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New European Centers To
Monitor Asteroid Threat
By Robert Roy Britt
Senior Science Writer
Space.com
1-8-2


To improve knowledge and raise public awareness about the threat of an asteroid smacking planet Earth, two separate facilities were announced recently in the UK.
 
The Comet and Asteroid Information Network (CAIN) launched Jan. 1 and is managed by the International Spaceguard Information Center in Wales.
 
CAIN will pool information and research efforts of at least 9 universities and institutions, including the Armagh Observatory. The non-governmental consortium is expected to be a vocal proponent of increased international funding for research into detecting and tracking objects that could pose a risk to the planet.
 
No known asteroid is currently on a collision course with Earth. Yet scientists cite past impacts, such as one thought to have led to the demise of dinosaurs 65 million years ago, as evidence that civilization ought to prepare itself for the inevitable.
 
In a separate move, the British government announced it would open an Information Center on Near Earth Objects (NEOs) this spring, following through on plans spelled out nearly a year ago.
 
The governmental center, which will operate out of National Space Science Center in Leicester, will educate the public about asteroids and comets. It also aims to "analyze the potential threat from NEOs" that might hit Earth.
 
This threat "has been an issue of increased international interest and concern over recent years," said Science Minister Lord Sainsbury. "By setting up an information center we are helping the UK play a full and prominent role in an area that requires international action."
 
A Gesture
 
The astronomer Sir Patrick Moore said the center would provide useful information to the public for a low cost. But other researchers are waiting for the British government to do more. They point out that the center, which will cost £300,000 over three years, is little more than a public relations facility.
 
Benny Peiser, an NEO expert at Liverpool John Moores University, called the center a "goodwill gesture by the UK government" but said its tight budget and lack of science personnel would limit its effectiveness.
 
The center will not be involved in the search for asteroids, though it might fund two small telescopes on the Canary Islands for doing follow-up surveys on asteroids that have been discovered by other researchers.
 
"There are concerns, however, that these instruments will simply reproduce the search efforts of other teams in the Northern Hemisphere," Peiser said.
 
Astronomers had hoped the UK would fund the construction of a large telescope in the Southern Hemisphere, where the NEO search has been less comprehensive. While a government task force set up two years ago recommended the telescope, no decision has been rendered.
 
The Threat
 
Researchers estimate that there are about 1,000 NEOs larger than 1 kilometer, the minimum size considered capable of causing global devastation. Though no one knows for sure, such objects are suspected of hitting Earth every 100,000 to 300,000 years.
 
If one were found to be headed our way, experts say it's possible the rock could be deflected or destroyed by detonating nuclear explosives on or near it. The technology needed to mount such a mission has yet to be developed.
 
For now, nonetheless, the search is on.
 
NASA has a congressionally mandated goal to find 90 percent of these large NEOs by 2008. Roughly 500 have been found by various individuals and international research teams. But as more are discovered, those that remain become statistically harder to root out, and most astronomers don't expect NASA's goal to be met on time.
 
NASA also funds some of the research and follow-up observations needed to pin down the orbits of NEOs, a critical next-step in accessing any possible danger. But the agency -- one of the few that has the kind of budget needed for such work on large scales -- prefers to channel most of its money into space-based research rather than ground-based observations.
 
Just last month, NASA reduced funding of an NEO program at the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico and announced intentions to shuttle the program over to the National Science Foundation. An NSF spokesman was surprised by the suggestion and said his agency had not had time to react to it.
 
Meanwhile, critics have long maintained that not enough is being done to find smaller NEOs, which could cause regional destruction if they hit Earth. Others worry that the cost and resources needed to find all these small space rocks, which number in the millions, is prohibitive, at least in the near term.
 
Other institutions inside and outside the United States contribute to the search and research of NEOs. The Minor Planet Center, in Cambridge, Massachusetts, serves as the clearinghouse for all data collected on space rocks.
 
The two new centers represent an increased internationalization of the effort, but it's not yet clear what role they will ultimately play.


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