From: yee@trident.arc.nasa.gov (Peter E. Yee)
Subject: NASA Headline News for 04/07/92 (Forwarded)
Apparently-To: sci-space-news@ames.arc.nasa.gov
Followup-To: sci.space
Organization: NASA Ames Research Center, Moffett Field, CA
Date: Tue, 7 Apr 1992 19:21:48 GMT

             Headline News
Internal Communications Branch (P-2) NASA Headquarters

  Tuesday, April 7, 1992  Audio Service: 202 / 755-1788

This is NASA Headline News for Tuesday, April 7, 1992 . . .

Following yesterday's successful 22-second test firing of Endeavour's
three shuttle main engines, Kennedy Space Center technicians are
presently analyzing the engine performance data but note that the
initial results look good.  Concurrently, launch pad technicians are
reconfiguring the pad from yesterday's test to the normal launch
configuration.  The next event scheduled for the STS-49 Endeavour
vehicle is the flight crew - launch team terminal countdown
demonstration test presently set for April 17.  The flight director and
payload manager pre-launch briefings for the ambitious STS-49 mission
took place this morning from Johnson Space Center.  They were aired
live on NASA Select TV and will be repeated this afternoon beginning at
2:00 pm.  Tomorrow, the flight crew briefing will be aired live at 9:00
am EST and repeated later in the day.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Astrophysicists associated with the Hubble Space Telescope and the
Compton Gamma Ray Observatory will hold a press briefing tomorrow at
1:00 pm EST in the NASA Headquarters auditorium to discuss new
information obtained with data from both these spacecraft.  Scientists
using Hubble data as well as ground- based optical telescope data will
discuss the discovery of a potentially massive black hole in our
galactic backyard a mere 2.3 million light years away.  Compton
Observatory scientists will report on a new class of gamma ray quasars
which have been discovered.  Both teams of scientists will also discuss
the significance of the new findings and place them into a cosmological
context.  The briefing will be carried live on NASA Select TV, and will
also feature new images and a 4- minute video animation depicting the
collapse of a galactic core.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Noted science fiction author and futurist Isaac Asimov, 72, died
Monday, April 6, at New York University Hospital of heart and kidney
ailments.  Asimov was the author of more than 320 books and non-fiction
articles published in journals and magazines.  He is the human who
coined the term "robotics" and derived the notion that robots may not
injure a human.  Asimov was born in the Russian village of Petrovichi,
about 250 miles southwest of Moscow, and immigrated to the U.S. in 1923
with his family.  They settled in Brooklyn.  He received a masters and
doctoral degree in  chemistry from Columbia University and while
teaching at Boston University in 1950 penned his first science fiction
novel.  Dr. Asimov was one of the humanists invited by JPL to
participate in and observe the 1976 landing of the two Viking
spacecraft on Mars.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Jet Propulsion Laboratory flight controllers report that Magellan
continues to perform nominally in its orbit about Venus.  The
spacecraft continues to perform stereo mapping and has thus far covered
14 percent of the planet in the stereo mode.  This mapping mode matches
images being taken currently by Magellan with images obtained in the
first mapping cycle, 16 months ago.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *

Marshall Space Flight Center education specialists report their space
education data base -- Spacelink -- has reached a record level of users
with nearly 18,000 registered individuals logging in to the electronic
system.  Twenty percent of the users are teachers and an additional
one-third of the total users are students.  Marshall says there are
over 6,600 files available on the system.  During the STS-45 Atlas-1
mission, the system was receiving over 1,000 callers a day.

Marshall and the Johnson Space Center education office both supported
the recently-completed Technology Conference in Mayaguez, Puerto Rico.
The two centers provided exhibits and education specialists for the
exhibition, which hosted an estimated student audience of 9,300.


Here's the broadcast schedule for Public Affairs events on NASA Select
TV.  Note that all events and times may change without notice, and that
all times listed are Eastern.

Tuesday, April 7, 1992
 1:00 pm  Continuous Improvement Colloquium from NASA 
                Headquarters.
 2:00 pm  Repeat of STS-49 pre-mission briefings from Johnson 
                Space Center including Flight Director briefing, Intelsat 
                briefing, Commercial Protein Crystal Growth briefing, 
                and Endeavour overview briefing.
Wednesday, April 8, 1992
 9:00 am  STS-49 pre-mission flight crew briefing from JSC.
 1:00 pm  Hubble Space Telescope / Compton Gamma Ray 
                Observatory press conference on Black Holes and Quasars 
                from NASA Headquarters.
 2:00 pm  Delayed presentation of Associate Administrator for 
                Space Science and Applications Dr. Lennard Fisk's 
                testimony on the Landsat program before the House 
                Environment Subcommittee (taped on April 7).

This report is filed daily at noon, Monday through Friday.  It is 
a service of NASA's Office of Public Affairs.  The editor is 
Charles Redmond, 202/453-8425 or CREDMOND on NASAmail.  
NASA Select TV is carried on GE Satcom F2R, transponder 13, 
C-Band, 72 degrees West Longitude, transponder frequency is 
3960 MegaHertz, audio subcarrier is 6.8 MHz, polarization is 
vertical.