Steve Michel's Journal of
Lateral Modernism********************** Vol. IX No.12 December 2008
Microwave Rockets-Micheal Micci's legacy
by Steve Michel
I came across this old OMNI article about Microwave powered rockets. This technology was developed by Micheal Micci Phd. back in the 1980s as a way to make satellite propulsion more efficient. That's right: the microwave technology to make popcorn at home he proved could be used to heat a gas at high temperatures for propulsion. The logic is that microwave heat generation is more efficient than chemical based combustion. By focusing a 1000 watt magnetron from a regular kitchen microwave to heat gas confined in a chamber, he achieved thrusts sufficient to maneuver a satellite. NASA at the time, did not fund the project and to this day sticks to the more conventional methods of rocket propulsion using electrodes and ammonia to maneuver satellites. According to Micci, "The aerospace industry is very conservative. Once they've got something that works they don't want to risk a satellite by trying something new." Turns out he was right. By the late 1990s the research had moved from NASA funding to private aerospace companies and little scientific papers surfaced since then. Micheal Micci went on produce research papers related to micro-gravity propulsion.
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Obama NASA :Solar Power satellites soon?
by Steve MichelAs Obama's transition team is understandably looking into NASA's budget,in these times of economic woes and astronomical government spending they are asking hard questions about NASA Ares program. During the election, however, he promised two billon dollar funding for NASA but did not name the Ares program. He is noted to have an interest in some of NASA's more practical projects: according to a recent article "Obama's NASA transition team also appears to be interested in a number of specific projects that have more or less languished in recent years. Among those projects are: the Deep Space Climate Observatory; a mothballed Earth- observing satellite formerly known as Triana; agency efforts to catalog asteroids and comets that could threaten Earth; and the harnessing of space-based solar power for use on Earth." Now the Solar Power Satellite project is solar power on steroids. Forget mere megawatts; we are talking about multi gigawatt energy production. This technology could do for energy what satellites have done for telecommunications. We're with you Sir.
Steve's interiors(tm)
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Fiction: Algebra Gang
Part 3: by Steve Michel
[I wrote this Science Fiction story a few years back: a somewhat pre-Obama slipstream narrative with old-school sensibilities.]
BigGee leaned closer to the two "Listen, those Blackhats are onto stuff. I checked their sites once on my old man's computer when he's wasn't home. His old computer so hard with firewalls and shit, nothin can get through. Blackhat forums are crazy with talk and with so much traffic, it's like a fucking city. You know what they do all day?"
"BigGee you on crack or something? Sniffing out geeks with zits"
"Yeah BigGee, you knocking on the wrong doors." Kay said.
"Problem Kay is you don't think things through. The Feds have metal detectors in school but no new books except for revised creationist texts or military recruitment brochures. You still think rhyming skills will get you rich- bottom fell out of the music scene since it went corporate.
JB nodded "It's all about infrastructure now. So what about them BigGee?"
"About who?"
"The Blackhats! fuck."
"Oh yeah. They hack. Talk hack and walk it too. One of their forum sites flashed my Ip number, geographic location and stats, like my firewalls weren't even there. Spooky."
Kay jabbed BigGee on the shoulder "Got that five bucks you owe me?"
"Piss off! I told you I gave it to you already."
JB's wrist watch alarm beeped urgently."It's late. Gotta bounce. See you guys tomorrow." Jb left them there arguing again as he turned up to the next street.
Britghon Ave. was one of the boroughs' last condo-blocks. JB walked in long paces alongside the vine smothered fence that stood between the miles of derelict buildings and the block of tenements. The street lights were out again on his street, only the tall mega towers on the horizon lit the night sky. They always reminded Jb of glittering black corrals he had seen on school TV. He was careful not to wake the sprawling drunks on the stairs as he went up to the apartment on the third floor were he lived with his father. He opened the door quietly and walked behind the lazy boy sofa. The old man was probably snoring in front of the TV again.
"Is that you boy?" A bald head peeked around the fat worn upholstery of the dingy reclining chair to peer at him.
"Any pizza left from last night?" JB headed towards the kitchen.
"What you been up to again? it's late..kitchen's closed"
JB dumped his laptop case on the table and picked out items from the fridge at random. "Did I get any calls? dad"
"Got a bunch of emails clogging up the TV. You better check those otherwise I'm deleting. Damn things keep popping up on the screen."
to be continued next month
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Cleanroom Design for the layman:
the foundation of upcoming nanotechnology research and production.
Good clean-room design is instrumental to modern day high tech industries in general -from aerospace, pharmaceutical to exotic nano-tech material sciences and physics. Clean-rooms are essentially facilities designed and operated to meet stringent dust free protocols to allow research, operations and production that require pristine air and highly controlled environments. Clean-rooms are classified to the degree of exacting standards they operate. Class 10 is the most stringent as per FTD and ISO standards (ISO level 1) only allows maximum 2 particles no smaller than 0.1micrometers per cubic meter. Most pharmaceutical production occurs in ISO 3 to ISO 5. Semiconductor research and production use ISO 5 or better with special precautions for electrostatic discharge. For the best current news on the subject check out Pennet's
Cleanrooms publication. From an interior design perspective, 90% of good cleanroom stem from special mechanical ventilation and filtering AND clean smooth uninterrupted surfaces that can withstand harsh chemical cleaning. The rest is in the details: air showers, operations and minimizing movement in the controlled environments. The costs can be astronomical from 1000$ to 28,000$ per square-foot. The strictest physics instrumentation clean-rooms can require a superstructure to isolate delicate equipment from vibrations and a fortune in airflow management to prevent contamination. Te space of a few paragraphs is not enough to convey the full picture. Entire volumes have been written on the subject.
Since my specialty is interior design I focus on the details that get the job done and make things manageable. Cleanroom design begins with knowledgeable users who know their requirements and can adapt their process for cleaner operations cost efficiently. I leave ventilation issues to the mechanical engineers and find there is much to consider with lighting,millwork and epoxy finishes.
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