France in Space No. 187

• 1: JASON 1 GOES AHEAD TO ORBIT
  
• 2: EUROPEAN GROUND TELESCOPE TAKES PICTURES AS SHARP AS HUBBLE
  
• 3: GALILEO SERVICES : UN CONSORTIUM PRÊT A ÊTRE CREE
  
• 4: EUTELSAT VISAVISION DIGITAL TV PACKAGE NOW AVAILABLE IN GERMANY
  
• 5: IMPROVEMENT IN MEDICAL DEVICES THANK TO ASTRONOMY
  

** 1: JASON 1 GOES AHEAD TO ORBIT

The Delta-II carrying Jason-1 and Timed was successfully launched from
Vandenberg Air Base in California, at 7:07 a.m. on December 7. The
separation of Jason, the American-French ocean observation satellite, from
the second stage occurred nearly one hour later. Many operations are now
scheduled until positioning and rendezvous with Topex/Poseidon. Jason-1,
which is a joint enterprise between NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory and
France’s CNES (French Space Agency), is going to replace the Topex/Poseidon
satellite, which has been sent in orbit in 1992. Meanwhile, Timed, a NASA’s
Spacecraft, holds a complement of instruments that will take a variety of
measurements on Earth’s atmosphere.
[CNES Press Release, Spacer and Space.com, 12/07/2001]

** 2: EUROPEAN GROUND TELESCOPE TAKES PICTURES AS SHARP AS HUBBLE

Developed by a team of astronomers and engineers from French and German
research institutes and ESO (European Southern Observatory), the
NAOS-CONICA Adaptive Optics (AO) facility produced an image as sharp as if
it were in space. This event is another important step in the Very Large
Telescope (VLT) project. On November 25, a steady stream of photons from a
southern star bounced off the computer-controlled deformable mirror inside
NAOS and proceeded to form in CONICA the sharpest image produced so far by
one of the VLT telescopes. With a core angular diameter of only 0.07
arcsec, this image is near the theoretical limit possible for a telescope
of this size and at the infrared wavelength used for this demonstration
(the K-band at 2.2 µm). Subsequent tests reached the spectacular
performance of 0.04 arcsec in the J-band (wavelength 1.2 µm). “I am proud
of this impressive achievement” said CEO Catherine Cesarsky “It shows the
true potential of European science and technology and it provides a fine
demonstration of the value of international cooperation”.

[ESO Press Release, 12/03/2001 and Space.com, 12/04/2001]

** 3: GALILEO SERVICES : A CONSORTIUM READY TO BE BORN

Six European industrialists are ready to create a consortium to develop
services related to the European Satellite Navigation System project :
Galileo . Thales, Eutelsat, Telespazio, Kongsberg Seatex, Septentrio and
FDC are ready to collaborate and develop services within the consortium in
tight relation with the entity responsible for the development of the space
infrastructure. The six firms hope that the European Council of
Transportation Ministers will officially approve the launch of the
development and validation phase. The technologies developed thanks to
Galileo will yield socio-economic benefits of 17 billion Euros between 2008
and 2020.
[AFP, 12/04/2001 and LesEchos, 12/06/2001]

** 4: EUTELSAT VISAVISION DIGITAL TV PACKAGE NOW AVAILABLE IN GERMANY

Eutelsat one of the world’s leading providers of satellite communication
solutions has officially launched its new digital package of
foreign-language television channels called visAvision, in Germany.
Callahan Associates, one of Europe’s leading cable companies, is the first
operator to have concluded a carriage contract with Eutelsat for visAvision
through its German subsidiary: Ish. Ish is now feeding a package of 14
foreign-language channels into its cable network in two German federal
Länder, with a total of 6.4 million subscribers. Eutelsat’s satellites
broadcast 996 TV channels in 30 languages and has developed the visAvision
package in cooperation with the leading foreign program providers.
Eutelsat, whose head-office is in Paris, will continue to expand visAvision
into other European markets including Switzerland, Austria, Belgium and the
Netherlands.

[Eutelsat Press Release, 11/29/2001]

** 5: IMPROVEMENT IN MEDICAL DEVICES THANK TO ASTRONOMY

While developing devices to capture X-rays from objects in space,
scientists of the European Space Agency (ESA) have designed a camera that
could become a powerful new weapon in the fight against cancer. This camera
could make a on-the-spot diagnoses and pinpoint cancerous areas to guide
surgeons without an exploratory operation. “The video camera will be
completely digital, so the surgeon will study the whole lymphatic system
and the potential cancerous pats on his monitor” said Dr. Tone Peacock,
Head of the Science Payloads Technology Division. For the first time, the
ESA researchers have produced a microchip similar to that found in a
household video camera but capable of detecting hard X-rays instead of
visible light. Instead of silicon, the microchip is made of a chemical
compound called epitaxial gallium arsenide. Having made the basic camera
sensor, the next stage in this work is to develop a system to send the
images to television screen in real time.
[ESA Press Release, 11/27/2001]

[From Agence France Presse (AFP), CNES Press Release, ESA Press Release,
ESO Press Release, Eutelsat Press Release (Eutelsat), Les Echos, Space.com,
Spacer]