Orbital bomb

Orbital Bomb. A satellite contg a nuclear warhead which circles the earth in a low orbit and which can be commanded to descend on a particular target. No such weapons are now known to be operational, and their deployment would be prohibited under the terms of the Outer Space Treaty of 1966. However, this treaty does not prohibit anything making less than a full circle around the earth, hence the FOBS... 

Other uses of lasers include eye surgery on detached retinas, spot welding, holography, isotope separation, accurate determination of the moon s orbit by reflection of laser light off a reflector placed on the moon s surface, and laser-guided bombs and missiles. Possible future uses include terrestrial and extraterrestrial communication, applications to computers, and production of the high temperatures needed for controlled nuclear-fusion reactions. 

Some of the elements of war have found a place in peacetime. The same kind of reaction in uranium that makes an atomic bomb explode can be controlled to make electricity in a nuclear power plant. The Cassini spacecraft now orbiting the planet Saturn runs on plutonium fuel. Plutonium-based fuel was also used to power devices that the Apollo 14 astronauts left on the Moon, such as a seismometer left to detect movements of the Moons crust. The Voyager spacecraft also sent its golden record out to the stars with... 

The strange carbon blast was produced by binary star 4U 1820-30, which consists of a dwarf star orbiting a neutron star. Gas from the dwarf flows in a spiral pattern around the neutron star. When some of the dwarf s gas collides with the neutron star s surface, a compressed slurry of hydrogen and helium is formed. Pressures and temperatures can get sufficiently high in the slurry layer that the elements flash-fuse in a thermonuclear explosion. Each blast leaves carbon, one of the byproducts of helium fusion. Gradually a layer of carbon several hundred meters thick reaches a critical temperature and ignites a carbon bomb that rages for hours. [For more information, see Robert Irion, Astronomers spot their first carbon bomb, Science 290(5495) 1279 (November 17, 2000).]... 

Various molecular orbital calculations " provide plausible stabilization energies for cyclopropenone. Photoacoustic and bomb calorimetry have provided the heat of formation of diphenylcyclopropenone as 350 16 and 354 + 21 kJ mol respectively, which leads to a stabilization energy of 46kJmol In contrast, the physical and spectroscopic properties of the cyclopropenones have been explained without recourse to aromatic stabilization, but this is contrary to what is generally accepted. 

The element uranium is a mixture of two isotopes, uranium-235 and uranium-238. Both isotopes have 92 protons in the nucleus, but uranium-238 has three additional neutrons. Both isotopes have 92 orbital electrons to balance the 92 protons, so their chemical properties are identical. When uranium is bombarded with neutrons, the two isotopes have differing nuclear reactions. A high percentage of the uranium-235 nuclei undergo fission, as described previously. The uranium-238, on the other hand, simply absorbs a neutron and is converted to the next heavier isotope, uranium-239. It is not possible to build a bomb out of natural uranium. The reason is that the chain reaction would be halted by uranium-238 because it removes neutrons without reproducing any new ones. 

Chemistry was supplanted during World War II by physics, which brought forth treasures radar, proximity fuses, electronic computers, and finally the atom bomb. More recently, the elite armies of the world have turned to the fruits of computer science and electronic engineering. They fight wars by remote control, with video cameras aboard pilotless aircraft and bombs that home in precisely on geographic coordinates delivered by orbiting satellites. 

When the American military roars into battle today, airmen in supersonic jets release bombs that fly toward their targets on the wings of radio signals from orbiting satellites. Pictures of the scene arrive at my computer courtesy of the Internet, conceived and originally developed by military-funded scientists. Every part of this scene—the aircraft, the pilot, the missiles, satellites, and computer networks—represents one small piece of a scientific and military juggernaut that follows a path blazed by Fritz Haber. 

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