would have to be built with
strong materials and all the ones that we know are metals, and they would
generate secondary radiation. So, I'm changing the subject of this thread
;-). (Of course I would not discard advances in materials science that could
make viable habitats made of "superplastics", but at the present time this
is just mere speculation.)

[snikt]
> Possible but not a subject I know a lot about, my wife is the one who
> is into biology.
>

I know that there is some evidence of people with a genetic setup that makes
them very resistant to the deleterious effects of alcohol and cigarettes,
for instance. But I don't know if there is some equivalent resistance (in
humans or animals) regarding radiation...

[snikt]
> Perhaps but there is lots of metal in closer, in fact consider the
> planet Mercury, a (relatively) thin crust/mantel and a solid metal
> (iron/nickel and others) core. A very large core in relation to the
> size of the planet. How hard would it be it bombard it with rocks
> until you dug a large hole? Not the best place to work but then
> mines
> never are.
>

Does Mercury have a solid or a melted core? I remember that it is said that
Mercury is very similar to the Moon (except for the metal core), so a mostly
solid nucleus seems more likely... if that core could be reached, than there
would be an endless supply of metals.

The method of rock bombardment might work, but one could also build giant
mirrors in orbit and vaporize directly a hole (along some years or decades)
by concentrating sunlight in some point of the surface. (And remember,
sunlight is almost seven times stronger in Mercury than on Earth, and the
planet does not have an atmosphere to absorb or reflect part of an incoming
beam.)

Hum, for some reason, it seems that I love projects involving rock-cutting
lasers or drilling beams... ;-)

[snikt]
> Possible but I can see a few small problems but they are really just
> engineering not major breakthroughs. Of course there could be a
> dozen
> things I missed. Maybe a better way to generate power would be to
> dangle a couple of very long conductive lines from a station (well
> shielded) towards Jupiter from a close orbit. The very strong
> magnetic field would be crossed by line/tether and a current
> generated. This is what NASA tried a little while ago from the
> shuttle. They had trouble with abrasion of the cable and also with
> the release, things that could be fixed. Tidal action keeps it lined
> up the right way and to increase power output you just add more
> lines.

Yes, the method of directly generating electricity by extending wires in
space is very ingenious, elegant and efficient, but it has two weak points:

1) You have to have a strong magnetosphere at hand, so probably it would be
viable only in the neighborhood of the gas giants, as in your example
involving Jupiter.

2) What you're doing is converting kinetic energy into electricity. That
means that your station would spiral inward Jupiter as its movement would be
converted into electricity - and eventually it would fall into the planet.
Of course, if your "station" has enough mass (e.g., it is in fact an adapted
asteroid), the amount of kinetic energy would be enormous and sufficient to
keep the station in orbit for a long, long time. (Centuries or millennia,
perhaps. I have just made a quick and error-prone calculation and found out
that an asteroid with a mass of 1.6x10^15Kg - 10Km diameter, supposing a
rock-density of 3000Kg/m^3 - orbiting at 10 Km/s, would have enough kinetic
energy to power its entire surface with 1 KW of light - about the sunlight
power at Earth - during more than seven millennia. Of course I should do a
more accurate calculation using potential gravitational energy, but that
gives us at least an idea of the magnitude of the "lifespan" of such energy
generation method.)

I think that disadvantage (1) is the one that is really restrictive, but
even though that method certainly has its niche of applications.

> Just one of many ways to generate power in space. Also I seem to
> recall something about Helium3 and fusion reactors, damn memory.
>

Helium 3 would lead to fusion reactors that would require less power to get
nuclear "ignition" and where kinetic energy of protons generated during the
reaction could be directly converted into electricity by magnetic induction.
Therefore, Helium 3-deuterium reactors would be more efficient and easy to
get working than the deuterium-tritium reactors under experimentation
nowadays. Of course Earth does not have Helium-3 - it can be found on gas
giants (Uranus, due to its smaller mass, could be a candidate for Helium-3
mining) and also on the Moon, where the Helium-3 generated by the Sun gets
trapped in titanium occurring in the lunar soil (or something like that).

[snikt]
> The Reality Dysfunction, The Neutronium Alchemist and The Naked God
> by
> Peter Hamilton, a three book series that has living habitats as part
> of the setting for the stories, there are also others by the same
> author that use this setting.
>

Cool! I think that I already have some candidates for my next purchase at
Amazon.com ;-). And I was just hit by the curse that plagues wanna-be
science fiction authors: there is always someone who had the same idea that
you thought was completely original...

> Here are a few web sites you might want to look at.
>
> http://www.asi.org/
>
> http://members.aol.com/oscarcombs/settle.htm
>
> http://members.aol.com/oscarcombs/spacsetl.htm
>
> http://www.spacefuture.com/
>
> http://www.permanent.com/
>

Thanks. In fact, I already know those links, except for SpaceFuture, which
was down and so I could not check it to see if I have already visited that.

Talking about the Artemis Project... Have you seen the news about the
Chinese space program and their desire to send people to the Moon?

> Darren Brown.

[snikt]
Dr. Omni
ICQ # 53853815

Salutations,

One point before I reply. First I must admit to a mistake, I called
it a Mass Coronal Ejection, a look at the space weather site attached
to NASA tells me that it's a Coronal Mass Ejection, a CME not a MCE,
a
minor point but I really don't like to pass on faulty data.

It seems that you and I are the only active people in here, how
disappointing. Tell me you have called this "Spacesettlers", I
assume
from that you are mostly interested in the human settlement aspect of
space exploration? Don't get me wrong, given a magic wand I would
spend the worlds military budget on getting us (the human race in
general) into a multi-planet/habitat situation. Just consider how we
currently have all our eggs in one basket. All it would take is a
single large lump of cosmic flotsam and even with twenty years notice
we still might not be able to do anything. In fact politics,
religion, the laws of physics and human nature could effectively
undermine any attempt to save ourselves. To that end the more places
we are the lest chance of any single, natural disaster putting a stop
to us. I was just wondering about your interests, your pseudonym
"DrOmni" would indicate a wide ranging interest, it would help to
know
if I was talking to a specialist or a polymath. The wonders of the
internet, I sit in my office in Australia and try to decide how to
answer a post from Brazil, not a simple thing. What to say well
here
goes.

>That is really interesting, Darren! Thanks for the lesson on
>primary/secondary cosmic radiation. I was not aware about this
difference,
>and now that you explained it I have to agree that radiation
shielding *is*

It is not really a difference so much as a way to describe two faces
of the same coin. There is not really a thing such as Primary and
Secondary radiation so much as radiation at various levels of energy
and penetrating power and what happens when a powerful (high energy)
particle hits something solid/dense. An example of this when
telescopes on the ground scan the sky looking for flashes of light
from high energy cosmic rays hitting the upper atmosphere and
bursting
into a shower of particles. The single particle is the primary and
the shower is the secondary, so to speak.

>a necessity *anywhere* in space. Any habitat would have to be built
with
>strong materials and all the ones that we know are metals, and they
would
>generate secondary radiation. So, I'm changing the subject of this
thread
>;-). (Of course I would not discard advances in materials science
that could
>make viable habitats made of "superplastics", but at the present
time
this
>is just mere speculation.)

They might not be plastic but all kinds of possibilities exist, there
is a page at one of the NASA sites that talks about research into
materials science.

>[snikt]
>> Possible but not a subject I know a lot about, my wife is the one
who
>> is into biology.
>>
>
>I know that there is some evidence of people with a genetic setup
that makes
>them very resistant to the deleterious effects of alcohol and
cigarettes,
>for instance. But I don't know if there is some equivalent
resistance
(in
>humans or animals) regarding radiation...

I'm on very shaky ground here but I seem to recall something about
micro-organisms that were able to take huge amounts of radiation and
survive. The problem as I see it is not the health of the mature
adult but possible damage to the genes in the reproductive cells
leading to a large (maybe too large) number of mutations, increasing
the genetic load to the point where the system collapses under the
drain on resources and loss of viability.

>[snikt]
>> Perhaps but there is lots of metal in closer, in fact consider the
>> planet Mercury, a (relatively) thin crust/mantel and a solid metal
>> (iron/nickel and others) core. A very large core in relation to
the
>> size of the planet. How hard would it be it bombard it with rocks
>> until you dug a large hole? Not the best place to work but then
>> mines
>> never are.
>
>Does Mercury have a solid or a melted core? I remember that it is
said that
>Mercury is very similar to the Moon (except for the metal core), so
a
mostly
>solid nucleus seems more likely... if that core could be reached,
than there
>would be an endless supply of metals.

Not endless but it might as well be for all practical purposes. And
yes, I think the latest state of play gives Mercury a liquid inner
core but the outer is solid and very close to the surface, only a few
hundred kilometres (I know that sounds like a lot but not if you
throw
really big rocks)

>
>The method of rock bombardment might work, but one could also build
giant
>mirrors in orbit and vaporize directly a hole (along some years or
decades)
>by concentrating sunlight in some point of the surface. (And
remember,
>sunlight is almost seven times stronger in Mercury than on Earth,
and
the
>planet does not have an atmosphere to absorb or reflect part of an
incoming
>beam.)
>
>Hum, for some reason, it seems that I love projects involving
rock-cutting
>lasers or drilling beams... ;-)

Yes, you do seem to like drills, while I think a big hammer is
cheaper, not better, just cheaper.

>Yes, the method of directly generating electricity by extending
wires
in
>space is very ingenious, elegant and efficient, but it has two weak
points:
>
>1) You have to have a strong magnetosphere at hand, so probably it
would be
>viable only in the neighborhood of the gas giants, as in your example
>involving Jupiter.
>
>2) What you're doing is converting kinetic energy into electricity.
That
>means that your station would spiral inward Jupiter as its movement
would be
>converted into electricity - and eventually it would fall into the
planet.
>Of course, if your "station" has enough mass (e.g., it is in fact an
adapted
>asteroid), the amount of kinetic energy would be enormous and
sufficient to
>keep the station in orbit for a long, long time. (Centuries or
millennia,
>perhaps. I have just made a quick and error-prone calculation and
found out
>that an asteroid with a mass of 1.6x10^15Kg - 10Km diameter,
supposing a
>rock-density of 3000Kg/m^3 - orbiting at 10 Km/s, would have enough
kinetic
>energy to power its entire surface with 1 KW of light - about the
sunlight
>power at Earth - during more than seven millennia. Of course I
should
do a
>more accurate calculation using potential gravitational energy, but
that
>gives us at least an idea of the magnitude of the "lifespan" of such
energy
>generation method.)
>
>I think that disadvantage (1) is the one that is really restrictive,
but
>even though that method certainly has its niche of applications.

The gas giants are really big so there is a lot of room to put power
plants but it occurs to me that I read that some of Jupiter's inner
moons were in fact inside the magnetosphere. If that is the case
then
all you need do is cover the surface with wires and sit back.

>> Just one of many ways to generate power in space. Also I seem to
>> recall something about Helium3 and fusion reactors, damn memory.
>
>Helium 3 would lead to fusion reactors that would require less power
to get
>nuclear "ignition" and where kinetic energy of protons generated
during the
>reaction could be directly converted into electricity by magnetic
induction.
>Therefore, Helium 3-deuterium reactors would be more efficient and
easy to
>get working than the deuterium-tritium reactors under experimentation
>nowadays. Of course Earth does not have Helium-3 - it can be found
on
gas
>giants (Uranus, due to its smaller mass, could be a candidate for
Helium-3
>mining) and also on the Moon, where the Helium-3 generated by the
Sun
gets
>trapped in titanium occurring in the lunar soil (or something like
that).

The moon is a lot closer that Jupiter or Uranus, a good place to
start, in fact the moon is a good place to build a large fusion
reactor, if anything went wrong, well there isn't a lot they could
damage, is there. But you should have a look at
http://antimatter.phys.psu.edu/documents.html . This group have also
been reported on in Science and New Scientist
http://www.newscientist.com/home.html and on the NASA site.

>> The Reality Dysfunction, The Neutronium Alchemist and The Naked God
>> by
>> Peter Hamilton, a three book series that has living habitats as
part
>> of the setting for the stories, there are also others by the same
>> author that use this setting.

>Cool! I think that I already have some candidates for my next
purchase at
>Amazon.com ;-). And I was just hit by the curse that plagues wanna-be
>science fiction authors: there is always someone who had the same
idea that
>you thought was completely original...

Always the way, still if you borrow one person it's plagiarism but if
you borrow from ten people it's research.

>Talking about the Artemis Project... Have you seen the news about the
>Chinese space program and their desire to send people to the Moon?

Yes but I don't know if I would be quick to volunteer, the Chinese
satellite program has been threatened with having its insurance
revoked due to the number of launch problems, including total
destruction of the rocket. Don't know if I'd feel safe enough.

Darren Brown

From: "Darren Brown"
To:
Sent: Thursday, October 19, 2000 3:07 AM
Subject: [spacesettlers] Re: Ok, radiation shielding is necessary *anywhere*

> Salutations,
>

Salutations,

> One point before I reply. First I must admit to a mistake, I called
> it a Mass Coronal Ejection, a look at the space weather site attached
> to NASA tells me that it's a Coronal Mass Ejection, a CME not a MCE,
> a
> minor point but I really don't like to pass on faulty data.
>

Seems the same to me (order of adjectives in English always seemed
irrelevant to me, but maybe that's just because I'm not a native speaker);
anyway, ok, lets use CME from this point on.

> It seems that you and I are the only active people in here, how
> disappointing.

Indeed. Well, I received a message from another guy, nicknamed "Seagull",
but he never posted anything more again. The case is that this group is
somewhat recent and I made no effort to advertise it. Hummmmmm... Perhaps if
I put it in my signature, though that perhaps would not be *that* useful: I
am also a member of a science list and a skeptics list - for Brazilians -
and I would have to catch the attention of someone who at the same time
likes the subject of space colonization and also feels comfortable writing
in English - not a much frequent combination. By the way, do you participate
on any other lists/newsgroups with interests intersecting space
colonization? Maybe it would be easier for you to find more potential
members for our list.

> Tell me you have called this "Spacesettlers", I
> assume
> from that you are mostly interested in the human settlement aspect of
> space exploration?

Indeed. With a special emphasis in space settlements/habitats. I'm kind of
skeptical about terraformation projects, for example, though I try to keep
myself open minded to them.

> Don't get me wrong, given a magic wand I would
> spend the worlds military budget on getting us (the human race in
> general) into a multi-planet/habitat situation. Just consider how we
> currently have all our eggs in one basket. All it would take is a
> single large lump of cosmic flotsam and even with twenty years notice
> we still might not be able to do anything. In fact politics,
> religion, the laws of physics and human nature could effectively
> undermine any attempt to save ourselves. To that end the more places
> we are the lest chance of any single, natural disaster putting a stop
> to us.

Yes, yes... It is pretty weird how *everyone* seems to be completely unaware
of the fragility of the human race right know. I also have this sense of
urgency regarding space colonization, but I think that it will take decades
(or even a couple of centuries) for the first off-Earth human settlements
actually exist. I'll be happy if I just see during my lifetime the raise of
some cheap way (a few tens of thousands dollars per ticket ;-) to get into
LEO...

> I was just wondering about your interests, your pseudonym
> "DrOmni" would indicate a wide ranging interest, it would help to
> know
> if I was talking to a specialist or a polymath.

Your guess is right, I'm a generalist. (I prefer that term to "polymath",
which seems to imply that I would have enciclopedic amounts of knowledge
inside my head...) "Dr. Omni" was a nickname given to me by a friend at the
University, because he was used to say that I knew a little bit of
everything; it stuck, and it is the name that I prefer to use in the
Internet. Unlike many internet pseudonyms, it is not a "cover" for hiding my
real name, Lucio de Souza Coelho - it's just a matter of preference, really.

> The wonders of the
> internet, I sit in my office in Australia and try to decide how to
> answer a post from Brazil, not a simple thing. What to say. well
> here
> goes.
>

;-) I chose to create an *international* mailing list because I was
surprised to see that there is *no* list at e-groups dealing with space
habitats - although there are many lists dealing, for example, with
terraformation. It seemed that space habitats are not a very popular
subject - people seem to be too used to living in a planet, and too
brainwashed by decades of science fiction movies and shows with characters
living on planets, to like the idea spacehabs (actually, most of the people
that I know does not even know that concept). Therefore, I thought that I
would need a big enough human mass to get participants on the group - so I
chose English (the international language) as the official language for the
list.

[snikt]
> Yes, you do seem to like drills, while I think a big hammer is
> cheaper, not better, just cheaper.
>

But would the "hammer method" really be that cheap? You would need a
monstrously big electromagnetic mass driver or other mammoth propulsion
system to deflect the orbit of a big asteroid; it is not evident for me why
that would be cheaper than a mirror with a monstrously large surface
(although probably a few micrometers thick).

> The gas giants are really big so there is a lot of room to put power
> plants but it occurs to me that I read that some of Jupiter's inner
> moons were in fact inside the magnetosphere. If that is the case
> then
> all you need do is cover the surface with wires and sit back.
>

Yes, Io is deep inside the magnetosphere and in fact some of the phenomenal
internal heat of that moon is generated by Joule Effect, caused by Jupiter's
magnetic field inducing electric currents through the moon. Maybe even
Europa is deep inside the magnetosphere, but I don't know for sure...

[snikt]
> The moon is a lot closer that Jupiter or Uranus, a good place to
> start, in fact the moon is a good place to build a large fusion
> reactor, if anything went wrong, well there isn't a lot they could
> damage, is there. But you should have a look at
> http://antimatter.phys.psu.edu/documents.html . This group have also
> been reported on in Science and New Scientist
> http://www.newscientist.com/home.html and on the NASA site.
>

I think that antimatter is perhaps the key to deep space travel, but it is
worth to remember that antimatter is not a *source* of energy, it is an
extremely efficient *storage means* for energy. But you need to spend lots
of energy to create antimatter, and that energy would have to come from some
natural (Sun, electric tethers, etc) or artificial (fusion reactors) source.

[snikt]
> Yes but I don't know if I would be quick to volunteer, the Chinese
> satellite program has been threatened with having its insurance
> revoked due to the number of launch problems, including total
> destruction of the rocket. Don't know if I'd feel safe enough.
>

Indeed, the Chinese now are like the Americans in the early 60's, blowing up
a rocket after the other. Building a vehicle that works in extreme
conditions like a space rocket is not an easy task, and is also a technology
that is normally kept secret (due to its utility in building
intercontinental missiles). At least, the Chinese are a bit more advanced
than we Brazilians - we have tried already two or three prototype satellite
launch vehicles along the last year or so, and all of them failed for one
reason or another.

> Darren Brown
[snikt]

Dr. Omni
ICQ# 53853815

--- In spacesettlers@egroups.com, "Dr. Omni" wrote:
> From: "Darren Brown"
> To:
> Sent: Thursday, October 19, 2000 3:07 AM
> Subject: [spacesettlers] Re: Ok, radiation shielding is necessary
*anywhere*

Hello again Lucio,

You are very correct about the ordering of English (in truth a very
illogical and badly structured language, this is the result of
borrowing - stealing - words from so many other languages. I had the
advantage - hmmm .. maybe disadvantage - of being born into an
English speaking culture - my hat's off to anybody who learns it as a
second, third language), I only mention this in order to
conform
with the wording found in site dealing with space weather but Mass
Coronal Ejection and Coronal Mass Ejection do mean the same. As I
said a very minor point.

[.]
>> minor point but I really don't like to pass on faulty data.
>>
>
>Seems the same to me (order of adjectives in English always seemed
>irrelevant to me, but maybe that's just because I'm not a native
speaker);
>anyway, ok, lets use CME from this point on.

You are doing better than me, let me see Brazil, that would be
Portuguese plus English, that gives you at lest one more than me. I
regret not doing a second language at school and now I find myself
too
pressed for time, my daughter however currently learning Spanish.

[.]
>> It seems that you and I are the only active people in here, how
>> disappointing.
>
>Indeed. Well, I received a message from another guy, nicknamed
"Seagull",
>but he never posted anything more again. The case is that this group
is
>somewhat recent and I made no effort to advertise it. Hummmmmm...
Perhaps if
>I put it in my signature, though that perhaps would not be *that*
useful: I
>am also a member of a science list and a skeptics list - for
Brazilians -
>and I would have to catch the attention of someone who at the same
time
>likes the subject of space colonization and also feels comfortable
writing
>in English - not a much frequent combination. By the way, do you
participate
>on any other lists/newsgroups with interests intersecting space
>colonization? Maybe it would be easier for you to find more potential
>members for our list.

Alas no other list relating space colonisation but several that
related to computer security and electronic forensics (my
profession),
I currently average around 200-250 emails a day if I added too many
lists I would drown in mail as it is I spend 4-6 hours a day reading
and responding to mail, add to that the 15 or so journals and all the
memos, new product adverts and miscellaneous correspondence and I am
already having trouble getting through everything. Still we all need
a few interests in life and so I am looking around at things like
this
list.

[.]
>> from that you are mostly interested in the human settlement aspect
of
>> space exploration?
>Indeed. With a special emphasis in space settlements/habitats. I'm
kind of
>skeptical about terraformation projects, for example, though I try
to
keep
>myself open minded to them.

Terraforming is an interesting concept but I really think it has
limited potential here. Consider, there are really only two planets
that could be used, Venus and Mars, both have problems. Venus has a
rotation rate that is much too slow, so even if you managed to fix
the
atmosphere you would still have major problems, given the length of
the day and the amount of sunlight you would be getting the daytime
temperature would most likely be a bit high for comfort and it might
just get a little cool at night, all in all an uncomfortable
situation. This doesn't even begin to address the possible problems
of high UV flux and the human physiological complications that arise
from the extended day/night length. Venus does however have nice
gravity. Moving on to Mars the situation is better but I can see the
need to constantly replenish the atmosphere as the weaker gravity
allows it to bleed off into space. There is also the potential for
difficulties from the weaker surface gravity and what it might do the
long term human development. Lots of possible trouble plus very long
time lines. It sounds good but I'm not convinced that it will work
or
if it does it may be far too expensive or complex (complex systems
have a tendency to fail at the worst time). I once had an augment
with a couple (married) who thought that it was irresponsible and
immoral to be using radio-isotopes in space-craft power systems, they
thought that we were polluting space with radioactive waste. I tried
to tell them that space was itself was full of radiation and that
even
if we vaporised the entire Earth we would only succeed if causing a
very slight local and temporary amount of pollution that wouldn't
even
begin to compare to what was spewed out of a single star. They had
no
idea of comparative volume and mass. If we assume no native life on
a
planet or moon (indigenous life would of course change everything)
then changing the environment to allow people to live on the surface
would force a limit on activities on those planets, after going to
the
trouble and expense of setting up a habitable biosphere you can be
certain they wouldn't want you polluting it and making it
uninhabitable again. There are a lot of activities (mining and
industry just to name two) that we could do on the surface of the
moons and planets as they are now that wouldn't really upset anything
(of course the two people I mentioned before seem to me to be the
type
to object for irrational reasons to everything). Just think if you
had a really dangerous process that you needed to do in a high
gravity
- 1G -, without the side effects to would get on a spinning habitat,
just go to Venus. Some people look at a planet/moon and see a
possible home, I look and see a large mass that nature has
conveniently put in one place. We can live on Earth or a habitat but
the rest are resources that we can use.

[.]
>> Don't get me wrong, given a magic wand I would
>> spend the worlds military budget on getting us (the human race in
>> general) into a multi-planet/habitat situation. Just consider how
we
>> currently have all our eggs in one basket. All it would take is a
>> single large lump of cosmic flotsam and even with twenty years
notice
>> we still might not be able to do anything. In fact politics,
>> religion, the laws of physics and human nature could effectively
>> undermine any attempt to save ourselves. To that end the more
places
>> we are the lest chance of any single, natural disaster putting a
stop
>> to us.
>
>Yes, yes... It is pretty weird how *everyone* seems to be completely
unaware
>of the fragility of the human race right know. I also have this
sense
of
>urgency regarding space colonization, but I think that it will take
decades
>(or even a couple of centuries) for the first off-Earth human
settlements
>actually exist. I'll be happy if I just see during my lifetime the
raise of
>some cheap way (a few tens of thousands dollars per ticket ;-) to
get
into
>LEO...

A number of possible ways exist and are being looked at. One that I
find intriguing is the light craft. A spinning disk that rides on a
pulsed laser light that has been tested to lift a model about 30
metres in the air so far (the last I read). I think it is possible
that within the next, say 20-30 years we will have affordable travel
to LEO.

>> I was just wondering about your interests, your pseudonym
>> "DrOmni" would indicate a wide ranging interest, it would help to
>> know
>> if I was talking to a specialist or a polymath.
>
>Your guess is right, I'm a generalist. (I prefer that term to
"polymath",
>which seems to imply that I would have enciclopedic amounts of
knowledge
>inside my head...) "Dr. Omni" was a nickname given to me by a friend
at the
>University, because he was used to say that I knew a little bit of
>everything; it stuck, and it is the name that I prefer to use in the
>Internet. Unlike many internet pseudonyms, it is not a "cover" for
hiding my
>real name, Lucio de Souza Coelho - it's just a matter of
preference,
really.

I didn't mean to imply that you were attempting to hide anything,
your
profile can be seen in eGroups. I was just commenting that it seemed
to fit what I had seen of your opinions. A polymath doesn't require
an encyclopedic knowledge, just a very strong and broad base. Still
a
generalist is just as good, a specialist as we know is a person who
knows more and more about less and less, alas at work I'm considered
a
specialist, which just goes to show that most people do not know what
they are talking about.

>> The wonders of the
>> internet, I sit in my office in Australia and try to decide how to
>> answer a post from Brazil, not a simple thing. What to say. well
>> here
>> goes.
>
>;-) I chose to create an *international* mailing list because I was
>surprised to see that there is *no* list at e-groups dealing with
space
>habitats - although there are many lists dealing, for example, with
>terraformation. It seemed that space habitats are not a very popular
>subject - people seem to be too used to living in a planet, and too
>brainwashed by decades of science fiction movies and shows with
characters
>living on planets, to like the idea spacehabs (actually, most of the
people
>that I know does not even know that concept). Therefore, I thought
that I
>would need a big enough human mass to get participants on the group
-
so I
>chose English (the international language) as the official language
for the
>list.

True, I must say though a habitat is much more appealing to me. If
we
learn from experience that people do not need a full 1G for normal
health or it is possible to have long periods at less than a full G
then a lot of interesting things are possible. Consider a n extended
family, you could have mother, father and children living at the
lower
level (1G) and grandparents living up the hill at the lower gravity
area (say .5G), where they find it easier to move around and live a
normal life. In fact it might not be just people who need a lower
gravity who live up the hill, maybe a lot of people would like to
live
in a low or even zero G area. Now while a micro-G living space would
not be healthy for permeant living you may be able get around the
problems by living at the top of the hill and working at the bottom.
The point being there is a lot more possible in a habitat, a planet
give you one type of G a habitat gives you all types of G. For my
part, sign me up for the first seat, I'd shovel waste in a sewer to
live in a habitat (not my first choice you understand).

>> Yes, you do seem to like drills, while I think a big hammer is
>> cheaper, not better, just cheaper.
>
>But would the "hammer method" really be that cheap? You would need a
>monstrously big electromagnetic mass driver or other mammoth
propulsion
>system to deflect the orbit of a big asteroid; it is not evident for
me why
>that would be cheaper than a mirror with a monstrously large surface
>(although probably a few micrometers thick).

The main problem with a mirror is keeping it in place but you would
not need a large or expensive propulsion system. You could just go
back to the old Orion concept, take one (or more) fission/fusion bomb
and place at the back of the rock/s and at the right time set it off.
If you do it at the right time you could arrange a slingshot type
orbit (just like we do for most of the long range probes) and drop it
on to your target, repeat as needed. You could also use a low
thrust,
long burn ion drive or a mass driver (mount it on the rock and throw
small bits out the back to act as your propellent, in fact you could
have an iron ion drive - hard to say fast). It might just take a few
years to impact but that is okay, the problem of course is the target
does not have to be Mercury. Who would make sure they were aiming
for
Mercury and not Earth?

>> The gas giants are really big so there is a lot of room to put
power
>> plants but it occurs to me that I read that some of Jupiter's inner
>> moons were in fact inside the magnetosphere. If that is the case
>> then
>> all you need do is cover the surface with wires and sit back.
>
>Yes, Io is deep inside the magnetosphere and in fact some of the
phenomenal
>internal heat of that moon is generated by Joule Effect, caused by
Jupiter's
>magnetic field inducing electric currents through the moon. Maybe
even
>Europa is deep inside the magnetosphere, but I don't know for sure...

There are so many ways to generate power in space that the main
problem is which one to pick. Power is not going to be the limiting
factor. We have a lot of limits here but out there it is raining
riches and all we need do is hold out our hands.

>> The moon is a lot closer that Jupiter or Uranus, a good place to
>> start, in fact the moon is a good place to build a large fusion
>> reactor, if anything went wrong, well there isn't a lot they could
>> damage, is there. But you should have a look at
>> http://antimatter.phys.psu.edu/documents.html . This group have
also
>> been reported on in Science and New Scientist
>> http://www.newscientist.com/home.html and on the NASA site.

>I think that antimatter is perhaps the key to deep space travel, but
it is
>worth to remember that antimatter is not a *source* of energy, it is
an
>extremely efficient *storage means* for energy. But you need to
spend
lots
>of energy to create antimatter, and that energy would have to come
from some
>natural (Sun, electric tethers, etc) or artificial (fusion reactors)
source.

The links I included will take you to a site where they talk about
things they are doing now with anti-matter and the AIMF (Anti-matter
Induced Micro Fusion) project does not use a 100% matter/anti-matter
reaction to give you power but has the anti-matter acting as a
trigger, a few nano-grams of anti-matter will produce a lot more
power
than is consumed in making it (in theory).

>> Yes but I don't know if I would be quick to volunteer, the Chinese
>> satellite program has been threatened with having its insurance
>> revoked due to the number of launch problems, including total
>> destruction of the rocket. Don't know if I'd feel safe enough.
>>
>
>Indeed, the Chinese now are like the Americans in the early 60's,
blowing up
>a rocket after the other. Building a vehicle that works in extreme
>conditions like a space rocket is not an easy task, and is also a
technology
>that is normally kept secret (due to its utility in building
>intercontinental missiles). At least, the Chinese are a bit more
advanced
>than we Brazilians - we have tried already two or three prototype
satellite
>launch vehicles along the last year or so, and all of them failed
for
one
>reason or another.

At lest you have a program, Australia is not even at that point, we
have a few things kicking around but nothing solid. India and Japan
are also pursuing space programs.

Darren Brown

From: "Darren Brown"
To:
Sent: Sunday, October 22, 2000 10:43 AM
Subject: [spacesettlers] Re: Ok, radiation shielding is necessary *anywhere*

[snikt]
> Hello again Lucio,
>

Hello again Darren,

[snikt]
> You are doing better than me, let me see Brazil, that would be
> Portuguese plus English, that gives you at lest one more than me. I
> regret not doing a second language at school and now I find myself
> too
> pressed for time, my daughter however currently learning Spanish.
>

I often heard people whose native language is English saying that they
should learn a foreign language - just like you're doing ;-). But in general
there is no compelling reason for a person who has English as the first
language to learn another language: since English is already the current
universal language, such a person can communicate with people around all
Earth. In countries where the main language is not English, however, there
is an enormous *economic* pressure to learn English. In Brazil, for example,
people who speak English will usually get more and better jobs, and it is
usual for parents of middle and upper class to put their children to learn
English since a tender age; even public schools have basics of English as
part of the classes. Therefore, it is kind of common to find Brazilians who
speak English (and also people who speak Spanish, due to the common market
that we share with our neighbor countries), but people who speak German,
French or any other language are far more rare and do that as a hobby or due
to their ancestry (in the south of Brazil it is extremely common to find
people who speak German, for example, due to the massive colonization that
took place there).

[snikt]
> Alas no other list relating space colonisation but several that
> related to computer security and electronic forensics (my
> profession),
> I currently average around 200-250 emails a day if I added too many
> lists I would drown in mail as it is I spend 4-6 hours a day reading
> and responding to mail, add to that the 15 or so journals and all the
> memos, new product adverts and miscellaneous correspondence and I am
> already having trouble getting through everything. Still we all need
> a few interests in life and so I am looking around at things like
> this
> list.
>

It seems that we are in about the same e-mail situation... It is amazing how
much time I spend with e-mails - most of them from my company.

[snikt]
> A number of possible ways exist and are being looked at. One that I
> find intriguing is the light craft. A spinning disk that rides on a
> pulsed laser light that has been tested to lift a model about 30
> metres in the air so far (the last I read). I think it is possible
> that within the next, say 20-30 years we will have affordable travel
> to LEO.
>

That is also my hope. And yes, the lightcraft seems very promising!

[snikt]
> The point being there is a lot more possible in a habitat, a planet
> give you one type of G a habitat gives you all types of G. For my
> part, sign me up for the first seat, I'd shovel waste in a sewer to
> live in a habitat (not my first choice you understand).

Again, agreed. Also, sometimes I wonder if a habitat is the *only* possible
way for space colonization considering the human physiology. There are
several studies indicating that zero gravity has several deleterious
effects - malformation of fetuses, abnormal citoskeletons, etc - that could
make very difficult (or even impossible) for a human colony to thrive in a
microgravity environment. But in fact no one knows what is the gravitational
threshold that would prevent those hazardous effects: maybe even a gravity
like that of Mars would still be insufficient... We will have to wait for a
lot of studies along this upcoming century to see what kinds of space
colonization options are biologically viable.

[snikt]
> The main problem with a mirror is keeping it in place but you would
> not need a large or expensive propulsion system. You could just go
> back to the old Orion concept, take one (or more) fission/fusion bomb
> and place at the back of the rock/s and at the right time set it off.
> If you do it at the right time you could arrange a slingshot type
> orbit (just like we do for most of the long range probes) and drop it
> on to your target, repeat as needed. You could also use a low
> thrust,
> long burn ion drive or a mass driver (mount it on the rock and throw
> small bits out the back to act as your propellent, in fact you could
> have an iron ion drive - hard to say fast). It might just take a few
> years to impact but that is okay, the problem of course is the target
> does not have to be Mercury. Who would make sure they were aiming
> for
> Mercury and not Earth?
>

I would put my money on the mass driver or ion drive. I think that the nuke
method seems kind of unpredictable - you would deflect the asteroid's orbit,
sure, but it would be hard to say precisely what would be the new orbit. If
you're trying to hit a planet in the Solar System - like Mercury, in our
discussion - then your task is like trying to hit a microbe floating inside
a room, and then I think that we would need very precise methods... (But of
course that is just an intuitive thought, I did no calculation to see the
validity of that.)

And yes, maybe mass drivers could even represent an economy of scale, since
they could be reusable - once a mass driver puts an asteroid in the right
path, it can be moved to another asteroid (by using conventional propulsion
means) and then resume its job in another place.

[snikt]
> Darren Brown
[snikt]

Dr. Omni
ICQ# 53853815

--- In spacesettlers@egroups.com, "Dr. Omni" wrote:
Hello again,
Sorry about the delay in responding but I've been a bit pressed for
time in the last few days, I've spent the last few days in court (as a
witness, part of my work) and I'm just now catching up on my mail.

> I often heard people whose native language is English saying that
they
> should learn a foreign language - just like you're doing ;-). But in
general
> there is no compelling reason for a person who has English as the
first
> language to learn another language: since English is already the
current
> universal language, such a person can communicate with people around
all
> Earth.

True to a degree but don't tell that to the French, they are really
sensitive about English being a "lingua franca", the reason most
diplomats and passports use French as a second language is that until
this century the place that English now holds was held by French, it
was the official language of everything international (during the
Olympics, there was a small protocol problem here during the games,
our Governor General - our head of state is the English Queen and the
GG is her Vice Regal presences in Australia but has very little real
power - refused to speak in French before English). From memory (and
a source I can not remember so it may not be correct) there are about
1 billion English speakers, as a 1st or 2nd language. Now there are
about that number of people in India and more than that in China, I
know that they don't all use the same language but with a strong local
media that will change but maybe not as fast as English is picked up
from satellite. I like the idea of people all around the world being
able to talk to each other, communication is the foundation of
peaceful interaction but I also understand how people who do not have
English as a first language might feel some resentment. By the way
it's my daughter that is learning Spanish, I'd like to but time is not
on my side.

> In countries where the main language is not English, however,
there
> is an enormous *economic* pressure to learn English. In Brazil, for
example,
> people who speak English will usually get more and better jobs, and
it is
> usual for parents of middle and upper class to put their children to
learn
> English since a tender age; even public schools have basics of
English as
> part of the classes. Therefore, it is kind of common to find
Brazilians who
> speak English (and also people who speak Spanish, due to the common
market
> that we share with our neighbor countries), but people who speak
German,
> French or any other language are far more rare and do that as a
hobby or due
> to their ancestry (in the south of Brazil it is extremely common to
find
> people who speak German, for example, due to the massive
colonization that
> took place there).

Australia is such a mix of people these days that it is very common to
walk down a street and see sighs or hear people talking in almost any
language you care to name. As I sit here I have just changed TV
stations, the one I was watching (well listening to in the background
as I read and typed) was the Multi-Cultural station (SBS, we have five
free to air stations, two government stations - SBS & the ABC - and
three commercial stations, plus pay TV which is not the same all over
the country). SBS broadcasts in a large number of languages with
English subtitles where needed, today we have had the usual overseas
news programs in Japanese, Cantonese, Mandarin, Indonesian, German,
French, Serbian and a couple I can't figure out from the name and then
they are followed by programs in Mandarin, Polish, English, French,
Czech, French, English, German and French. This is not the only
languages they vary day by day and the bigger the film/television
industry of the country the more air time they will get. Australia's
mix of cultures gives the station an audience. In fact Australia's
Multiculturalism program is a good example of some of the problems and
solutions that would come up in a habitat with a mixed nationality
population. With a few exceptions (every country has it share of
intolerant low life's) Australians are in the main happy with a
population with mixed ethnic backgrounds. There are at times some
tensions (most often with people who are fighting or having some other
kind of strife in the country of origin, this tends to stop or
decrease after the second or third generation as the children have
trouble identifying with their parents causes). We are proof that
such a culture is possible and from my own experience I can tell you
that a lot of the changes that have happened over the years are
positive, a lot of things the immigrants brought with them have been
made part of our everyday life and this has added a lot of variety to
everything, although sometimes the mix can have odd outcomes. All in
all I think it has been a positive thing, in fact some of the things I
thought I would not like have turned out to be things that now I can't
imagine being without. If you saw some parts of the Olympics and the
other programs that were made at the same time some of the things that
come from such a mixed culture would have come through although I
should point out that still the majority of Australians have an
Anglo-Saxon/Western European background but the mix is changing. With
a habitat and with a number of habitats I think you might have a lot
of strange cultural outcomes but from living in Australia I believe
that they will be positive outcomes, in fact they may even be one of
the better things to come from a habitat.

> [snikt]
> It seems that we are in about the same e-mail situation... It is
amazing how
> much time I spend with e-mails - most of them from my company.

I sometimes wonder if e-mail is a positive part of life or if we have
fallen into a subtle trap.

> [snikt]
> > A number of possible ways exist and are being looked at. One that
I
> > find intriguing is the light craft. A spinning disk that rides on
a
> > pulsed laser light that has been tested to lift a model about 30
> > metres in the air so far (the last I read).
>
> That is also my hope. And yes, the lightcraft seems very promising!

I first saw a mention of this type of craft in a book called "A step
further out" by Jerry Pournelle, then next in an articles in
"Scientific American" and "New Scientist". The Scientific American
links;

http://www.sciam.com/1999/0299issue/0299beardsley.html and
http://www.sciam.com/1999/0299issue/0299beardsleybox4.html

I also recall an interview with Robert Forward where this type of
craft was talked about so the idea seems to have been around for some
time. The Pournelle book is interesting (a quick look at the Barnes &
Nobel web site - bn.com - shows they still have some copies in the out
of print section), it has a chapter devoted to the reality that an
astroid belt based nation would have to deal with. It assumes that
some kind of fusion based rocket able to manage 1G for prolonged
periods (a common staple of such stories used to make the transit
times manageable, that is days and weeks not months and years), and he
find that the capital of such a nation would most likely be not be on
one of the larger rocks but on Mars. So much for the independent
republic of the astroid belt.

> Again, agreed. Also, sometimes I wonder if a habitat is the *only*
possible
> way for space colonization considering the human physiology. There
are
> several studies indicating that zero gravity has several deleterious
> effects - malformation of fetuses, abnormal citoskeletons, etc -
that could
> make very difficult (or even impossible) for a human colony to
thrive in a
> microgravity environment. But in fact no one knows what is the
gravitational
> threshold that would prevent those hazardous effects: maybe even a
gravity
> like that of Mars would still be insufficient... We will have to
wait for a
> lot of studies along this upcoming century to see what kinds of
space
> colonization options are biologically viable.

Yes, we don't know all that we should but given a way to orbit then
building a habitat with a reasonable pseudo gravity shouldn't be that
big a problem. While micro-G might be great for a while it would soon
present problems with day to day life. When the first long term
stations were being designed (Skylab, Mir) they encountered a lot of
problems with lots of little, basic things that would make living
there forever uncomfortable, people might be able to adapt to the
physical things but they will not want to be uncomfortable. Just
consider basics like cooking, no way to keep things on a plate, no
convection to cook things in a pot or how about babies, they wouldn't
be born with the knowledge of how to use a toilet with suction or how
to stop from choking on the vomit they often bring up after feeding.
It might be that our bodies could adapt to micro-G but could our
lifestyle? We may only need 0.1G or 0.5G but if you are going to spin
a habitat to give say 0.5G then why not a full 1G and then just have
multiple levels where people could move to what ever suited them?

> I would put my money on the mass driver or ion drive. I think that
the nuke
> method seems kind of unpredictable - you would deflect the
asteroid's orbit,
> sure, but it would be hard to say precisely what would be the new
orbit. If
> you're trying to hit a planet in the Solar System - like Mercury, in
our
> discussion - then your task is like trying to hit a microbe floating
inside
> a room, and then I think that we would need very precise methods...
(But of
> course that is just an intuitive thought, I did no calculation to
see the
> validity of that.)

Large nuclear explosions would not be that unpredictable, besides you
would need more than one and in fact a combination of systems. The
big blast would start you moving and then long/short burns from an ion
drive to steer. It would not be that different from what we use now,
one big burn at the start and lots of smaller corrections on the way.
Of course none of it would be needed unless you wanted to try to crack
the crust of the planet and given the amount of raw martial that is
out there it most likely would not be needed.

> And yes, maybe mass drivers could even represent an economy of
scale, since
> they could be reusable - once a mass driver puts an asteroid in the
right
> path, it can be moved to another asteroid (by using conventional
propulsion
> means) and then resume its job in another place.

Yes, this is possible.

One other point to think about. The building of and the moving of a
habitat is just the start, once you have the shell and it moving in
the right orbit and spinning at the right speed, what next?

Now you have to get a population and then you have to house, feed,
clothe, water, entertain, supply air and a general environment for
them. What happens to the excess heat or do you need to supply heat?
Where does the sewerage go and what happens to it? What do you
produce and who buys it? How do you get it to your customers?

Just a few of the many questions that need answers.

Darren Brown

--- In spacesettlers@egroups.com, "Darren Brown"

> What happens to the excess heat or do you need to supply
heat?

If we're talking about the solar-powered habitats of O'Neill, we'll
need to dump excess heat. Fans circulating air through metal
radiators should be sufficient.

> Where does the sewerage go and what happens to it?

To the CELSS of course. We just try not to think about it too much.
:)

Another alternative was proposed by Marshall Savage. He recommended
use of a super-critical combustion chamber to combust sewerage down to
simple compounds, which would then go into the CELSS. It's just a
choice between using microorganisms to do the job, or using the
machine Savage recommends.

> What do you
> produce and who buys it? How do you get it to your customers?

I get lots of arguments from Mars advocates, but I still say SPS is a
plausible export for orbital settlements, and Earth is the market for
it. O'Neill was intelligent and practical enough to know that his
vision of orbital habitats would not be realized until he could
identify a market better served from space than from Earth, and I
think he correctly identified it. When I ask what market is better
served from Mars than anywhere else, I just get told that exports
aren't really all that important, and money isn't everything.

The thing I like about SPS is that the customer being served is Earth.
I can't seem to convince Mars advocates that the first customer for
our products has to be Earth people. They don't seem to understand
that saying the justification for settling Mars is to serve the
markets that the Martians will require is a circular argument.

I think O'Neill was correct in saying that the only products better
produced in space than on Earth are orbital assets, but orbital assets
can still be sold to customers on Earth. The beauty of SPS is that
power can be beamed down. I don't have as much confidence in the idea
that anything might be mined in space and then sent down to the Earth,
although I suppose some platinum group metals might be an outside
possibility.

Rgds,
Mike Combs

Hi, Mike! I'm honored to see you participating of our list! Your site on
space settlements was one of the things that helped me to recover from my
Mars terraforming brainwash... ;-) Well, now lets go to your message...

From: "Mike Combs"
To:
Sent: Tuesday, November 07, 2000 12:30 PM
Subject: [spacesettlers] Re: Ok, radiation shielding is necessary *anywhere*

[snikt]
> If we're talking about the solar-powered habitats of O'Neill, we'll
> need to dump excess heat. Fans circulating air through metal
> radiators should be sufficient.
>

Are there cases were we would not need to dump excess heat? Hmmmm...
Nuke-powered habitats would have to drain excess heat from the reactor, but
perhaps not from the habitat itself; and "tether-powered" habitats (I don't
know if there is a more elegant name for this, a habitat that would generate
electricity directly by using a tether to cross the force lines of a
planetary magnetic field) maybe would not need any dumping at all, if
cleverly designed. Is that the case?

[snikt]
> To the CELSS of course. We just try not to think about it too much.
> :)
>

What are CELSS?

> Another alternative was proposed by Marshall Savage. He recommended
> use of a super-critical combustion chamber to combust sewerage down to
> simple compounds, which would then go into the CELSS. It's just a
> choice between using microorganisms to do the job, or using the
> machine Savage recommends.
>

That corresponds to the idea that I exposed in another message - vaporizing
sewers to elementary substances. I think that this option would be better
accepted by the population of the habitat in psychological terms, and given
the vast amounts of energy available in a solar-powered habitat that would
not be an economic problem.

[snikt]
> I get lots of arguments from Mars advocates, but I still say SPS is a
> plausible export for orbital settlements, and Earth is the market for
> it. O'Neill was intelligent and practical enough to know that his
> vision of orbital habitats would not be realized until he could
> identify a market better served from space than from Earth, and I
> think he correctly identified it. When I ask what market is better
> served from Mars than anywhere else, I just get told that exports
> aren't really all that important, and money isn't everything.

I think that they're forgetting a small detail: usually money *is*
everything for people who would have enough money to finance immediate Mars
exploration. ;-)

I agree with the idea of SPS. Actually, I tend to see it as a solution for
the energy problem on Earth more likely than fusion reactors. Fifty years
ago, many researches predicted that in fifty years we would have viable
fusion at work. Nowadays, they say the same thing... I think that probably
the cost of launching payloads to LEO will drop enough to allow SPS before
we have fusion reactors.

[snikt]
> I think O'Neill was correct in saying that the only products better
> produced in space than on Earth are orbital assets, but orbital assets
> can still be sold to customers on Earth. The beauty of SPS is that
> power can be beamed down. I don't have as much confidence in the idea
> that anything might be mined in space and then sent down to the Earth,
> although I suppose some platinum group metals might be an outside
> possibility.
>

I think that space-mined ores can be brought down to Earth on a relatively
inexpensive way. You have simply to encapsulate them in some heat-resistant
envelope and drop them into the atmosphere, in a way that they'll fall on
some previously assigned crash site. I say "crash site" because, since the
capsule would contain just minerals with minimum processing, it could simply
crash at hundreds of kilometers per hour - after that, bulldozers and trucks
could "re-mine" the debris on the surface. That could be advantageous for
nations poor in mineral resources, once space travel is made common. Of
course I'm no space nor mining specialist and my idea of "mining
meteor-delivery" may be very nave in some point.

> Rgds,

Rgds,

> Mike Combs
[snikt]

Dr. Omni
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