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               |         Biuletyn PTA nr 16         |  
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  Biuletyn informacyjny Zarzadu Glownego Polskiego Towarzystwa Astro-  
  nomicznego (Adres kontaktowy: M. Ostrowski, pta@oa.uj.edu.pl , 
  a w bardzo pilnych sprawach: mio@oa.uj.edu.pl )  
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Spis tresci:  
  
   I.    O grantach NATO 
   II.   Sprostowanie do ostatnich Nowinek Naukowych
   III.  Nowinki naukowe

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   I.  O grantach NATO 

Polecam Panstwa uwadze naukowy program NATO, w ramach ktorego
przyznawane sa stypendia oraz dotacje na organizowanie konferencji
i wspolprace naukowa. Z moich osobistych obserwacji wynika, ze jest 
to program sprawnie zarzadzany, a ilosc papierkowej roboty przy 
wystepowaniu o grant i sprawozdawaniu jest niewielka. Do realizacji 
zostaje zaakceptowany mniej - wiecej co trzeci propozal.  Na wspolprace 
naukowa (podroze i diety dla siebie i gosci) mozna dostac od $5,000 do $25,000.
Niestety nie wiem nic blizszego o stypendiach.

Polecam odwiedzenie nastepujacych stron:
Informacje ogolne:               http://www.nato.int/science/
Stypendia:                       http://www.nato.int/science/fellows.htm

Organizacja konferencji i wspolpraca indywidualna 
    ("nasz" program ma skrot PST):  http://www.nato.int/science/cst.htm

Informacja o specjalnym statusie nowych czlonkow:  
                http://www.nato.int/science/newmemb.htm

UWAGA: 
formularze, ktore mozna sciagnac ze stron programu naukowego NATO 
dopuszczaja mozliwosc ubiegania sie o pieniadze na sprzet. Jest to 
juz niestety nieaktualne, sprzetu nie dostaniemy. 

                                             Michal Rozyczka (CAMK)
From: mnr@camk.edu.pl
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   II.  Sprostowanie danych z ostatnich Nowinek Naukowych


Drobne sprostowanie dotyczace ostatniego numeru Biuletynu PTA.

W Nowinkach naukowych, w artykule o "SPONGELIKE STRUCTURES NEAR THE SUN'S
SURFACE" jest informacja, ze obserwacje pochodza z (cyt.) "TRACE satellite
(at extreme ultraviolet wavelengths) and the SOHO satellite (in x rays)"
(kon.cyt.) SOHO nie posiada instrumentu, ktorego przeznaczeniem bylyby
obserwacje w dziedzinie rentgenowskiej. Wspomniana analiza struktur
gabczastych opiera sie rzeczywiscie na obserwacjach z TRACE oraz z
instrumentu SUMER (Solar Ultraviolet Measurements of Emitted Radiation) na
SOHO. SUMER uzyskuje widma dysku slonecznego w zakresie od 500 A do 1600 A.

From: Danuta Dobrzycka <danuta@cfa.harvard.edu>
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   III. Nowinki naukowe

  OPTICAL BLACK HOLES, objects that attract and trap specific colors of
  light, can be made in earthly laboratories, two researchers have shown
  theoretically, offering possibilities for lab-based analogs of general
  relativity and potentially even quantum gravity phenomena. According to
  researchers at the Royal Institute of Technology in Sweden and at the
  University of St Andrews in Scotland (Ulf Leonhardt,
  leonhardt@quantopt.kth.se, 011-46-8-791-1324), the trick is to create a
  vortex of fluid that whirls at velocities comparable to the speed of light
  inside the fluid. Such a feat is now possible, with the advent of techniques
  for slowing down light to just a few meters per second through such
  substances as a Bose-Einstein condensate (Update 415) or a rubidium gas
  (Phys. Rev. Focus, 29 June 1999). If  a sufficiently fast-spinning vortex of
  these or similar materials could be created, light inside the fluid could lose
  maneuverability and become trapped in the vortex.  Since light in an
  optical black hole would behave analogously to matter in a real black
  hole, these light-trapping whirlpools would permit laboratory study of
  Hawking radiation, the hypothetical emissions from evaporating black
  holes; this radiation, which consists of particles made near the hole's
  boundary,  is next-to-impossible to observe directly since it is obscured by
  the cosmic microwave background. In addition, the researchers speculate
  that studying quanta of light interacting with the quantum-mechanical
  matter waves in BECs could even help establish "a testable prototype
  model of quantum gravity." In the meantime, physicists are also pursuing
  the idea of creating "acoustical black holes" (dumb holes), regions that
  capture and trap sound waves. (Leonhardt and Piwnicki, Physical Review
  Letters, 31 January 2000; Physical Review A, December 1999; Select
  Articles; also see http://www.st-
  and.ac.uk/~www_pa/group/quantumoptics/media.html)
  
  "THE FORMATION AND EVOLUTION OF GALAXIES are intimately
  connected to the presence of a central massive black hole," asserts
  Douglas Richstone of the University of Michigan.  Richstone was at the
  recent meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Atlanta to report
  the new identification of supermassive black holes at the cores of three
  nearby elliptical galaxies, adding to an already substantial association
  between galaxies possessing centralized, high-density spheroidal clumps
  or bulges of stars and nearby heavy black holes (star concentration
  correlating closely with black hole mass).  Richstone pointed to the
  growing consensus that these massive black holes are the remnants of
  quasars (a notion underscored at the meeting by the report given by
  Andrew Wilson of the University of Maryland--of many "dying quasars"
  in nearby galaxies, objects whose radio spectra resemble a quieter version
  of quasar spectra) and to the historical fact that the age of quasar
  formation occurred before the time when most stars were forming in
  galaxies (to judge from high redshift observations).  Richstone concluded
  that "Radiation and high-energy particles released by the formation and
  growth of black holes are the  dominant sources of heat and kinetic energy
  for star-forming gas in protogalaxies."
  

FIRST SPACECRAFT IN ORBIT AROUND AN ASTEROID.  The Near
Earth Asteroid Rendevous (NEAR) spacecraft has arrived at, and gone
into orbit around, asteroid Eros, which was at a distance of 160 million
miles from Earth when the rendevous occurred.  The asteroid, whose
gravity is about one thousandth that of Earth, might  represent a chunk of
matter not much altered from the time the solar system was formed 4
billion years ago, and so it is of great interest to planetary scientists. 
(NASA press conference, 17 Feb;
http://near.jhuapl.edu/iod/20000215/index.html)

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