E-Book, Englisch, 196 Seiten
Reihe: Gus
E-Book, Englisch, 196 Seiten
Reihe: Gus
ISBN: 978-1-5439-6736-4
Verlag: BookBaby
Format: EPUB
Kopierschutz: Adobe DRM (»Systemvoraussetzungen)
Terry Smith started his professional career after serving as a lieutenant in the U.S. Army followed by completing his MBA at the University of Texas at Austin. His working career centered around financial and general management in healthcare, mergers and acquisitions. He also was a part-time professor teaching in a graduate program in these fields for over 30 years. He is married with two children and lives in El Paso, Texas. Gus is his first book.
Autoren/Hrsg.
Weitere Infos & Material
Chapter 1 The Dream Team The Dream Team was established by order of the President of the United States to develop a comprehensive program to deal with deficiencies in preparing the nation for the future. Other countries have made major advancements that put the U.S. behind in the use of the solar system to augment scientific knowledge in several areas. The Dream Team will address these deficiencies to move forward and again place the country in the lead position. The assembly for the team was placed under the management of the National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA) with a goal of completion of the team and its mission and goals within six months. This is felt to be a tight schedule but necessary due to the dire situation faced by the country. The funding of the Dream Team and the mission was placed before Congress for authorization as the program would entail additional missions to complete the goals to be established by the Dream Team. The funding was derailed by a restriction that the Dream Team have an equal number of Republicans and Democrats and finally Congress established a Committee for the specific purpose of reviewing the requirements of the entire mission and the political component of the persons to be included in the mission. The Committee called individuals to testify which was held up by the need to maintain secrecy in some aspects of the mission and therefore the questioning was held in private. The project dragged along until it neared time for a Congressional recess and it was called for a vote. The funding was approved and the political affiliation of the members of the Dream Team was eliminated from the requirements. The team was initially called a Think Tank, but was soon changed by the initial members of the team to separate it from existing groups using this title, and to create the idea that they would be going beyond assembling known information to development of new scientific information to advance the country and the world. NASA initially appointed a team manager with a goal to develop six groups, later expanded adding a seventh group with the inclusion of Cosmology. The team manager had to possess special skills associated with keeping a group of highly specialized academic types working within established guidelines. Such people are always difficult to manage but in this case keeping them working as equals as part of a team was to be especially challenging. Each group was to begin with three members that would meet twice each week. Every other week the group leader for each group would meet with the other group leaders and the team manager to discuss progress and issues that needed to be addressed by the entire team. After the first month the designated member from each group was identified to be on the launch team for Able3, which was the mission identification. On alternate weeks the launch team received orientation to the flight procedures and their individual assignments with Able3. Again they had a tight schedule for the entire process but as they progressed meeting the deadline it was determined to be feasible. Often the scheduled meetings had conflicts as the members declared that they had other priorities to meet. Finally the team manager announced that members must attend all meetings or be replaced by an alternate. Attendance became 100% as no member wanted to be cut from the team as it held a great deal of scientific prestige. The launch team was identified and their initial orientation was provided which included their physicals and a review of the possible risks involved. They were aware of the risks from prior failures, none of which had occurred for the last three years. The following are members of the team: Evin Phillips has studied the various fields involved in Cosmology for over twenty-five years. In spite of dedicating his professional life to this endeavor he still has many questions concerning the origin and general structure of the universe with its many parts, elements and laws especially dealing with the characteristics of space. His current belief is that the creation of the universe is somehow a combination of science and religion. Dr. Phillips was not initially chosen to be aboard the launch of Able3 as the goal of his research didn’t seem to meet the express criteria of future space development. He worked tirelessly to be included in the venture, meeting with all of the chosen participants and the team manager and promoting his participation. His concept was to do his individual research as much as possible based primarily of prior theories of Cosmology, but to use the collective input of the team to review and discuss the possible origin of the universe and opportunities of how the universe could fit into the future of the Earth and its inhabitants. They finally agreed that this discussion could offer a break from their specific fields of research, including how they could fit in to the world of Cosmology. Dr. Phillips, like all of the members of the team, has a unique personality. He is quiet and extremely studious of the world around him. He truly wants to be part of improvements in the United States and throughout the world addressing the many conflicts and internal issues that exist, and seems to be getting worse as challenges in society grow. He is probably the best listener of the team and only speaks to help quiet tensions that arise in the meetings and group as a whole. He is 55 years old and his position in the field of Cosmology has given him a unique position as an authority in an area that is not always considered a scientific research-based topic. He has written three books on the subject with the books generally leading to additional questions and eventually to a new book. Dr. Phillips only had one colleague to work with him developing his research to work on during his trip to the Space Station America. Most of their work for the mission was centered on topics to discuss with the other members of the Dream Team while in space. Although his hopes are to be able to observe some other life form from the Space Station America, he is not very hopeful as it is still not far enough into the universe for such observations. Wanda Norris has been involved in the study of Materials Science for over twenty years, both commercially and for government research organizations. Generally, Materials Science involves just about all basic substances, both natural such as gold and iron, and human-made such as plastics. There have been a number of advances in the field based on the analysis of the properties of the materials involving the mechanical, chemical, electrical, thermal, optical and magnetic properties of each material. Combining various materials can serve to produce improvements to meet the various uses of these products. Dr. Norris specifically wants to study the effect of gravitation on materials during the mission. The current research is often based on the magnetic pull associated with various materials and research conducted by Dr. Norris and her colleagues theorizes that the composition of many materials is altered by gravitational influence that can impact their productive use. Dr. Norris has developed many of the testing equipment systems which are shared with universities and proprietary companies involved in Materials Science. She easily could have created a great deal of personal wealth by marketing these equipment systems but has been comfortable in simply recovering her costs in their development and manufacturing. Dr. Norris is 45 years old and has dedicated her life to her profession and research in Materials Science. Her list of books published covers a broad range of topics in the field which are often used as the basis of educational offerings in many universities. Her role in government research has placed her as the top expert in Materials Science and she was the obvious choice to be included in the Dream Team. In spite of her status in her profession Dr. Norris remains a quiet person and not known for using her popularity to develop a broad social life as have some of her colleagues. Attempts by professional journals to interview Dr. Norris and write articles about her successes have been ignored as she prefers to remain rather secluded and dedicated to her work. Ivan Trabosci, MD, has an extensive history with Space Medicine and has the designation as the first physician with Board Certification in Space Medicine. His major interest continues to be research in not only how astronauts and others spending time outside of the Earth’s gravitational pull are effected by their travel, but also how various organisms change including their reaction to traditional antibiotics. Research has already shown that individuals in long-term space travel show a loss of bone density, loss of muscle mass, balance disorders, sleep disturbances, cardiovascular changes and immune system issues. Dr. Trabosci has a large list of topics to research during his time in space that also includes the variances associated with ethnicity and sex of the traveler. In addition to his research as part of the team, Dr. Trabosci will deal with any health issues arising with his fellow space travelers. Two of the current travelers aboard the Space Station America have reported illnesses and have been quarantined from the other four persons in the group. Before returning them to Earth, Dr. Trabosci will need to investigate the nature of their illnesses to determine if they pose a threat...
