Astronauts on the shuttle Columbia were trying to regain control of their craft before it broke apart in 2003, but there was no chance of surviving the accident, a NASA report said on Tuesday.

From the crew鈥檚 perspective, the shift from what appeared to be a normal descent on 1 February 2003, into disaster happened so fast that the astronauts didn鈥檛 even have time to close the visors on their helmets.

Columbia broke apart about 20 km over Texas as it headed for landing at the Kennedy Space Center. The cause of the accident was traced to a hole in one of the shuttle鈥檚 wings, which was hit by a piece of falling foam insulation during launch 16 days earlier.

Seven astronauts, including Israel鈥檚 first astronaut, Ilan Ramon, were killed when superheated atmospheric gases blasted inside the breach like a blow torch, melting the ship鈥檚 structure.

Rapid depressurisation

The crew cabin broke away from the ship and started spinning rapidly. Analysis of the wreckage indicated the crew members had flipped cockpit switches in response to alarms that were sounding. The astronauts had also reset the shuttle鈥檚 autopilot system, the report said.

鈥淲e have evidence from some of the switch positions that the crew was trying very hard to regain control. We鈥檙e talking about a very brief time in a crisis situation,鈥� said NASA鈥檚 deputy associate administrator, Wayne Hale.

But rapid depressurisation caused the Columbia crew to lose consciousness, and medical findings show that they could not have recovered, said the report, which took four years to compile.

Traumatic injuries

鈥淭his report confirms that although the valiant Columbia crew tried every possible way to maintain control of their vehicle, the accident was not ultimately survivable,鈥� said Hale, who oversaw the shuttle programme during its return to flight after the accident.

Analysis shows the astronauts鈥� shoulder harnesses failed and their helmets did not adequately protect their heads. The lack of safety restraints caused traumatic injuries.

The investigation also found problems with the shuttle鈥檚 seats and parachute landing system, which requires astronauts be conscious to operate manually.

Even if the safety gear had worked, the astronauts would have died due to the winds, shock waves and other extreme conditions in the upper atmosphere.

Automated spacesuits

Designing spacesuits that are more automated and integrated into future spaceships is among 30 recommendations made in the report.

鈥淚 call on spacecraft designers from all the other nations of the world, as well as the commercial and personal spacecraft designers here at home to read this report and apply these hard lessons which have been paid for so dearly,鈥� Hale said.

Also killed in the accident were shuttle commander Rick Husband, pilot William McCool and astronauts Michael Anderson, David Brown, Kalpana Chawla and Laurel Clark.

Much of what is in the report was discovered by the Columbia accident investigation team, which released a series of findings and recommendations six months after the disaster.

The panel advised retiring the space shuttles as soon as NASA finishes using them to complete construction of the International Space Station, a $100 billion project of 16 partner countries that has been under way for more than a decade. The shuttle Challenger broke apart in 1986.

Since the accident, NASA has flown 11 shuttle missions and has nine left in its schedule. A 10th mission to fly a physics experiment to the space station is under consideration.

鈥淲e found that people who on average slept longer were at reduced risk of developing new coronary artery calcifications over five years,鈥� said Diane Lauderdale of the University of Chicago Medical Center, whose study appears in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

鈥淚t was surprisingly strong,鈥� Lauderdale said. Calcium deposits in the coronary arteries are considered a precursor of future heart disease. 鈥淚t鈥檚 a very early marker of future risk,鈥� she said.

Unlike other studies looking at the risks of getting too little sleep, which use people鈥檚 own estimates of their sleep patterns, Lauderdale鈥檚 team set out to measure actual sleep patterns.

They fitted 495 people aged 35 to 47 with sophisticated wrist bands that tracked subtle body movements. Information from these recorders was fed into a computer program that was able to detect actual sleep patterns.

The team used special computed tomography, or CT, scans to assess the buildup of calcium inside heart arteries, performing one scan at the start of the study and one five years later.

Seven hours

After accounting for other differences such as age, gender, race, education, smoking and risk for sleep apnea, the team found sleep duration appeared to play a significant role in the development of coronary artery calcification.

About 12% of the people in the study developed artery calcification during the five-year study period.

Among those who had slept less than five hours a night, 27% had developed artery calcification. That dropped to 11% among those who slept five to seven hours, and to 6% among those who slept more than seven hours a night.

Lauderdale said it is not clear why this difference occurred in people who slept less, but they had some theories. Because blood pressure tends to fall off during sleep, it could be that people who slept longer had lower blood pressure over a 24-hour period.

Stress hormone

Or, it could be related to reduced exposure to the stress hormone cortisol, which is decreased during sleep.

Or it may be some unidentified process. 鈥淚t鈥檚 something of a mystery,鈥� Lauderdale said.

Kathy Parker, a sleep researcher from the University of Rochester鈥檚 School of Nursing in New York, said the study underscores the role sleep plays in health.

鈥淧eople think that sleep doesn鈥檛 matter, but clearly it does. Sleep deprivation is a public health problem and studies such as this show how increasing sleep duration can have tremendously positive effects,鈥� Parker, who was not involved in the research, said in a statement.

Lauderdale said her findings should be confirmed by others, but said many studies point to the need for at least six hours of sleep a night.

Space Exploration Technologies (SpaceX), a Hawthorne, California-based company headed by PayPal founder Elon Musk, and Dulles, Virginia-based Orbital Sciences Corp are due to start cargo shipments to and from the space station beginning in 2010 (see Space 鈥榯axis鈥� could cut the cost of spaceflight).

NASA decided to use a commercial contractor for deliveries rather than relying on the Russian Progress cargo vehicles, which help deliver supplies to the space station.

Russia will transport US astronauts to and from the station on its Soyuz capsules after the shuttles are retired in 2010. The proposed shuttle replacement will not be ready to fly until about 2015.

鈥淭hese commercial carriers will carry about 40 to 70 percent of our cargo to (the) space station,鈥� NASA鈥檚 associate administrator for space flight, Bill Gerstenmaier, told reporters on a conference call.

SpaceX and Orbital Sciences beat out a Chicago-based consortium called PlanetSpace that included three of the space agency鈥檚 prime contractors 鈥� Lockheed Martin Corp, Boeing Co and Alliant Techsystems Inc.

SpaceX鈥檚 contract is for 12 flights for $1.6 billion, while Orbital will make up to eight flights for $1.9 billion.

Both companies had previously been awarded NASA contracts, worth a combined $500 million, to develop their orbital cargo delivery systems.

SpaceX plans to launch from a complex it built at Cape Canaveral Air Force Station, beside the Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Orbital plans to fly from NASA鈥檚 Wallops Island facility in Virginia.

Engineers believe electrical charges triggered glitches that caused Russian space capsules returning from the station to land hard and off-course during two consecutive homecomings in October 2007 and April 2008.

Flight controllers staged a spacewalk in July to disconnect suspect equipment on the last Soyuz capsule, circumventing the problem for its landing in October.

In search of more data, Russian flight controllers late on Monday dispatched station commander Michael Fincke, a veteran of four previous spacewalks, and flight engineer Yury Lonchakov, who made his first spacewalk, to install a probe to monitor electrical fields near where Soyuz capsules park.

鈥淭he space station is this big, old huge chunk of metal flying through a magnetic field,鈥� deputy program manager Kirk Shireman told reporters last week. 鈥淭here鈥檚 an electron cloud flowing around the station at all times. And then the station itself generates electricity.鈥�

Fincke and Lonchakov quickly completed the primary task of their spacewalk, then installed two science experiments to the outside of the station鈥檚 module.

But when it came time to test new gear, flight controllers could not get any data to the ground.

With time running out, flight directors told the men to retrieve one of the experiments and head back to the airlock. 鈥淲e鈥檝e done everything we could,鈥� Finke, speaking Russian, said through a translator.

The station, a $100 billion project of 16 nations, is nearing completion after more than a decade of construction. Next year, NASA and its partners plan to expand the station鈥檚 live-aboard crew size from three members to six.

NASA鈥檚 next mission to the station is scheduled for February.

Understanding how these holes form will help them better predict the electrical storms that cause power grid blackouts and auroras, activity that will peak in 2011 or 2012 as sunspots hit their maximum level.

快猫短视频s at the meeting in San Francisco this week said they had been entirely wrong about how solar particles that cause the storms were entering the Earth鈥檚 magnetosphere, a bubble of magnetism that surrounds Earth and protects us from charged particles from the Sun.

快猫短视频s once believed that the particles entered when the Sun鈥檚 magnetic field was aligned opposite to that of the Earth鈥檚. But the team鈥檚 findings show that 20 times more solar particles enter the Earth鈥檚 magnetic field when it is aligned in the same direction as the Sun鈥檚 magnetic field than when the two are opposed.

In June 2007, NASA鈥檚 five probes flew through one of the tears just as it was opening. Sensors recorded a torrent of solar wind particles streaming into the magnetosphere, said team member of the University of New Hampshire.

Levee breach

鈥淭he opening was huge 鈥� four times wider than Earth itself,鈥� said Raeder. 鈥淭his kind of influx is an order of magnitude greater than what we thought was possible.鈥�

In separate research, Wenhui Li, also of the University of New Hampshire, and colleagues offer an explanation. As charged particles flow out from the Sun, they carry solar magnetic fields past Earth.

The team鈥檚 computer simulations show that even though the Earth鈥檚 and the Sun鈥檚 magnetic fields point in the same direction at equatorial latitudes, they point in opposite directions at high latitudes. When the opposite fields are pressed together, they connect and tear holes in Earth鈥檚 magnetic field over the poles.

Energised particles

However, when solar and terrestrial magnetic fields point in opposite directions and reconnect in a different way, the Sun鈥檚 charged particles get energised and cause magnetic storms that can overload power lines with excess current, causing widespread blackouts.

鈥淚f the solar field has been aligned with the Earth鈥檚 for a while, we now know Earth鈥檚 field is heavily loaded with solar particles and primed for a strong storm,鈥� said Raeder in a statement. 鈥淭his discovery gives us a basic predictive capability for the severity of solar storms, similar to a hurricane forecaster鈥檚 realisation that warmer oceans set the stage for more intense hurricanes.鈥�

鈥淚n fact, we expect stronger storms in the upcoming solar cycle,鈥� he continued. 鈥淭he Sun鈥檚 magnetic field changes direction every cycle, and due to its new orientation in the upcoming cycle, we expect the clouds of particles ejected from the Sun will have a field which is at first aligned with Earth, then becomes opposite as the cloud passes by.鈥�

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Nine eastern European countries had threatened to veto the deal over the proposal to auction off emission permits. Until now, European nations were given a certain number of permits to emit greenhouse gases. Under the next phase of the , the permits were to be auctioned off to the highest bidders, providing an extra incentive for reducing emissions.

The eastern European nations worry that auctioning would cripple their industry, which relies heavily on coal 鈥� the most polluting fossil fuel.

Trader relief

Under the final agreement, coal-dependent nations with low GDP per capita will get free permits equal to up to 70% of their current average annual emissions. This 鈥減rivilege鈥� will cease in 2020.

These companies will also be able to import a higher portion of cheaper emissions offsets from developing countries to help meet EU targets.

The leaders also agreed to earmark 300 million permits 鈥� worth between 4.5 billion and 6 billion euros 鈥� for carbon capture and storage technology.

Without high-level agreement, the European trading scheme, which underpins the first international carbon-trading market, risked stalling and carbon traders were relieved at the outcome of this week鈥檚 summit.

Loophole concern

鈥淭he worst thing for the carbon market would have been that the package was not agreed this year before the [European] Parliament breaks up,鈥� says Trevor Sikorski, head of carbon research at Barclays Capital.

鈥淕etting a deal trumped everything. If there was no deal, there was a risk of real drift towards [the 2009 UN climate talks in Copenhagen] which would have destroyed Europe鈥檚 credibility on the issue,鈥� says Mark Lewis, a carbon analyst at Deutsche Bank.

Environmental groups, however, felt the deal did not go far enough.

鈥淗uge loopholes allow big energy users to carry on polluting and nations to buy offset 鈥榗redits鈥� from abroad,鈥� says Robin Webster of Friends of the Earth. 鈥淢assive concessions were made to manufacturing industries, which will mean they are handed out rights to pollute.鈥�

In Poznan yesterday, US senator John Kerry said to expect the US to lead global climate policy next year.

鈥淚t will be like the difference between night and day,鈥� Kerry said of President-elect Barack Obama鈥檚 enthusiasm for action against climate change after what he called eight years of inaction under President George W Bush.

In particular, Kerry said Obama would sign up to a UN pact to fight global warming in late 2009 even if US climate laws are not yet in place.

鈥淲e can have commenced the [domestic] legislative process, we don鈥檛 have to have completed it,鈥� before agreeing to cuts under a UN treaty, he said.

Kyoto 2.0?

Some have doubted whether the UN will be able to meet its goal of agreeing on a successor to the Kyoto protocol at the next UN climate summit in Denmark in December 2009 because the new US administration will still be very young.

But Kerry insisted the 2009 deadline would be met. Coming from the designated head of Obama鈥檚 Senate Foreign Relations Committee, his comments bear some weight.

However, speaking to Reuters on the sidelines of the summit, Kerry added that China, India and Russia would also have to promise to cut greenhouse gas emissions to win US Senate blessing of any pact.

鈥淲hat is important is that we go to Copenhagen understanding that no treaty is going to pass the US Senate unless it is a global solution. China, India, Russia 鈥� all countries have to be part of the solution,鈥� he said.

鈥淐hina is now the largest emitter in the world. It has to reduce, in concrete fixed levels from its current levels. So do we. So does the EU, so does the rest of the world.鈥�

Fair share of CO₂

Earlier this week, India鈥檚 negotiator at the Poznan summit said his nation would not volunteer to take on legally binding emissions targets.

India, China and other developing nations have long argued that, because they emitted the lion鈥檚 share of emissions during the 20th century, western economies bear the burden of responsibility when it comes to emissions reductions.

These differences are likely to carry over to final negotiations in Copenhagen in December 2009. 鈥淭his is a blue-collar conference,鈥� Yvo de Boer, head of the UN鈥檚 climate change secretariat, said in Poznan. 鈥淚t鈥檚 about getting a job done, it鈥檚 not about spectacles or breakthroughs.鈥�

Obama has said he plans to cut US emissions 鈥� now about 17% percent above 1990 levels 鈥� back to 1990 levels by 2020 and then by 80% below 1990 levels by 2050.

In Brussels, national leaders are debating a package to reduce EU emissions by 20% below 1990 levels and produce 20% of the bloc鈥檚 energy from renewable resources, by 2020.

President-elect Barack Obama has chosen a Nobel laureate for US energy secretary and is likely to pick an environmental veteran to serve as coordinator of climate policies, Democratic Party officials said on Wednesday.

Rounding out his cabinet, Obama planned to announce at a Chicago news conference on Thursday that former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, a South Dakota Democrat, would lead efforts to improve the health care system as the secretary of Health and Human Services.

Simmering in the background is the scandal involving Illinois Governor Rod Blagojevich, who was arrested on Tuesday and charged with attempting to sell the US Senate seat that Obama had held until he was elected president on 4 November. Obama on Wednesday called on Blagojevich to resign and has sought to distance himself from the disgraced governor.

Announcements to come in the days ahead include several key environment-related appointments 鈥� Steven Chu as energy secretary, Carol Browner as energy and climate coordinator, Nancy Sutley to head the White House Council on Environmental Quality and Lisa Jackson to run the Environmental Protection Agency.

Scientific solutions

They will be charged with developing policies to reduce carbon emissions blamed for global warming, develop new sources of energy and create new jobs 鈥� a top priority for Obama.

Chu is and shared the 1997 Nobel Prize in Physics. He was an early advocate for scientific solutions to climate change.

Browner was administrator of the Environmental Protection Agency during the Clinton administration. A principal at global strategy firm The Albright Group LLC, she heads Obama鈥檚 advisory team on energy and the environment.

Sutley has a long history in the environmental community. She is currently deputy mayor for energy and environment for Los Angeles and served on the California State Water Resources Control Board earlier this decade.

Jackson has served as commissioner of the Department of Environmental Protection in New Jersey.

People caught up in the five-year crisis have cut down large areas of woodland, partly to feed a booming war-fuelled construction industry.

Tree cover has become so sparse in some areas that Darfuris often have to travel more than 75 kilometres from their camps to find enough wood to sell or use for fuel, the report added.

鈥淲e鈥檙e now seeing extreme stress on the environment around many of the camps and the major towns in Darfur,鈥� said UNEP鈥檚 Sudan country director Clive Bates in a statement. 鈥淲e need to plant millions of trees and introduce new technologies for construction and energy as quickly as humanly possible.鈥�

Destructive construction

The UNEP report said demand for wood in Darfur鈥檚 three main towns 鈥� El Fasher, Nyala and El Geneina 鈥� had increased an estimated 鈥渢wo to three times鈥� since the conflict started in 2003.

Numbers of saw-mills and wood-fired brick kilns have rocketed in the region鈥檚 main towns to keep up with rising demand for building materials for new peacekeeping bases, displacement shelters and accommodation for UN staff, the report added.

It said brick-making kilns alone were burning up an estimated 52,000 trees a year, which meant 鈥渢he current form of brick-making is having a disastrous impact on Darfur鈥檚 fragile environment鈥�.

鈥淭he brick kilns are occupying and in many cases destroying valuable agricultural land by digging up clay soils around towns,鈥� the report added.

Humanitarian effort

Farmers driven from their fields by the conflict often found the timber trade was the only business left open to them after taking shelter in displacement camps, said the report, entitled 鈥淒estitution, distortion and deforestation鈥�.

International experts say more than 2.5 million people have been driven from their homes since mostly non-Arab rebels took up arms against the government in 2003, accusing the Sudanese government in Khartoum of neglecting the remote western region.

Most of the displaced have taken shelter in dusty camps clustered around major towns and peacekeeping camps, supported by the world鈥檚 largest humanitarian effort.

The UNEP report said the move of people from the countryside to the cities had 鈥渢riggered a sudden and large increase in demand for firewood鈥�.

Avoidable tragedy

There were also signs militias and government soldiers had started earning money from collecting and selling mahogany and other hardwood trees for the furniture trade.

Nyala鈥檚 famous Kunduwa hardwood forest had been destroyed by extensive logging from 2005 to 2007 said the report, adding 鈥渋ts destruction is regarded by many as a tragedy that could have been avoided鈥�.

The report called for development organisations to launch environmental awareness campaigns in the region, and to pilot the use of alternative fuel sources and building materials.

Carbon dioxide has been seen on a planet outside our solar system 鈥� offering hope that astronomers will be able to detect signs of life on other worlds, astronomers said on Tuesday.

NASA said its Hubble Space Telescope has discovered carbon dioxide in the atmosphere of 鈥渉ot Jupiter鈥� planet HD 189733b, which orbits a nearby star 63 light years from Earth.

The planet is itself too hot to support life as we know it 鈥� its surface is about 1000 掳C, whereas no life on Earth has been found to survive temperatures above 130 掳C.

But the astronomers said the observations are a proof-of-concept demonstration that the basic chemistry for life can be measured on planets orbiting other stars.

In February, 快猫短视频 reported that organic molecules in the form of methane had been found on the planet, one of about 300 discovered around stars other than our own. Evidence has also been found for water vapour there.

鈥淭hese atmospheric studies will begin to determine the compositions and chemical processes operating on distant worlds orbiting other stars,鈥� said Eric Smith, Hubble Space Telescope programme scientist at NASA.

Mark Swain of NASA鈥檚 Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, California, used Hubble鈥檚 near-infrared camera and multi-object spectrometer to study infrared light from the planet.

He was able to identify carbon dioxide and carbon monoxide, which absorb certain wavelengths of near-infrared radiation.

鈥淭he carbon dioxide is the main reason for the excitement because, under the right circumstances, it could have a connection to biological activity as it does on Earth,鈥� Swain said in a statement.

鈥淭he very fact we are able to detect it and estimate its abundance is significant for the long-term effort of characterising planets to find out what they are made of and if they could be a possible host for life.鈥�