Could Ancient Pottery Improve Spacecraft Tiles? 57
astroengine writes "Earlier this year, the National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded nearly $500,000 to scientists from the Getty Conservation Institute, Stanford's National Accelerator Laboratory (SLAC) and the Aerospace Corporation to study the chemical and physical properties of ancient Attic pottery. Why? Well, the project will improve our understanding of iron-spinel chemistry, which is critical to the advanced ceramics used for thermal protection in aerospace applications, such as in the heat shield tiles used by spacecraft during atmospheric reentry."
Re:Finally... (Score:1, Insightful)
... a good reason to tell those kids in high school there IS good reason to occupy their minds with ( Latin and ) Greek antiquity. Which is not to be confounded, as the OP demonstrates, with antiquities at the fair.
Either that, or "those who forget the past are condemned to repeat it." Which is advice that I wish that half of our first-world countries' leaders would listen to. Fall of the Roman Empire, anyone?