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Science
Friday > Archives
> 1997
> October
> October 17, 1997
Hour One: Astronomy Update /25th anniversary of the Clean
Water Act
Cosmologists studying the age of the universe have had to try to deal
with an extremely vexing problem - the fact that certain stars appear
to somehow be older than the age of the universe. Trying to explain
this discrepancy has left many astronomers scratching their heads. Now,
new findings from a group of astronomers at Case Western Reserve University
in Ohio, using a European Space Agency satellite, may have helped to
ease some of these concerns. The group has determined that certain globular
clusters of stars are actually only 11.5 billion years old, not the
15 billion years old formerly thought.
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But while some mysteries may have started to
clear up last week, new mysteries of space have
popped up. A team of astronomers from UCLA,
Caltech, and Columbia University, using an
infra-red instrument on the Hubble Space Telescope,
have spotted what they believe to be the brightest
star ever seen. The star, named the "Pistol star"
because it was located near the Pistol nebula, is
ten million times as powerful as our sun. It's not
just bright, either - it's huge, having a radius
larger than the radius between our sun and the
Earth. Even more amazing, the researchers believe
that the star may once have weighed up to 200 times
our sun, and that parts of the Pistol nebula may
have been formed from matter thrown off from its
surface in violent eruptions -- eruptions that are
still going on.
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photo copyright
D. Figer and NASA
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Join host Ira Flatow for a look at more of the puzzles of the universe,
during this segment of Science Friday.
Then , Twenty-five years ago, on October 18, 1972, Congress passed
the Clean Water Act. Responding to a slate of environmental problems
ranging from contamination in Boston Harbor to the 1969 flaming Cuyahoga
River in Ohio, the Clean Water Act set out to "restore and maintain
the chemical, physical, and biological integrity of the nation's waters."
As a result of the law, almost every city in the U.S. was required
to build a wastewater treatment plant. States developed standards (overseen
by the federal government) for controlling water quality. Toxic flows
of chemicals and effluent were greatly reduced as a result of the Clean
Water Act, but not all of the law's goals have been met. Two main goals
- zero discharge of pollutants into navigable waters by 1985, and fishable
and swimmable waters by 1983 - still are a long way off. According to
the EPA, 40 percent of the nation's water is still not fishable or swimmable.
Join host Ira Flatow as he takes a look at the Clean Water Act - its
history, its effects, and where we go from here.
Guests:
Mark Morris
Professor of Astronomy
University of California at Los Angeles
Los Angeles, CA
Lawrence M. Krauss
Professor of Astronomy
Ambrose Swasey Professor, Physics
Chair, Department of Physics
Case Western Reserve University
Cleveland, Ohio
Robbin Marks
Senior Policy Analyst
Natural Resources Defense
Council
Washington, DC
Todd Robins
Environmental Attorney
US Public Interest Research
Group
Washington, DC
Books/Articles Discussed:
Related links:
A press release from Case Western Reserve
about the age of the universe question
The Hipparcos satellite, used to date the
stars in question
Hubble Telescope photos
Cosmology Resources
A Star is Born
The EPA's salute to 25 years
of the Clean Water Act
Another EPA site, focussed on the CWA and the Great Lakes
The text of the CWA
Other water laws
Water OnLine
The Environmental Compliance Assistance Center
The Water Environment Federation
The Water Quality Association
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