Huge Balloon Lofts New Telescope

Science Daily is reporting that a new solar telescope has been launched via an enormous balloon filled with helium. Dubbed project "Sunrise" the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR), NASA, Germany's Max Planck Institute for Solar Physics, Spain's Astrophysics Institute of the Canary Islands, and the Swedish Space Corporation all partnered to launch the balloon in order to view never before see features of the Sun. "The project may usher in a new generation of balloon-borne scientific missions that cost less than sending instruments into space. Scientists also can test an instrument on a balloon before making a commitment to launch it on a rocket. The balloon, with its gondola of scientific instruments, was launched successfully on the morning of October 3 from the Columbia Scientific Balloon Facility in Fort Sumner, New Mexico. It flew for about 10 hours, capturing stable images of the solar surface and additional data from the various instruments of the sophisticated payload. The gondola then separated from the balloon and descended with a parachute, landing safely in a field outside Dalhart, Texas."

Balloons are not new

[crumley]

Though this sounds like a very interesting project, the use of balloons (and sounding rockets) for instruments that might later fly in space is not new. Cosmic ray studies have been using balloons for since 1912 [nasa.gov].

What may be new here is using balloons for instruments that need to be aimed precisely. Detectors on previous balloons were usually omni-directional, or could make measurements over large surface angles. Their Sun-tracking technology aiming sounds interesting, and I look forward to reading about their results

Re:Poor Images

[$RANDOMLUSER]

The first sentence of TFA:

In a landmark test flight, the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) and a team of research partners this month successfully launched a solar telescope to an altitude of 120,000 feet, borne by a balloon larger than a Boeing 747 jumbo jet.

Find a plane that will do 120,000 feet for any length of time.

Balloons aren't New in Astronomy

[CheshireCatCO]

While the scope and precision of this project appears to be admirable and new, the idea of using balloons to loft telescopes is most certainly not, though the summary and article may both give that impression. They launch balloons in Antarctica all the time for astronomical observations (remember BOOMERANG?) and much of the initial attempts to view the universe through non-optical, non-radio wavelengths (the ones where our atmosphere is basically opaque) was done with balloons in addition to the sounding rockets.

Re:Sun variations

[Anonymous Coward]

"A 2006 study and review of existing literature, published in Nature, determined that there has been no net increase in solar brightness since the mid 1970s, and that changes in solar output [wikipedia.org] within the past 400 years are unlikely to have played a major part in global warming."

HTH

Re:helium - the only use-once element

[Anonymous Coward]

Not quite true on any aspect except that helium does depart the atmosphere. Helium comes from natural gas, the deposits of which trap helium being created (yeah, created) by radioactive decay. It's created in nuclear reactors and will be a waste product from fusion reactors. It's a renewable resource. The higher parts of the atmosphere also have a significant density of helium (though high enough that the density is pretty low if you're trying to collect it.

Re:helium - the only use-once element

[Strahd von Zarovich]

From http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Helium#Occurrence_and_production [wikipedia.org]:

Nearly all helium on Earth is a result of radioactive decay. The decay product is primarily found in minerals of uranium and thorium, including cleveites, pitchblende, carnotite, monazite and beryl, because they emit alpha particles, which consist of helium nuclei (He2+) to which electrons readily combine. In this way an estimated 3.4 litres of helium per year are generated per cubic kilometer of the Earth's crust.