Walk through the halls of UC Irvine’s astronomy wing after dinner on a weeknight and you will find roomfuls of young graduate students, crammed into small desks, solving equations, writing computer code and developing innovative ways to analyze data. They do not have to be here. These are people with career options. They are scary-smart, creative and hardworking. Yet they have come here from all over the country and the world to sit in windowless offices and make a fifth of the money they could make back home or up the street. Why? They want to unlock the universe.

The United States is still the scientific light of the world. Ours is the society responsible for discovering humanity’s place in the universe, that we live in a galaxy called the Milky Way, one among billions of other galaxies stretched across the cosmic landscape. A hundred thousand years from now, if humans make it that long, the U.S. will be remembered for this, and historians will point to the immense contribution of the Hubble Space Telescope, with its miraculous visible-light images, the most detailed pictures of the cosmos yet produced by humankind.

Sadly, U.S. scientific leadership is beginning to fade. There is a sense of fear among our leaders that we can’t afford to invest in our future, just the kind of fear that endangers thoughtful debate about big-picture priorities.

One testament to our changing priorities is our commitment to the Hubble telescope as compared to its successor. The Hubble is, in every way, a monument to scientific exploration. Thanks to the Hubble, orbiting 350 miles overhead, we know that the universe began just under 14 billion years go. The age of the cosmos, once believed to be unknowable, is now available at the click of a mouse and has made it into schoolbooks in all 50 states. Astronomers have used the Hubble to determine the chemical makeup of planets that orbit distant stars and to discover dark energy, a mysterious substance propelling the universe to expand at an accelerating rate.

Many of the graduate students filling astronomy departments at University of California campuses, as well as Caltech and Stanford, have come to the state to explore and analyze terabytes of Hubble data. These data involve complex digital images, created in raw form onboard the orbiting telescope, and then decomposed into precise component colors. The Hubble beams this information to receivers around the world, where it is processed and made available for download. A graduate student working in Irvine can transfer Hubble images to a computer and then develop software to process and analyze the images’ meaning.

The goal is to squeeze information out of the gathered light that will help us discern the size, structure and chemical composition of objects that are almost always too far away for humans to ever hope to visit. The people who do this work are both creative and technically gifted. They must take what the universe provides — a shred of light collected by the Hubble — and discern implication from its signal.
We want these intelligent, dedicated people to live in our cities, to make their discoveries at our universities and to raise their families — the next generation of bright minds — right here.

Read the whole thing here. And then write your Senators and Representatives. JWST, and with it, US scientific leadership, and an amazing opportunity to fill in the contours of the history and physics of our Universe, is really at risk. Very possibly only an outcry of the kind that saved Hubble will be enough to launch Hubble’s successor.

Misleading graphic alert! The vertical scale starts at $0.5 billion, not at $0. But taking that into account merely changes the situation from “complete annihilation” to “devastating harm.” We’re talking about a 40% cut, which won’t leave room to do much more than keep the lights on for existing programs.

The 2011 numbers are the President’s budget request; the 2012 numbers are from the bill that passed the House. This isn’t yet law, so there’s still time; the Senate and the White House will (thankfully) be involved in the final compromise.

Times are tough, and not everything is worth doing. But there are few things more important to the long-term flourishing of a country than investment in basic science. Sad to see the future sacrificed for bizarre political reasons.

Looking at it from the public’s view, sure, cutting projects that are “billions of dollars over budget and plagued by poor management” sounds like a pretty reasonable action.  But I’d like to try to take a few minutes to explain why it’s not as simple as the committee would like you to believe.

First and foremost, in many fields of astronomy we are rapidly approaching the limit of what can be done scientifically without JWST.  I recently finished teaching a graduate class on extragalactic astronomy, and I can’t tell you the number of times where I brought the students up to speed on the state of a field, and then had to say “If we’re going to push this to the next level, we need JWST”.  To demonstrate this, the plot below shows the brightness (i.e., flux) of an astronomical point source that can be detected with different telescopes in a fixed amount of time, as a function of the wavelength of light (along with a typical galaxy spectrum).  The magenta points show that JWST is hundreds of times more sensitive than anything out there.  In terms of scientific impact, this is like the difference between walking (4 miles/hr) and flying (400 miles/hr) for your ability to explore terrain on the Earth.  This is not to mention the drastic increase in the angular resolution of JWST compared to any other telescope on that plot — JWST will be able to see fine-scale structure that has never been seen at these wavelengths.

Moreover, JWST will blow through limits that lie at some of the most exciting areas of astronomy, with some of the widest public appeal, including high redshift galaxies and extrasolar planets.  The public rightfully adores Hubble for expanding our view of the universe, but it’s not going to last forever.  (Given funding constraints, the most likely fate for Hubble is the same as your 20 year old Toyota Tercel — it gets you where you’re going, but at some point you stop paying the money to fix the heater, repair the cracked windshield, and deal with the oil leak, and accept that sooner or later you’re going to be stranded on the side of the highway.)  When Hubble expires — and it will within a decade or less — where is the system that will expand upon the wonders that Hubble revealed?  Even Milky Jay knows that JWST is the future.

The demise of JWST would be a huge blow to american space-based astronomy as well.  On the ground, the US has ceded much of its historical primacy to the Europeans.  If JWST were cancelled, it would be a heavy blow to the US dominance in running true space-based observatories.  NASA will continue to run “experiments” in space — i.e., targeted smaller missions focused on limited scientific goals, but they will be giving up their unique place in creating flagship facilities that literally anyone can potentially use.  The impact of Hubble came in large part because it wasn’t a specific experiment for one particular problem.  It has broad capabilities, that were kept up to date with servicing missions, but using those capabilities was then essentially “crowd-sourced” to the entire world.  Through on-going rigorous, and frankly brutal, evaluations of scientific proposals, the community identifies the single most important scientific questions to be addressed by Hubble.  This process is carried out every. single. year., making sure that Hubble gets the most bang for the buck.  The same process also applied to NASA’s other “flagship” missions (e.g., Chandra, Spitzer), focused on other wavelengths, but these facilities too are rapidly running out of time.

To see what the loss of JWST would mean, look at the following chart of NASA missions.  JWST is the only flagship observatory coming up.  If we lose it, the person with the next great idea loses the chance to try it out.

So yes, JWST has cost more than was planned for.  But the majority of the cost is now “sunk costs”, and a huge fraction of the telescope and instruments actually exist.  This is not just a hole that people have been shoveling money into, and not getting anything for — useful stuff is actually built!  And working!   I would of course prefer that JWST launched on time and under budget, but, given how close we are to the end, I much prefer to go for it.  Canceling JWST is not going to usher in a golden age of other space-based science opportunities (the “crowding out theory”, where once the shade of JWST is gone, a thousand flowers will bloom).  The money will simply be gone from space-based astronomy, and instead of a single tree we can all climb, there will be some smaller pieces of shrubbery.

So to close, I’d like to leave with you with one of the finest bits of advocacy for JWST around.

(edit: Which I now realize Risa just posted! She has “how to contact your legislator” information, which is the single most important thing you can do at this point.)

$4.5 billion for NASA Science programs, which is $431 million below last year’s level. The bill also terminates funding for the James Webb Space Telescope, which is billions of dollars over budget and plagued by poor management.

In all, the House appropriations bill cuts 1.6 billion dollars from the NASA budget. The game is not over yet — the House Appropriations Subcommittee in charge of NASA will consider this bill today, and the full Appropriations committee will meet again to consider the final bill on Wednesday — and of course the Senate will have its own bill. But this is obviously a very ominous sign for NASA astrophysics in general.

JWST is a 6.5 meter IR-optimized telescope, which has been scheduled to launch in 2018. It is certainly true that it has suffered from numerous cost overruns, and has essentially eaten the rest of the NASA astrophysics program. However, nearly all the technical hurdles have now been overcome. And the science reach of JWST is spectacular. It is now the only observatory-class mission planned to operate once the current Great Observatories (Hubble, Spitzer, Chandra) reach their end of life. JWST has been the highest priority for NASA of the Decadal Surveys and essentially every other study commissioned by the field.

Hubble Space Telescope has given us amazing views of the Universe, back to about a billion years after the big bang. However, it has reached its limits there — JWST would allow us to see well into this first billion years, to view the formation of the first stars, galaxies, and black holes, and to study in detail how radiation from these objects reionized the Universe. There are no other planned missions that will allow us to observe this earliest stage of galaxy formation with this level of detail. JWST would also allow us to observe the chemical composition of planets outside the solar system, and to image the disks around stars as they begin planet formation.

It is hard to overstate the impact of HST on astronomy over the last two decades, and in particular on the public’s engagement with astronomy and science in general. There is just something incredibly inspiring and awesome about space-based observatories and the images they produce, that are unmatched by ground-based telescopes. JWST is a natural successor to Hubble in this mission: it has tremendous potential to be a vehicle of wonder. In addition to the science that would be lost, the funding losses to US astronomy, and the set back of our research progress, this loss to the public inspiration and engagement in scientific discovery could be one of the most substantial hits if JWST does not go forward.

I encourage all who are concerned about the next decade of astronomy to contact your representatives and senators as soon as possible. Termination of JWST would reduce the strength and visibility of the US science program as a whole, its impacts would be felt far beyond astrophysics. Killing JWST now also substantially threatens US credibility as an international partner, and sends the message that the US is just not interested in scientific leadership in major projects.

More at the New York Times, the Nature News Blog, Sky and Telescope, and Bad Astronomy. House press release here. The AAS will be releasing a statement later today. Thanks to Garth Illingworth for some useful background.

The case for JWST from a fan at the Vlog brothers: “I do not want to live in a world where we only focus on suck, and never think about awesome.”

LISA is not completely dead: the European Space Agency will keep the planning alive. But this is a serious step, not just a feint in a budget negotiation; the LISA International Science Team is being disbanded, told to pack up and go home. Hopefully the ESA will continue to push forward, and individual researchers in the US can somehow find money to still think about gravitational-wave astrophysics from space. It’s possible that a smaller mission could be put forward, but it’s not as if NASA has extra money they’re looking to spend right now.

Of all the concepts for big astrophysics missions in space, LISA is my favorite. Unlike LIGO, which strains as hard as possible and hopefully will detect something once its upgraded, LISA would be bombarded with gravitational waves, and the trick will be picking out the interesting signals from above the ambient noise. (That’s a problem we don’t mind having.) I was part of the original Beyond Einstein roadmap team (pdf) that packaged LISA and Constellation-X together with a dark energy mission to create an ambitious but realistic plan for NASA cosmology that Congress and the OMB could get behind. That was in 2002, before wars and tax cuts and financial catastrophes sapped the government of its ability to pay for anything. The best-laid plans of mice and men and NASA panels, as the saying goes.

LISA’s science is not just achievable, it’s incredibly interesting. It would detect thousands of binary systems within our galaxy, as well as numerous inspirals of middleweight black holes into supermassive ones in other galaxies, giving us incredibly detailed access to the spacetime metric near a black hole. As a side benefit, the wavelength is just right for looking at gravitational waves that might be produced in the early universe if the electroweak phase transition is especially violent. I remember giving a talk to particle physicists planning the International Linear Collider (another possibly doomed endeavor) back in 2003. It was great to see their eyes light up when I told them about this connection between satellite observatories and particle accelerators — at a meeting dominated by budget worries, it was a tiny oasis of actual science.

Hopefully things will somehow work out, but there’s not a lot of reason for optimism at the moment. We’ll see how things go.

Senator Lamar Alexander
Ranking Member
Energy & Water Appropriations Subcommittee

March 1, 2011

Dear Chairman Feinstein and Sen. Alexander,

We write in regards to the current proposed budget cuts on science, and the impact the cuts would have on the competitiveness of this nation, both in the short and long term. The economic health and world leadership of this country depends on an unbroken cycle of innovation, rooted in our ability to attract and educate new waves of creative young scientists and engineers, each year. It is this cycle of innovation, whose continuation depends on funding for basic research, that drives both basic and applied sciences, and the creation of new technologies and treatments that define and improve the quality of everyday life.

In order for the cycle to remain unbroken, and for the nation’s position of leadership to continue, basic research needs to be supported, even when the times demand strict fiscal responsibility. One never knows where the next transformative breakthrough will emerge, or who the next young scientist will be that creates it.

The proposed cuts to the Department of Energy Office of Science, the National Science Foundation and the National Institute of Standards and Technology would result in the immediate cessation of many scientifically critical activities, due in part to the layoff of thousands of scientists and engineers. The cuts would have a severe impact on cutting-edge research in areas such as biotechnology, nanotechnology, high-speed computing, advanced materials and photonics, as well as high energy physics, nuclear physics and fusion energy sciences.

At a time when we are seeking to spark economic growth and encourage talented young people to pursue careers in science and engineering, reducing federal support for science research and education is counterproductive. It is basic research that motivates many young people to study science. Such cuts will only hurt our competitiveness, especially at a time when emerging economies such as China and India are ramping up their investments in scientific research and education, and are learning to form their own generations of young innovators.

As young scientists and our mentors, we ask that you make science a priority and fund basic research at a level that provides long term growth as an investment, both in our future and our nation’s future. There are many exciting questions that we can only address if provided sufficient resources, not only this year but in the coming years as well. The tools and techniques that we develop in pursuit of these answers will have a lasting benefit to our country and society.

Sincerely,

1. Robert Roser, Fermilab, Batavia IL
2. Ben Kilminster, Fermilab, Batavia IL
3. Katherine Copic, Columbia University, New York, NY
4. Andrey Elagin, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX
5. Elisabetta Pianori University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA
6. Robyn Madrak, Fermilab, Batavia IL
7. Daniel Whiteson, UC Irvine, Irvine CA
8. Farrukh Azfar, Oxford, Batavia IL
9. Satyajit Behari, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore <d
10. Tom Schwarz, UC Davis, Davis CA
11. Ford Garberson, University of Chicago, Chicago IL
12. Andrey Loginov, Yale University, New Haven CT
13. Heather Ray, University of Florida, Gainseville Fl
14. Emma Alexander, Yale, Atlanta, Georgia
15. Jonathan S. Wilson, The Ohio State University, Columbus, Ohio
16. Rob Forrest, UC Davis, Davis CA
17. Dr Charles Plager, UCLA, Los Angeles CA
18. Kai Yi, University of Iowa, Iowa City Iowa
19. Bodhitha Jayatilaka, Duke University, Durham NC
20. Matthew Heintze, University of Florida, Gainseville FL
21. Yen-Chu Chen Institute of Physics, Academia Sinica Taipei, Taiwan, Republic of China
22. Kyle Knoepfel, Fermilab, Batavia IL
23. Deepak Kar, University of Dresden, Dresden Germany
24. Alison Lister, UC Davis, Davis CA
25. Valeria Bartsch, University of Susex, Falmer UK
26. Harinder Singh Bawa, UC Fresno, Fresno CA
27. Heather Gerberich, University of Illinios, Urbana IL
28. Chang Seong Moon, Seoul National University, Seoul Korea
29. Tingjun Yang, Fermilab, Batavia IL
30. Sebastian Grinstein, IFAE Barcelona, Spain
31. Max Goncharov, MIT, Boston MA
32. Michal Kreps, University of Warwick, Coventry UK
33. Giulia Manca, University of Cagliari, Cagliari Italy
34. Mousumi Datta, Fermilab, Batavia IL
35. Bonnie T. Fleming, Yale University New Haven CT
36. Sasha Pronko, LBL, Berkeley CA
37. Efe Yazgan, Postdoctoral Research Associate, Texas Tech University, Lubbock, Texas
38. Diego Tonelli, Fermilab, Batavia IL
39. Sergo Jindariani, Fermilab, Batavia IL
40. Meghan McAteer, University of Texas, Austin TX
41. Olga Norniella, UIUC, Urbana Champaign IL
42. David Cox, UC Davis, Davis CA
43. Dongwook Jang, Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh PA
44. Justin Pilot, OSU, Columbus OH
45. Kirsten Tollefson, Michigan State, East Lansing MI
46. John Conway, UC Davis, Davis CA
47. Robin Erbacher, UC Davis, Davis CA
48. Leo Jenner, Fermilab, Batavia IL
49. Paola Garosi, University of Siena, Siena Italy
50. Xinchun Tian University of South Carolina, Columbia SC
51. Karen Bland, Baylor University, Waco Tx
52. Enrique Palencia, CERN, Geneva Switzerland
53. Joseph Walding, College of William and Mary, Williamsburg VA
54. Marcelle Soares-Santos, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
55. Prashant Subbaro, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia PA
56. Halley Brown, Fermilab, Batavia IL
57. J.P. Chou, Brown University, Providence RI
58. Sudhir Malik, University of Nebraska, Lincoln Nebraska
59. Christian Pascal Graf, UIC, Chicago IL
60. Matthew Worcester, University of Chicago, Chicago IL
61. Ritoban Basu Thakur, Fermilab, Batavia IL
62. Carley Kopecky, UC Davis, Davis CA
63. Zeynep Isvan, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh PA
64. Derek Strom, UIC, Chicago IL
65. Dr Christina Mesropian, Rockefeller University, NYC NY
66. Ayesh Jayasinghe, University of Oklahoma, Norman, Oklahoma
67. Gary Cheng, Columbia, NYC NY
68. Suneel Dutt, Panjab University, Chandigarh India
69. James Monk, UCL, London UK
70. Aaron Morris, Northern Illinois Univ. Dekalb IL
71. Jacob Linacre, Fermilab, Batavia IL
72. Ioana Anghel, UIC, Chicago IL
73. Ian Howley University of Texas, Arlington TX
74. Karolos Potamianos, Purdue University, West Lafayette IN
75. Shulamit Moed Sher, Harvard University, Boston MA
76. Jason St. John, Boston University, Boston MA
77. Bruno Casal, ETH Zurich, Zurich Switzerland
78. Gavril Giurgiu, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore MD
79. Alexander Paramonov, Argonne National Lab, Argonne IL
80. Bari Osmanov, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL
81. Jeffrey Kubo, Fermilab, Batavia IL
82. Adam Patch, Yale University, New Haven IL
83. Anna Mazzacane, Fermilab, Batavia IL
84. Michael Peter Cooke, Fermilab, Batavia IL
85. Benjamin Auerbach, Yale University, New Haven CT
86. Warren Clarida, University of Iowa, Iowa City IA
87. Ricky Fok, University of Oregon, Eugene OR
88. Samvel Khalatyan, UIC Chicago IL
89. Miguel Mondragon, Fermilab, Batavia IL
90. Federico Sforza, PISA University, PISA Italy
91. Jon Wilson, OSU, Columbus Ohio
92. Jonathan Asaadi, Texas A&M, College Station TX
93. Edward Laird, Princeton, Princeton NJ
94. Dean Andrew Hidas, Rutgers University, Piscataway NJ
95. Irkli Chakaberia, Kansas State University, Manhattan KS
96. Mark Mathis, College of William and Mary, Williamsburg VA
97. Alejandro de la Puente, Notre Dame, South Bend Indiana
98. Yaofu Zhou, IIT, Chicago IL
99. Sarah Lockwitz, Yale University, New Haven CT
100. Douglas Orbaker, University of Rochester, Rochester NY
101. Joseph Haley, Northeastern University, Boston MA
102. Steve Nahn, MIT, Boston MA
103. Harvey Newman, Caltech, Pasadena CA
104. Austin Napier, Tufts, Medford MA
105. Sarah Demers, Yale, New Haven CT
106. JoAnne Hewett, SLAC/Stanford, Stanford CA
107. Jean-Luc Vay, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA
108. Tatiana Rodriguez, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia PA
109. Evan Friis, UC Davis, Davis California
110. Anyes Tafford, UC Irvine, Irvine CA
111. Avto Kharchilava, SUNY Buffalo, Buffalo NY
112. Georgia Karagiorgi Columbia University, NYC NY
113. Aaron Mislivec, University of Rochester, Rochester NY
114. William J Willis, Columbia University, NYC NY
115. Michael Murray, University of Kansas, Lawrence KS
116. Victor Yarba, Fermilab, Batavia IL
117. Florencia Canelli, University of Chicago/Fermilab, Chicago IL
118. Stefan M.Spanier, University of Tennessee, Knoxville TN
119. Pushpa Bhat, Fermilab, Batavia IL
120. James Wetzel, University of Iowa, Iowa City Ia
121. John Penwell, Indiana University, Bloomington IN
122. Igor Gorelov, University of New Mexico, Albequerque NM
123. Barbara Alvarez Gonzalez, MSU, East Lansing MI
124. Mauro Donega, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia PA
125. Angela Galtieri, LBL, Berkeley CA
126. Josehp F Muratore, BNL, Upton New York
127. Julie Managan, Rice University, Houston TX
128. Elizabeth H. Simmons, Michigan State University, East Lansing, Michigan
129. Elisa Pueschel, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA
130. Ben Brau, U. Mass., Amherst MA
131. Jennifer Klay , California Polytechnic State University, San Luis Obispo CA
132. Daryl Hare, Rutgers University, Springfield NJ
133. Daniel McDonald, Rice University, Houston TX
134. Sridhara Dasu, University of Wisconsin, Madison WI
135. Steven Blusk, Syracuse University, Syracuse NY
136. Fabrizio Margaroli, Purdue University, West Lafayette IN
137. John Strologas, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque NM
138. Nathan Goldschmidt, University of Florida, Gainesville Fl
139. Eva Halkiadakis, Rutgers, Picsataway NJ
140. Howard Haber UC Santa Cruz, Santa Cruz CA
141. Hongliang Liu, UC Riverside, Riverside CA
142. Stephen Parke, Fermilab, Batavia IL
143. Joachim Kopp, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
144. Alan Fisher, SLAC, Menlo Park CA
145. Jacobo Konigsberg, University of Florida, Gainesville FL
146. Zeno D. Greenwood, Louisiana Tech University, Ruston LA
147. Harrison B. Prosper, Florida State University, Tallahassee FL
148. Nikolai Smirnov, Yale University, New Haven CT
149. Nick Evans, University of Texas, Austin TX
150. Michael E. Peskin, SLAC, Stanford University, Stanford, California
151. Lawrence S. Pinsky, University of Houston, Houston, Texas
152. Bo Fenton-Olsen, LBL, Berkeley CA
153. Carlo Dallapiccola, University of Massachusetts, Amherst MA
154. Ron Madras, LBL, Berkeley CA
155. Paddy Fox, Fermilab, Batavia IL
156. Lance Dixon, SLAC, Menlo Park CA
157. Douglas Wright, Lawrence Livermore National Lab, Pleasanton CA
158. Ian Shipsey, Purdue University, West Lafayette IN
159. Reid Mumford, Salt lake City Utah
160. Pamela Klabbers, University of Wisconsin, Madison Wisconsin
161. Richard A. Vidal, Fermilab, Batavia IL
162. Ankush Mitra, Academia Sinica, Taipei Taiwan
163. Robert Hirosky, University of Virginia, Charlottesville VA
164. Chris Neu, University of Virginia, Charlottesville VA
165. Lina Galtieri, LBL, Berkeley CA
166. Marco Trovato, University of PISA, PISA Italy
167. Elizabeth Worcester, University of Chicago, Chicago IL
168. Leo Sabato, University of PISA, PISA Italy
169. Yu Zeng, Duke University, Durham NC
170. Yine Sun, Fermilab, Batavia IL
171. Viktoriya Zvoda, Fermilab, Batavia IL
172. Hatim Hegab, Oklahoma State University, Stillwater OK
173. Alexey Naumov, Fermilab, Batavia IL
174. Andrei Khilkevich, Fermilab, Batavia IL
175. Azeddine Kasmi, Baylor University, Waco TX
176. Robert Zwaska, Fermilab, Batavia IL
177. Alexander Romanenko, Fermilab, Batavia IL
178. Denise C. Ford, Northwestern University, Evanston IL
179. Kenichi Hatakeyama, Baylor University, Waco TX
180. Geum Bong Yu, Duke University, Durham NC
181. Tim Maxwell, Northern Illinois, Dekalb IL
182. Jun Guo, Columbia University, New York, NY
183. Liang Li, University of California, Riverside, Riverside, CA
184. Gianluca Petrillo, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY
185. Dr. Tyler Dorland, University of Washington, Seattle, Washington.
186. Jesus Orduna, Rice University, Huston, TX
187. Mark A. Padilla, University of California Riverside, Riverside CA.
188. Zhenyu Ye, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Batavia, Illinois
189. Andrew Kobach, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL
190. Hang Yin, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
191. Ryan J. Hooper, Bradley University, Peoria, IL 61625
192. Ashish Kumar, SUNY Buffalo, NY
193. Kayle DeVaughan, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
194. Dennis Mackin, Rice University, Houston, TX
195. Avdhesh Chandra Rice University, Houston, TX
196. Juliette Alimena, Brown University, Providence, RI
197. Satish Desai Fermilab, Batavia, IL
198. Jadranka Sekaric University of Kansas, Lawrence, Kansas
199. Dale Johnston, University of Nebraska, Lincoln NE
200. Dr. Andrew Haas, Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, Menlo Park, CA.
201. Kathryn Tschann-Grimm, Stony Brook University Stony Brook, NY
202. Peter Renkel, Southern Methodist University, Dallas, Texas.
203. Marc Buehler (PhD), University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA
204. Oleksiy Atramentov, Research Associate, Rutgers U., New Brunswick, NJ
205. Shabnam Jabeen, Brown University Providence, RI
206. Subhendu Chakrabarti, State University of New York, Stony Brook
207. Alex Melnitchouk, University of Mississippi, University, MS
208. Michael Eads, University of Nebraska – Lincoln
209. Michael Wang, Unversity of Rochester, Rochester, NY
210. Carrie McGivern, University of Kansas
211. Diego Menezes, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL.
212. Ioannis Katsanos, University of Nebraska – Lincoln
213. Trang Hoang, Florida State University, Tallahassee, IL
214. Sung Woo, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
215. Sehwook Lee, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa
216. Maiko Takahashi, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
217. Dmitry Bandurin, Florida State University, Tallahassee, Florida
218. Leah Welty-Rieger, Northwestern University, Evanston IL
219. Amitabha Das University of Arizona
220. Xuebing Bu, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Batavia, IL
221. Joseph G Haley Northeastern U Boston, MA
222. Bjoern Penning, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Batavia, IL
223. Andreas Jung, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
224. Daniel Boline , SUNY at Stony Brook, NY
225. Mandy Rominsky, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Batavia, IL
226. Michelle Prewitt, Rice University, Houston, TX
227. Kenneth Herner, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
228. Mark Williams, Fermilab International Fellow, Chicago, Il
229. Yunhe Xie, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
230. Gabriel Facini, Northeastern University, Boston, MA
231. John Backus Mayes, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, CA
232. Harold Nguyen, Univ. of California Riverside, Riverside, CA
233. Anton Kravchenko, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC
234. Ryan M White, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC
235. David Doll, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA
236. Bradley Wray, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX
237. Alexander Rakitin, California Inst. of Technology, Pasadena, CA
238. Daniel Chao, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA
239. Alexander Palmer, University of Texas at Dallas, Dallas, TX
240. Gil Vitug, University of California at Riverside, Riverside, CA
241. Rajarshi Das, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO
242. Chih-hsiang Cheng, California Inst. of Technology, San Jose, CA
243. Bertrand Echenard, California Inst. of Technology, Pasadena, CA
244. Liang Sun, Univ. of Cincinnati, Cincinnati, OH
245. Ada Rubin, Iowa State University, San Jose, Ca
246. Mikhail Dubrovin, SLAC, Menlo Park, CA
247. Andy Ruland, University of Texas at Austin, Austin, TX
248. Jaclyn Schwehr, Colorado State University, Fort Collins, CO
249. Bryan Fulsom, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Menlo Park, CA
250. Chris Bouchard; University of Illinois; Urbana, IL
251. Daping Du; University of Iowa; Iowa City, IA
252. Gordan Krnjaic; Johns Hopkins University; Baltimore, MD
253. Tim Linden; University of California at Santa Cruz; Santa Cruz, CA
254. Mark Mattson, Wayne State University, Detroit MI
255. Robert Craig Group, University of Virginia, Charlottesville VA
256. Artur Apresian, Caltech, Pasadena CA
257. Donatella Toretta, Fermilab, Batavia IL
258. Kate Scholberg, Dune University, Durham NC
259. Vito Di Benedetto, Università del Salento, Lecce, Italy.
260. Eric Feng, University of Chicago, Chicago IL
261. Tami Kramer, Fermilab, Batavia, Illinois
262. Nicholas Hadley, The University of Maryland, College Park, MD
263. Paul Sheldon, Vanderbilt Univerisity, Nashville, TN
264. Daniela Bortoletto, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana
265. Paul Padley, Rice University, Houston, TX.
266. Stanley Durkin, Ohio State University, Columbus OH
267. Kenneth Bloom, the University of Nebraska, Lincoln NE
268. Robert M. Harris, Fermilab, Batavia Illinois
269. Luc Demortier, The Rockefeller University, New York, NY
270. Greg Landsberg, Brown University, Providence RI
271. Tao Han Univ. of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin
272. Manfred Paulini, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA
273. Nikos Varelas, University of Illinois at Chicago, Chicago, Illinois
274. Brad Cox, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, VA
275. J. William Gary, University of California, Riverside; Riverside, CA
276. Marcus Hohlmann, Florida Institute of Technology, Melbourne, FL
277. Daniel Elvira, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
278. Jun Miyamoto, Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge, LA
279. Wesley Smith, U. Wisconsin – Madison, Madison, WI
280. Norbert Neumeister, Purdue University, W. Lafayette, IN
281. Bruce A. Barnett, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
282. David Saltzberg, UCLA, Los Angeles, California
283. Cecilia E. Gerber, University of Illinois, Chicago, IL
284. Robert Clare, University of California, Riverside, Riverside, CA
285. Alan Weinstein, Caltech, Pasadena CA
286. Hans P. Paar, University of California, San Diego
287. Edwin Norbeck, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA
288. Claudio Campagnari, University Of California, Santa Barbara, CA
289. Yasar Onel, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA
290. Ren-yuan Zhu, Caltech, Pasadena, CA
291. Colin Jessop, University of Notre Dame, South Bend, IN
292. Christopher G. Tully, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
293. Marc Baarmand, Florida Institute of Technology, Melbourne, Florida
294. Liz Sexton-Kennedy, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
295. Dimitri Bourilkov, University of Florida, Gainesville
296. Guenakh Mitselmakher, Universtity of Florida, Gainesville, FL
297. Yuri Gershtein, Rutgers, Piscataway, NJ
298. William T. Ford, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO
299. Pierre Ramond, University of Florida, Gainesville, FL
300. Richard Lander, University of California, Davis, Davis CA
301. Jim Alexander, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York
302. Pete Markowitz, Florida International University, Miami, FL
303. Frank Wuerthwein, UCSD, La Jolla, CA
304. Cecilia Gerber, Univ. of Illinois-Chicago, Chicago, IL
305. Mitchell Wayne, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN
306. Kaori Maeshima, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
307. David Stickland, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
308. Peter Elmer, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
309. Lothar Bauerdick, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Batavia, IL
310. Igor Vorobiev, Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh, PA
311. Frank Geurts, Rice University, Houston TX
312. Vasken Hagopian, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL
313. Sharon Hagopian, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL
314. David E. Pellett, University of California, Davis, Davis, CA
315. Richard Breedon, University of California, Davis, Davis, CA
316. Dick Loveless, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI
317. Anders Ryd, Cornell University, Ithaca, New York
318. Vivek Sharma, University of California, San Diego, La Jolla, Ca
319. Tim Doody, Fermilab, Batavia IL
320. Joe Incandela, UC Santa Barbara, Sanata Barbara, CA
321. Stanley J. Brodsky, Stanford University, Stanford, CA
322. Douglas Glenzinski, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
323. Marj Corcoran, Rice University, Houston, TX
324. Duncan Carlsmith, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI
325. Philip Baringer, University of Kansas, Lawrence, KS
326. Jon A Bakken, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
327. Lawrence Sulak, Boston University, Boston, MA
328. Robert Harr, Wayne State University, Detroit MI
329. Virgil Barnes, Purdue University, West Lafayette, Indiana
330. George Alverson, Northeastern University, Boston, MA
331. Don Reeder, University of Wisconsin-Madison, Madison, WI
332. Michael Schmitt, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL
333. Kamal K. Seth, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL
334. André de Gouvêa, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL
335. Brian Heltsley, Cornell University, Cornell, NY
336. Suharyo Sumowidagdo, University of California, Riverside, Riverside CA
337. Weimin Wu, Fermilab, Batavia, Illinois
338. Andriy Zatserklyaniy, University of Puerto Rico, Mayaguez, Mayaguez, PR
339. Philip D. Lawson, Boston University, Boston MA
340. Alexei Safonov, Texas A&M University, Colleeg Station TX
341. Christopher Neu, University of Virginia, Charlottesville, Virginia
342. Petar Maksimovic, The Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
343. Keith Ulmer, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO
344. Selcuk Cihangir, Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory, Batavia, IL
345. William Tanenbaum, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
346. Christopher Justus, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA.
347. Edmund Berry, Princeton University, Princeton, NJ
348. Aran Garcia-Bellido, University of Rochester, Rochester, NY
349. Remigius K Mommsen, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
350. David Stuart, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA
351. Salvatore Rappoccio, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
352. Tia Miceli, University of California Davis, Davis CA
353. Sinjini Sengupta, Texas A&M University, College Station, Texas
354. Sorina Popescu, Fermilab, Batavia IL
355. Andrew Askew, Florida State University, Tallahassee, FL
356. Frank Chlebana, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
357. Nhan Tran, Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore, MD
358. Ted Kolberg, University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, IN
359. Julia Yarba, Fermilab, Batavia IL
360. Kirk Arndt, Purdue University, West Lafayette, IN
361. Jeffrey Temple, University of Maryland, College Park, MD
362. Robert L Stone, Rutgers University, New Brunswick, NJ
363. Aram Avetisyan, Brown University, Providence, RI
364. Dorian Kcira, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA
365. Valentin Kuznetsov, Cornell University, Ithaca, NY
366. Nancy Marinelli, Univ. of Notre Dame – Notre Dame, IN
367. Jacob Anderson, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
368. Seth Cooper, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis, MN
369. Andres Florez, Vanderbilt University, Nashville, TN
370. Yuriy Pischalnikov, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
371. Seema Sharma, Fermilab, Batavia IL
372. Alexi Mestvirishvili, University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA
373. Yuyi Guo, Fermilab, Batavia IL
374. Jorge L. Rodriguez, Florida International University, Miami, Florida
375. Oliver Gutsche, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
376. Jeffrey Kolb, University of Notre Dame, South Bend, IN
377. Francisco Yumiceva, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
378. Roy Joaquin Montalvo, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX
379. Steven Lowette, UCSB, Santa Barbara, California
380. Igor Vodopiyanov, Florida Institute of Technology,Melbourne, FL
381. James Zabel, Rice University, Houston, TX
382. Yuriy Pakhotin, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX
383. Jason Gilmore, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX
384. Weiren Chou, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
385. J. Kandaswamy, SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory, Stanford, CA
386. Jordan M. Tucker, University of California, Los Angeles, Los Angeles, CA
387. Hongxuan Liu, Baylor University, Waco, TX
388. Christoph Paus, MIT, Cambridge, MA
389. Armando LANARO, University of Wisconsin, Madison, Wisconsin
390. Tiesheng Dai, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan
391. Chi M. Lei, Fermilab, Batavia, IL
392. George S.F. Stephans, MIT, Cambridge, Massachusetts
393. Ye Li, Northwestern University, Evanston IL
394. Will Flanagan, Texas A&M University, College Station, TX
395. James Gainer, Northwestern University, Evanston IL
396. Kunal Kumar, Northwestern University, Evanston, IL
397. Bernadette Heyburn, University of Colorado, Boulder, CO
398. Don Summers, University of Mississippi, Oxford, MS
399. Eric Vaandering, Fermilab, Batavia IL
400. Dimitris Varouchas, LBNL, Berkeley, CA
401. Burton DeWilde, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY
402. Josh Cogan, SLAC/Stanford, Palo Alto, CA (voter in Indianland, SC)
403. M. Saleem, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK
404. Paul Jackson, SLAC/Stanford University, Menlo Park, CA
405. Devin Harper, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI
406. Mark Oreglia, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL
407. Darren Price, Indiana University, Bloomington IN
408. Kevin Finelli, Duke University, Durham, NC
409. John Stupak, SUNY Stony Brook, Stony Brook, NY
410. James Degenhardt, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA
411. Dilip Jana, University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK
412. Krzysztof Sliwa, Tufts University, Medford, Massachusetts
413. Hayes Dee Meritt, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH
414. Steven Farrell, University of California, Irvine, CA
415. Joseph Tuggle, University of Chicago, Chicago, IL
416. Tetteh Addy, Hampton University, Hampton, VA
417. Lashkar Kashif, University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI
418. Ning Zhou, University of California, Irvine, CA
419. Seth Zenz, University of California, Berkeley, CA
420. Michael Werth, University of California, Irvine, CA
421. Jianrong Deng, University California, Irvine, CA
422. Dominick Olivito, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA
423. Joshua Moss, Ohio State University, Columbus, OH
424. Zachary Marshall, graduate of Calech, Malibu, CA
425. Andrew Nelson, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa
426. Tim Andeen, Columbia University, New York, NY
427. Robert Calkins, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL
428. Caleb Lampen, University of Arizona, Tucson, AZ
429. Kevin Slagle, University of California, Irvine, CA
430. Louise Skinnari, University of California, Berkeley, CA
431. Fayez Mahmoud Abu-Ajamieh,Northern Illinois University, Dekalb, IL
432. Lauren Tompkins, University of California, Berkeley, CA
433. Kevin O’Connell, University of Pittsburgh, Pittsburgh, PA
434. Maxwell I. Scherzer, University of California, Berkeley, CA
435. Danial Slichter, University of California, Berkeley, CA
436. Woochun Park, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC
437. Jae Jun Kim, University of South Carolina, Columbia, SC
438. Matthew Relich, University of California, Irvine, CA
439. Scott Aefsky, Brandeis University, Waltham, MA
440. Reza AmirArjomand, University of California, Irvine, CA
441. Shannon MacKenzie, University of Louisville, Louisville KY
442. Fabien Tarrade, Brookhaven National Lab, Upton, NY
443. Chad Suhr, Northern Illinois University, DeKalb, IL
444. Xin Qian, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA
445. Jedrzej Biesiada, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA
446. Corrinne mills, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
447. Brokk Toggerson, University of California, Irvine, CA
448. Stephanie Majewski, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY
449. Rajivalochan Subramaniam, Louisiana Tech University, Ruston, LA
450. Andre M. Bach, UC Berkeley & Lawrence Berkeley National Lab, Berkeley, CA
451. Hideki Okawa, University of California, Irvine, CA
452. Zhen Yan, Boston University, Boston, MA
453. Robert Harrington, Boston University, Boston, MA
454. Emily Thompson, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA
455. Christopher K. Vermilion, University of Louisville, Louisville, KY
456. William Edson, State University of New York at Albany, Albany, NY
457. William S. Lockman, University of California, Santa Cruz, CA 95064
458. Dmitri Smirnov, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton, NY
459. James Saxon, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA
460. Matthew Hickman, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA
461. Kurt Brendlinger, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA
462. Bradley Dober, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA
463. Alex Long, Boston University, Boston, MA
464. Chris Potter, University of Oregon, Eugene, OR
465. Peter Radloff, University of Oregon, Eugene OR
466. W. Thomas Meyer, Iowa State University, Ames, Iowa
467. Usha Mallik, The University of Iowa, Iowa City, IA
468. Simona Malace, Jefferson Lab, Newport News, VA
469. German Colón, University of Massachusetts, Amherst, MA
470. Therese Jones, University of California, Berkeley, CA
471. Jessica Metcalfe, University of New Mexico, Albuquerque, NM
472. Anze Slosar, Brookhaven National Laboratory, Upton NY
473. Sarah Newman,University of California, Berkeley, CA
474. Shirley Ho, Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory, Berkeley, CA
475. Kyoko Yamamoto, Iowa State University, Ames, IA
476. Eyal Kazin, New York University, New York, NY
477. Alexander Tuna, University of Pennsylvania, Philadelphia, PA
478. Regina Caputo, Stony Brook University, Stony Brook, NY
479. Alfred Goshaw, Duke University, Durham, NC

Without going into any judgments, the White House budget is much more favorable for science. Here are summaries for the Department of Energy, NASA, and the National Science Foundation. Here are some highlights; for simplicity I’m just comparing the actual amount spent in 2010 vs. the proposed budget for 2012. (2011 is confusing because we’re currently operating under a continuing resolution, not a real budget.) So keep in mind that these percentage changes are spread over two years.

• DoE discretionary spending would increase by 11.5%, from $26.5 billion to $29.5 billion. Much of that is for clean energy research. Science would increase by 9%, from $5.0 billion to $5.4 billion. If you dig into the details (pdf), we find High Energy Physics taking a 5% cut, from $842 million to $797 million. That’s been the story for quite a while now; flat or slowly declining budgets, which means that programs are being worn away by inflation.
• NSF would get a 13% increase, from $6.6 billion to $7.6 billion. Most of this is real research money. There is $40 million to train new K-12 and undergraduate science teachers.
• NASA’s budget stays flat at $18.7 billion. But the science budget would increase by 11.5%, from $4.5 billion to $5.0 billion.

Overall, not too bad for science. Keep in mind that this is only a proposal, and it won’t go through Congress unscathed. Given that Republicans have a majority in the House, you have to expect that the final agreement will be a compromise, so it’s still very possible that basic research will be gutted in the final budget. HEP would seem to be hurting no matter what, but I don’t know how much of that can be traced to the planned Tevatron shutdown.

Among the cuts is $1.1 billion from the Department of Energy Office of Science, the agency which funds the majority of basic physics research at universities and national labs. This is out of a total proposed budget of $5.12 billion for basic research. That request for FY2011 was slightly above the FY2010 actual appropriation, meaning that the proposed cut for FY2011 represents more than a $890 million decrease relative to FY2010.

If enacted (and what happens next is a high-stakes game of chicken), clearly, this represents a 20% rescission half way through the fiscal year. Effectively it’s a 40% cut. Imagine you are a national lab director, or a university PI like me. If I am told that I will not get the money we were awarded by the DOE, we will need to let people go, no question. People are talking about closing the national labs for some period, and I have heard rumors that the Tevatron at Fermilab, scheduled to shut down in September, will actually be turned off in a couple weeks on March 1, ten years to the day that Run 2 began.

The exact programs within the DOE Office of Science to be cut will be detailed by the committee soon, I expect. But this is utter devastation for the people that form the bedrock foundation of our high tech economy, and train the next generation of scientists and engineers. It is breathtakingly stupid.

And how does cutting $100 billion in government spending “help our economy grow and create jobs”? The immediate result will be the loss of something like a million jobs. This is just an order of magnitude guess, based on the notion that all government spending supports jobs one way or another, at about $100k per job. Maybe it’s 600k, maybe it’s 1.5 million – I don’t know. But to say this creates jobs? I am totally baffled by this logic. I am no economist, but maybe one out there can enlighten me.

As far as I can see, we cut federal spending so the ultra-rich can keep their tax breaks, and they invest the money they keep overseas where labor is cheaper. So we are killing American jobs – some of the best ones we have in high-tech and alternative energy – and sending them out of the country. This is incredible.

The administration’s FY2012 request will be released tomorrow. No doubt the house majority party will declare it DOA…

The story is about Ibn al-Haytham (sometimes Latinized to Alhazen), a pioneering Muslim scientist from around the year 1000. A story is appropriate because we just don’t know too many details of al-Haytham’s life. What we do know is that he was placed under house arrest in Cairo after disappointing the Caliph by failing to control the floods of the Nile.

There was an unanticipated advantage to house arrest, at least in Jennifer’s retelling — al-Haytham was denied his precious books, so he couldn’t engage in the usual work of scholars, which was taken to be commenting on classic texts. Instead, he hit upon the idea of doing experiments on his own. The amazing result was a seven-volume Book of Optics. Long story short, this was the work that really established the idea that sight relies on rays of light stretching from objects to the eye, as well as introducing the camera obscura and discussing the physical mechanism of sight.

After ten years of arrest, the Caliph died and al-Haytham was released. But he didn’t slow down, producing “scores” (according to Wikipedia) of other works on physics, astronomy, mathematics, and medicine. Kind of makes my own C.V. seem pretty puny by comparison; better get back to work.

I have a lengthy post in the works about my own feelings about the state of the British higher education system, and the treatment of science more specifically. However, here I’d like to make sure that any interested readers are aware of a concerted effort to push back against the planned short-sighted cuts, under the banner of the Science is Vital campaign.

From their website, Science is Vital is

… a group of concerned scientists, engineers and supporters of science who are campaigning to prevent destructive levels of cuts to science funding in the UK.

and the concrete steps that one can take to help the cause (mostly useful if you live in Britain) are

1. Sign the Campaign for Science & Engineering petition.
2. Join the Science is Vital demo in central London, Saturday 9th October at 2 PM.
3. Write to your MP about the importance of science, technology, engineering and maths.
4. Come to the Houses of Parliament for the Science is Vital lobby of MPs on 12th October, 3.30 to 4.30 PM.
5. Spread the word using the posters.

Fellow cosmological bloggers Andrew Jaffe (an American who lives and works in the UK, as a Professor at Imperial College, and blogs at Leaves on the Line) and Peter Coles (a Professor at Cardiff University who blogs at In the Dark) have been writing eloquently and persuasively about the threat to British science for quite some time now. Both have recent posts (Jaffe, Coles) which describe the Science is Vital effort and the motivations behind it.

If you care about science, and maintaining Britain’s historical strength in this area, I urge you to sign the Science is Vital petition, and do whatever you can to fight the planned cuts. It can take a long time to become one of the world’s leading nations in such an important endeavor, but considerably less time to throw away that status. Please don’t let that happen to British science.

At present, it looks like there will be two more space shuttle launches. That’s it. Within a year, our nation will no longer have the capability to launch humans into space. For some this is a sure sign that America is sliding into mediocrity. Both the first and the last man to step on the Moon testified before Congress last May, speaking out against the Obama plan to shut down the Constellation program (video). Their testimony was reminiscent of a past age, where we proved our worth by beating the Russians to the Moon, and the natural next step is to now prove our worth by beating the Chinese to the Red Planet. The jingoistic associations are unsettling, and these arguments gloss over the staggering costs involved. To quote none other than Neil Armstrong: “If the leadership we have acquired through our investment is allowed simply to fade away, other nations will surely step in where we have faltered. I do not believe that this would be in our best interests.”

It is certainly amazing that we’ve had continuous human “inhabitants” in low-Earth orbit. Rocket science is, indeed, rocket science, and this should never be taken for granted. Launching people into orbit is a massive endeavor, and having them survive in the incredibly inhospitable environment of space is even more impressive. But the simple truth is that the contributions to basic science from the space station have been entirely negligible (especially in comparison with the staggering costs). Furthermore, I would argue that the Hubble space telescope has done significantly more to awe and inspire the world than the International Space Station.

A year ago we discussed an Academy report which criticized the direction of the manned space program, and recommended profound changes. Subsequently the Academy released a separate report sharply criticizing the scientific underpinning of NASA, and recommending similar changes. Two months ago the Obama administration outlined a new vision for NASA, in line with these reports, including the cancellation of the Constellation program (which was the new and improved version of the Apollo program). Given the immense sums of money involved, especially to influential states such as Florida and Texas, Congress has taken the liberty of trying to do an end-run around the White House, and fund Constellation despite the lack of a request for funding. In a triumph of politics over common-sense, money will be poured into building more rockets, rather than funding a broad portfolio of technological development (including better ways to get humans into orbit and beyond) and basic research (including unmanned probes and satellites elucidating the mysteries of the Universe). In the latest salvo, fourteen Nobel laureates, and a few astronauts for good measure, issued an open letter supporting Obama’s strategy, and advising Congress against throwing all of NASA’s eggs in the “heavy lift rocket” basket.

One thing is clear: for better or worse, the shuttle program is at an end. There is no clear successor, and it will likely be many years before another astronaut is launched into orbit by the United States. If you want to experience the thrill of sending humans into space (and it is an incredible, indescribable rush), you’d better hustle on down to the Kennedy Space Flight Center. The next-to-last launch is currently scheduled for November 1, 2010.

So I went to Wikipedia. There, you can find a reference to a New York Times article from the beginning of August, where the total volume of the leak was estimated to be 780,000 cubic meters of oil. Now, that’s clearly in the category of “reasonable guess” – no one knows for sure. But it is very unlikely to be a factor of two larger or smaller than that, so let’s just use that for now. There are a lot of other uncertainties, for example the amount of natural gas (methane) that came out with the oil, how the flow rate changed with time, and so on. But again, let’s just ignore those.

How big is 780,000 cubic meters? Simply taking the cube root of this number, this is the volume of a cube 92 meters on a side. It would look something like this next to the Pentagon:

I can imagine two reactions to this comparison: 1) Damn, that’s a lot of oil! 2) That’s tiny compared to the volume of the Gulf of Mexico! (I bet one’s political views might play a role in which reaction comes first…)

If we were to take this volume and spread it out in a layer 1 millimeter thick, it would cover an area of 780 million square meters, which is a square about 28 kilometers on a side. The satellite images of the oil slick showed affected regions much larger than that, from which I conclude that the thickness of the surface layer must have been much less than 1 millimeter at those times. (But check my math, somebody!)

If all the oil were dissolved uniformly into the Gulf, which has a total volume three million billion times the size of the leak, the concentration would be about one third of one part per billion. That’s an interesting number all by itself, and not at all as small as it seems. But not all the oil leaked is in the Gulf – much of it evaporated and a good deal has been consumed by bacteria. But the rest of it went somewhere, right?

Now to the underwater plume. In the abstract of the Science Magazine paper that led to all the news stories, the authors said “Our findings indicate the presence of a continuous plume over 35 km in length, at approximately 1100 m depth that persisted for months without substantial biodegradation.” I cannot find the word “Manhattan” anywhere in their article, and so I have to conclude this was some mainstream media (WSJ?) person’s rather inept attempt at putting the size of the plume into perspective. It was parroted endlessly in the media as if it had meaning. In fact it’s quite misleading – clearly the term “Manhattan-sized” conjures up images of the whole island of Manhattan along with all the tall buildings…but as we have seen the total volume of oil leaked into the Gulf is about the size of one of those buildings.

So what is this plume? The authors define it as “a discrete spatial interval with hydrocarbon signals or signal surrogates (i.e., colored dissolved organic matter or aromatic hydrocarbon fluorescence) more than two standard deviations above the root-mean-square baseline variability.” That is, a place in the water where there is clearly oil present at detectable levels. It can be at quite low concentrations and still be detectable. One of the article’s main findings was that “Gas chromatographic analyses for only monoaromatic hydrocarbons of several water samples gathered using survey guidance confirm benzene, toluene, ethylbenzene, and total xylenes (BTEX) concentrations in excess of 50 μg L^–1 within the plume at 16 km downrange from the well site.” This is all bad stuff we don’t want in the water or getting into the food we eat.

I assume a lot more scientific research will need to be done to know the actual damage that the presence of these oil components will do to marine life, the fisheries, and the food chain. The authors took a stab at making an estimate of how much oxygen depletion was occurring due to biodegradation of the oil, concluding that “it may require many months before microbes significantly attenuate the hydrocarbon plume to the point that oxygen minimum zones develop that are intense enough…to threaten Gulf fisheries.” That’s good news for marine life, I assume, but means that the subsurface oil will take quite some time to be bioegraded, which is bad in the longer term. So why hasn’t the media talked about that aspect of the article?

There is no question that this was a huge amount of oil leaked into the Gulf and that the impacts will be felt for many years to come. It is an epic disaster by any measure and may have consequences no one has considered yet. But we have to be rational about the real impacts of the disaster, and rational about the real risks involved in deep water drilling. The only way is to continue vigorously the kind of research we saw in the Science Magazine article, and debate the findings openly. BP needs to release publicly everything it knows about the spill.

The full report is an excellent description of the entire field, both where we are now, and where we’re likely to be headed. If 200+ pages is a bit much to swallow, the report contains a 5 page Executive Summary (with 5 tables laying out the project rankings and costs). Probably the best place to start, however, is Julianne’s discussion of the report: post 1, post 2, and post 3.

For those with no attention span whatsoever, here is my 6 bullet-point summary:
1. Surveys rule the roost. The next decade is about survey telescopes. The #1 space priority is an infrared survey telescope (WFIRST) (a successor of SNAP/JDEM). The #1 ground priority is a wide-field optical survey telescope (LSST).
2. Another golden decade of cosmology (and planets). Both the top space and ground priorities originated as dark energy/cosmology missions. They turn out to be excellent planet missions as well.
3. Bang for the buck. Smaller, diverse, rapid-response programs provide excellent science return. The “Explorer program” and the “Mid-scale Innovations Program” are the #2 priorities for space and ground, respectively. Specific missions within these programs are unspecified.
4. The birth of gravitational-wave astronomy. We are (hopefully) entering the decade of gravitational-wave astrophysics. The Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) is the 3rd ranked space mission. This is a big deal: gravitational-waves have yet to be seen, but the astronomical community nonetheless recognizes and prioritizes the role they have to play in exploring our Universe.
5. Clash of the Titans. The 3rd priority for ground-based astronomy is a huge (30 meter) optical/infrared telescope. There are two projects well underway (GMT and TMT). The report encourages the NSF to pick one for federal investment.
6. Etcetera. Other things that are discussed include an X-ray telescope (IXO), a high-energy gamma ray telescope (ACTA), a submillimeter telescope (CCAT), and a number of smaller missions and projects (including full funding for NASA’s Astrophysics Theory Program). Note that the Hubble Space Telescope’s successor, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), is not extensively discussed in this report, since it is already funded and is on track for launch in the next few years.

I’m excited about all of these facilities. I’ve written papers related to many of them (JDEM, LISA, and LSST), and I am convinced they will all profoundly deepen our understanding of our Universe. The Decadal report represents a tremendous investment by the astro community, involving hundreds of scientists making extremely painful and difficult choices. At the end of the day, a clear ranking has been produced, and a strong case has been articulated. Now the task it to convince the full astronomy community, Congress, and the taxpayers that we have done our homework, and that these missions are worthy of major public investment. We have an incredible decade ahead of us!

For close to half a century, the astronomical community has gone through an extremely productive exercise in navel gazing, producing exhaustive reports once a decade to lay out our priorities as a field. These reports are the result of a year long process of consultation, analysis, and lobbying. Through the National Academy of Sciences, the community organizes a series of committees to evaluate every aspect of US astronomical research. They try to identify scientific areas that are ripe for breakthroughs, and then to match these areas with specific technological investments in astronomical tools (primarily telescopes, but also increasingly computational and theoretical resources). The committees then do their best to rank these investments into a prioritized list.

The process of making a prioritized list is relatively horrific, since it involves choices between extremely different, non-overlapping projects. For example, if you’ve spent your life understanding optical and near-infrared spectra of galaxies, you’ll be rooting for a gigantic ground based telescope — most competing projects will be of little utility for your research. However, as a field, we are forced to face up to the fact that sometimes the best way to move forward on an astrophysical topic is not necessarily where we, as individuals, have chosen to do so. We also have to recognize that what may interest us personally may not be the most important question in the field. For example, I’m a nearby galaxy kind of girl, but I’d be a fool not to recognize that extrasolar planets are far more “ripe” for dramatic results. Finally, accepting these facts is not equally easy for all individuals, and many people are willing to go the mattresses for their preferred outcome. One hopes for good behavior, but people will be people.

The reason the process is so high-stakes is that the ranking that comes out of the Decadal Survey is taken very, very seriously. The upper administration of NASA and the National Science Foundation take these recommendations as commandments (i.e. don’t bother seeking funding for the satellite telescope that was ranked 15th). Ever more seriously, congressional staffers read these reports, making Congress extremely unlikely to finance anything but a top ranked project. (The few times that earmarks have been laid out for specific projects, it’s been Seriously Frowned Upon by the community, and by any administrator who has based their planning on the ranked list). Frankly, this is great, even if it’s hard. We wouldn’t want anyone else to make these decisions but us, as hard as it is to sometimes see your favorite project nudged out by something you are far less interested in.

So, the big things to look for in the news tomorrow are the first ranked ground-based project (i.e. NSF funded) and the first ranked space-based project (NASA funded). In the current funding climate, and with the growing costs of building competitive facilities, the community is unlikely to get more than one major initiative rolling — if that. This decadal report is unlikely to make the mistakes of the last one, which can best be described as being equivalent to asking a 3 year old whether they’d prefer a bathtub full of ice cream or a pony. This round, there was much more attention paid to cost, so that the committee could make realistic decisions.

Frankly, it’s a bit of a scary time. The situation reminds me a bit too much of the Superconducting Supercollider. The funding levels needed to make big advances are at a point where we really can’t afford more than one major initiative a decade. That puts us in the unfortunate position of having a single point failure. Say we back one big project. Suppose that the one big project goes over budget (as cutting edge facilities frequently do) to the point where it gets cancelled, 10-15 years from now. Then, we’re left with nothing, and young astronomers start looking for jobs in Europe.

In 1900 there was not a single liberal democracy in the world (since none yet had universal suffrage); by 1950 there were twenty-two.

Tyler Cowen at Marginal Revolution has an ongoing series of posts in which he highlights “good sentences.” At first the conceit bugged me a bit, as how good can a single sentence be? It’s not like you have space to develop a sensible argument or anything.

But that’s the point, of course. A really good sentence packs a wallop because it fits an enormous amount into very few words. One technique for doing that is to exhibit an underlying assumption that is a remarkable claim in its own right. If I were to have tried to make the point that Ferris makes above, it would have been something like this:

Liberal democracies were established in fits and starts over a period of hundreds of years. The first major steps happened in countries like Britain, the United States, and France, where aristocratic systems were replaced (with different amounts of violence) by rule by popular vote. But I would argue that a true liberal democracy is one that features universal suffrage — every adult citizen has a right to participate. By that standard, there weren’t any liberal democracies in existence in the year 1900; but fifty years later, there were twenty-two.

Makes the point, but it’s a somewhat ponderous collection of mediocre sentences, rather than a single one of immense power. That’s the difference between someone who writes things, like me, and a true writer. I’m trying to learn.

Ferris’s book seems excellent, although I’ve just started reading it. It has a provocative thesis: the Enlightenment values of liberal democracy and scientific reasoning didn’t simply arise together. The emergence of science is rightfully understood as the cause of the democratic revolution. That’s the kind of thing I’d be happy to believe is true, so I’m especially skeptical, but I’m looking forward to the argument.

My own take is: what in the world is the big deal? Indeed, I would go so far as to ask: what could possibly be the big deal? Most of the noise has simply been nonsensical, focusing on misunderstandings of what scientists mean by the word “trick” and similar deep issues. And some people got upset when a dodgy paper was accepted by a journal, and they discussed giving the journal a cold shoulder. Cry me a river.

But I don’t really want to defend the scientists involved, because I’m not informed enough about who they are and what they did. For all I know, they may be very nasty and unethical human beings. (Actually that’s not true; I know Michael Mann, and he’s one of the nicest guys you’ll ever meet.) And I see no reason not to do a thorough investigation, and hand out appropriate sanctions if there’s real evidence of wrongdoing.

What baffles me is the idea that this changes the conversation about climate change in any way. This isn’t a case like Jan Hendrik Schon, the rogue physicist who rose to prominence on the basis of falsified data, and was later exposed. The job of monitoring the climate is one that has been taken up by more than just one or two groups of people. There have been thousands of peer-reviewed papers that have provided evidence of global warming. Not to mention common sense; when the concentration of CO2 in the atmosphere has shot up dramatically over the last century, and the temperature has done the same thing, it takes some willful stubbornness to avoid the obvious conclusion. All of the noise we’re hearing about “Climategate” is based on politics, not on science.

And that’s what really puzzles me. I understand the non-scientific motivations of certain climate denialists; in the abstract, they don’t want to accept that the unfettered actions of capitalism can ever have any deleterious effects, and in the concrete, many of them are paid by oil companies. (See this charming “letter to the American Physical Society,” whose handful of signatories includes “Roger Cohen, former Manager, Strategic Planning, ExxonMobil.”) Those are powerful incentives to ignore the evidence.

But what is the incentive on the other side supposed to be? What exactly is the motivation for the nefarious conspiracy of people who are supposedly plotting to mislead the world about global warming? What do the people counting oysters get out of this?

Are there a lot of people out there who think that scientists as a group (since the vast majority of scientists appreciate the problems of global warming) have knee-jerk reactions against technology and industry? Let me propose another motivation for whatever corners the East Anglia group might have contemplated cutting: they’ve seen the data, they know what’s happening to the planet, and they’re terrified of what the consequences might be. They know that the other side is motivated by non-scientific concerns, and they want to fight back as hard as they can, both for the good of humanity and for the integrity of science. There’s no question that scientists can go overboard, pulling the occasional shenanigans in the pursuit of their less lofty goals. (Like, you know, other human beings.) But nobody wants to believe that we’re facing a looming global ecological catastrophe. They believe it because that’s what the data imply.

From the scientific perspective, Obama has had tremendous impact (the Peace Prize singles out his “constructive role in meeting the great climatic challenges the world is confronting”). His appointees are first-rate, and there is a feeling that we are finally starting to move in the right direction. It is hard, of course, to point to tangible scientific results that have arisen because of Obama. There simply hasn’t been time enough. But this does not negate his impact; the momentum is apparent and encouraging. It is a similar story in international diplomacy. Obama also benefits from eight preceding years of Bush. Within the scientific community, the Bush administration represented a dark age. Any subsequent reasonable policy would seem to be enlightened. Thus to have a truly exceptional policy, informed by actual science and scientists (instead of cynical political aims), has a profound effect on the state of affairs. It is a similar story in international diplomacy.

My guess is that the Nobel committee wants to be relevant. A major criticism of the Physics Prize is that it has a relatively minor impact on the field of physics. It’s almost always given decades after the fact, to researchers that are already well known and well established. For the vast majority of recipients, their work is not suddenly transformed by the Prize. If anything, they become significantly less productive, as they’re now busy traveling the world and giving talks and (justifiably) enjoying the prominence only a Nobel can confer. Do not misunderstand: I am certainly not criticizing the Nobel Prize. It brings much positive attention to the field, and for the most part singles out very deserving recipients. It is the ultimate advertising campaign for physics, and we all benefit from it. (It would nonetheless be interesting to compare it to the Fields Medal [effectively the Nobel for mathematics], which is only given to mathematicians under the age of 40.) In this context, giving the Peace Prize to Obama is an inspired choice. They are hoping to give him more stature and leverage to help him achieve his goals; they want to help make the world a better place. It affirms the importance of American leadership on the world stage, and endorses our President’s vision of a world at peace. All Americans, regardless of political affiliation, should celebrate this.

President Obama yesterday conferred The National Medal of Science to Jim Gunn, as well as 8 other scientists. This is our nation’s highest scientific honor. It is a clear demonstration that our society values science, and acknowledges its contributions; even though this may not always be apparent in the squabbling on Capitol Hill, or on school boards “debating” evolution. Once a year scientists take pride of place, and are officially thanked by a grateful Nation. As usual, Obama unleashes his eloquence:

So this nation owes all of you an enormous debt of gratitude far greater than any medal can bestow. And we recognize your contributions, but we also celebrate the incredible contributions of the scientific endeavor itself. We see the promise — not just for our economy but for our health and well-being — in the human capacity for creativity and ingenuity. And we are reminded of the power of free and open inquiry, which is not only at the heart of all of your work, but at the heart of this experiment we call America.
…
there are those who say we can’t afford to invest in science, that it’s a luxury at a moment defined by necessities. I could not disagree more. Science is more essential for our prosperity, our security, and our health, and our way of life than it has ever been. And the winners we are recognizing only underscore that point, with achievements in physics and medicine, computer science and cognitive science, energy technology and biotechnology. We need to ensure that we are encouraging the next generation of discoveries — and the next generation of discoverers.

Full transcript here. Jim Gunn was honored “for his brilliant design of many of the most influential telescopes and instruments in astronomy, and in particular for the crucial role those technological marvels played in the creation of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey, which has cataloged 200 million stars, galaxies, and quasars; discovered the most distant known quasars; and probed the epoch of formation of the first stars and galaxies.”

Sitting in the audience were members of the administration, including Steve Chu (Secretary of Energy) and John Holdren (Science Advisor), widely respected scientists in their own right. Seeing them gathered with Obama, celebrating science, is a hopeful image. There is a perception that scientists are losing the goodwill amassed in the last Century, and are now thought of as just another interest group. But we need science to address many of the world’s most pressing challenges. We need young people to be inspired, and to want to become scientists. Occasions like this remind us that science, and scientists, will play a crucial role in our future.

The summary makes one critical point: NASA is woefully underfunded to accomplish its stated goals (Let’s go to the Moon and Mars and beyond!). The committee’s basic message is that, under the current funding profile, NASA can barely retire the space shuttles and the International Space Station. Any ambitious manned space exploration plans will have to be delayed by a minimum of 15-20 years (Bush wanted us to be playing soccer on the Moon by 2020). The committee says an additional $3 billion/year for ten years is required to have a viable manned exploration program, on top of the roughly $10 billion/year currently being spent (for reference, NASA science programs weigh in at under $5 billion/year). As far as space exploration is concerned, the current trajectory isn’t going to get us anywhere.

One interesting aspect of this report is the absence of science. Out of 12 pages, science is mentioned twice. In the third line of the report, we are advised that spaceflight “really is rocket science”. Cute. Towards the end of the introduction, we are told “Human exploration can contribute appropriately to the expansion of scientific knowledge”. The emphasis is theirs, not mine. Perhaps they’re feeling a little defensive? As well they should. From what I can tell, nobody has articulated a compelling scientific case for human beings to go beyond low-Earth orbit. Or even leave Earth, for that matter. From a scientific perspective, the International Space Station has been an unbelievably colossal waste of money. As the Economist tells us, “the useful science that has been done on board could be written up on the back of a postage stamp.” (Sam Ting’s AMS would be an exception. But this is unlikely to have been the most cost-effective way to go about this experiment.) The space shuttle program, on the other hand, has been instrumental in producing amazing science, epitomized by the launching and servicing of the Hubble Space Telescope. Given the immense cost of the shuttle program, however, the science return on investment remains fairly slim. How many space telescopes could have been built and launched by conventional rockets, for the cost of all that shuttle development?

It could be argued that the manned space program is not about science at all. It’s about slipping the surly bonds of Earth and fulfilling our “natural destiny”. There is certainly something compelling about this, although I would argue that the current plans are ludicrously expensive and overly ambitious. My main concern is that the public misses the distinction: NASA sometimes appears to conflate human exploration and basic research. When we talk about sending humans to the Moon or Mars, we’re not talking about scientific exploration. If science is your goal, you send unmanned probes and satellites, at a tiny fraction of the cost. These missions carry no risk to human life, and considerably larger scientific payoff.

Like any science fiction fan, I’m intrigued by the idea of human colonies on the Moon and Mars and beyond. But if these long-term aspirations suck the oxygen out of the room for basic science, humanity on the whole loses out.

President Obama addressed the National Academies of Science yesterday. If anyone doubted that change has come, and come to science, they need to watch this video. We’ve been waiting a long, long time for a president to take this kind of interest in furthering the cause of science in our country. His budget calls for a doubling of our nation’s investment in basic research in the coming years:

“No one can predict what new applications will be born of basic research: new treatments in our hospitals; new sources of efficient energy; new building materials; new kinds of crops more resistant to heat and drought.”

“It was basic research in the photoelectric effect that would one day lead to solar panels. It was basic research in physics that would eventually produce the CAT scan. The calculations of today’s GPS satellites are based on the equations that Einstein put to paper more than a century ago….”

“We double the budget of key agencies, including the National Science Foundation, a primary source of funding for academic research, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology, which supports a wide range of pursuits – from improving health information technology to measuring carbon pollution, from testing “smart grid” designs to developing advanced manufacturing processes. And my budget doubles funding for the Department of Energy’s Office of Science which builds and operates accelerators, colliders, supercomputers, high-energy light sources, and facilities for making nano-materials. Because we know that a nation’s potential for scientific discovery is defined by the tools it makes available to its researchers.”

Words fail me.