VOICE ONE:
This is Steve Ember.
VOICE TWO:
And this is Bob Doughty with the VOA Special English programEXPLORATIONS. Today we tell about a special place on the Internetcommunications system that helps young children learn about theexploration of space.
And we tell about copying nature to help design devices that mayhelp explore the planet Mars.
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VOICE ONE:
Researchers are studying a small Australian shellfish to helpthem build devices that could explore the surface of the planetMars. Australian scientists at the University of Melbourne arestudying a small shellfish called a yabby. The yabby is a smallsalt-water creature that looks like a crab.
David Macmillan is a professor of zoology at the University ofMelbourne. He says the yabby can do many different tasks although ithas a very limited amount of intelligence. Researchers are studyingthe Yabby to see if they can make a device similar to it that canalso perform difficult tasks.
Mister Macmillan says this kind of research is calledbiomimetics. Biomimetics is the science of using successful designsfound in nature and reproducing them as machines.
Mister Macmillan says biomimetics is a quickly expanding part ofscientific research. The kind of machines he is planning to buildare called robots.
VOICE TWO:
Mister Macmillan says many small creatures like the yabby areable to make many of the same decisions that humans make. Yet theyare not as intelligent as humans. For example, they search for andfind food. They can choose a mate so they can produce young. Theycan also look for and find an area to make a home or nest.
Mister Macmillan says humans make these same decisions usingmillions and millions of brain cells. Yet extremely small creatureslike the Australian yabby shellfish make the same decisions usingjust thousands of brain cells.
VOICE ONE:
Mister Macmillan says the computer industry is now able to makepowerful computers that are very small. These small computers can beplaced in small machines that could do useful work. A powerfulcomputer can act like a brain. So robots can be created to makedecisions, similar to the simple decisions made by a yabby.
Mister Macmillan says a good example would be a robot that couldbe designed to look for water. Another could be designed to searchfor minerals or chemicals. These robots could also be designed sothey could move across difficult areas of land and climb smallhills. Their small computers could also be able to link together toperform work or to help each other complete a task. The littlerobots would be able to perform tasks that would be too dangerousfor people.
VOICE TWO:
Researchers at the National Aeronautics and Space Administrationsay they want to expand their use of this kind of small robot. TheNASA researchers say some robots can already do this kind of work.But these robots are much too large and weigh too much to be takeninto space.
Researchers say they hope to see many of the small robots thathave the intelligence that Yabbies have exploring Mars in the nearfuture. They could provide information that will increase thechances of human exploration of the Red-Planet.
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VOICE ONE:
In Nineteen Ninety-Eight, the National Aeronautics and SpaceAdministration launched a very special and exciting space vehicle.Yet, it did not travel into space. This vehicle traveled in thecomputer Internet communications system. It is a Web site on theInternet called Space Place.
The Space Place Web site is a joint effort by NASA, the JetPropulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, the CaliforniaInstitute of Technology and the International Technology EducationAssociation. It was designed as a tool for teachers to help youngchildren learn about space technology.
VOICE TWO:
Space Place is meant for school children between the ages ofeight and thirteen. However, it can really be enjoyed by anyone whowants to learn about many different space sciences. Among thesubjects are space technology, Earth sciences and space sciences.
Space Place includes about forty activities that help childrenlearn about these subjects. It includes games that help teach aboutspace. Areas within the web site teach facts about the manydifferent sciences used in space exploration. Other areas offerplans to help teachers present many of these subjects to theirstudents.
VOICE ONE:
Recently, the federal government counted the number of peopleliving in the United States. This count takes place every ten years.It is called a census. Information collected in the latest censusshowed that Spanish is the first language for more thantwenty-seven-million people in the United States. Almostthirteen-million speakers of Spanish do not speak English very well.This number includes many children.
NASA officials decided that these Americans could use a Spanishlanguage version of Space Place. It was launched last month. It isalmost an exact copy of the English language Space Place.
VOICE TWO:
The information and activities at the Space Place web site aredeveloped by workers at the Jet Propulsion Laboratory. Much of theirwork has been published in past copies of “The Technology Teacher,”the magazine of the International Technology Education Association.
Teachers say that most of the information on Space Place is foryoung children. Yet much of it can be useful to older children inhigh school.
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VOICE ONE:
When you open the Space Place Web site, you will see a largescreen with several drawings. Each drawing opens a link to anotherpart of Space Place. Doctor Marc’s Amazing Facts is only one of themany areas in this web site that you can visit.
If you open Doctor Marc’s Amazing Facts, you will find it linksto twelve different questions. One of the links is called, “How Goodis the Amazing Hubble Space Telescope?”
The answer is: “If you could see as well as the camera on theHubble Space Telescope, you would be able to read the small print ona newspaper from one and a half kilometers away.” The answer may besimple, but it clearly describes how powerful the Hubble SpaceTelescope really is. This area of Space Place also has a computerlink to some of the beautiful color pictures produced by the spacetelescope.
Doctor Marc’s Amazing Facts also answers the question about howsatellites remain in the same position in the sky. The answer usedthe example of the GOES weather satellites. The job of a GOES is tostudy the weather over North America. The satellite orbits over thecenter of Earth at the equator and make one orbit a day. Since theEarth turns once a day, the weather satellite is moving at the samerate as the Earth and appears to stay in the same place in the skyall the time.
VOICE TWO:
Another area in Space Place is called Space Science In Action.There, you can learn about many different sciences. One is called,”The Infrared Photo Album.” This area shows many photographsincluding those of birds, a young boy, an alligator and a camel. Youcan look at these photographs as you normally would. You can alsochange the image to an infrared photograph.
Light is a form of energy. The human eye can see only some ofthis energy. Infrared photography permits us to see light energy thehuman eye can not see. Infrared photography is extremely valuable inspace because it permits researchers to see space objects the humaneye can not see.
VOICE ONE:
You can visit NASA’s Space Place if you have a computer and areable to link with the World Wide Web. Space Place provides valuableinformation in simple English that is easy to understand. And itprovides the same information in Spanish.
You can find Space Place by having your computer look for thewords “Space Place.” Enter it as one word: s-p-a-c-e-p-l-a-c-e.
Or you can enter the address. It is: w-w-w dots-p-a-c-e-p-l-a-c-e dot n-a-s-a dot g-o-v.
You can find the link to the Spanish language version of SpacePlace near the top of the opening page. Have Fun!
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VOICE TWO:
This program was written by Paul Thompson. I’m Bob Doughty.
VOICE ONE:
And I’m Steve Ember. Join us again next week for EXPLORATIONS, aprogram in Special English on the Voice of America.