Clarke DNA to be sent into space
Nasa is planning to send DNA of famed British science fiction writer Sir Arthur C Clarke into space — five years after his death.
The author of the novel 2001: A Space Odyssey died in 2008 in Sri Lanka, and now Nasa scientists have announced plans to send his DNA into orbit around the Sun in 2014 aboard the Sunjammer, a solar-powered spacecraft which gets its name from the writings of Clarke. Called the Sunjammer Cosmic Archive, the flying time capsule is a first in the history of space travel, carrying digital files of human DNA including Clarke’s aboard the sun-powered space ship.
The DNA is to be contained in a “BioFile”. Other so-called MindFiles, including images, music, voice recordings, and the like, provided by people all around the globe, will also be included in the cosmic archive for future generations — or perhaps other civilisations — to see.
“Clarke certainly imagined himself going to space someday, and that day is finally arriving,” said Stephen Eisele, vice president of Space Services, Inc, a Nasa contractor on the project.
Nasa’s mission manager Ron Unger, at the Marshall Space Flight Centre, described the Sunjammer project, as a ‘game changing technology’ that could alter mankind’s approach to space travel.
Simply put, the technology is a “solar sail” that gathers light from the Sun and turns it into a propulsion source for a spacecraft, Unger said.
It seems like something out of Clarke’s sci-fi writings, which is one reason that his DNA, which he left to science upon his death, is the payload for the mission, Eisele said.
This Nasa-funded technology demonstration is designed to highlight the efficacy of solar sails for space propulsion applications; it’s now being built by Sunjammer team leader L’Garde, based in Tustin, California.
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