By Patricia Daukantas

A smorgasbord of recent developments in U.S. energy policy, astrophysics and the deep sea:

• The barren desert that once hosted hundreds of nuclear fission explosions will become a testing ground for collecting energy from that ultimate source of fusion power, the Sun. The U.S. Department of Energy has announced it is creating a solar energy demonstration zone at the Nevada Test Site. U.S. Energy Secretary (and OSA Honorary Member) Steven Chu recently signed an agreement with his counterpart at the Interior Department, which owns the land. The 25 square miles of desert, which is away from the regions of the test site that actually saw nuclear explosions, will host demonstrations of concentrated solar power (CSP) technologies.
• The Hubble Space Telescope’s master repairman has gotten himself a second ground-based gig. John Grunsfeld, who has made three space trips to fix and upgrade the 20-year-old orbiting instrument, will be a research professor of physics and astronomy at Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Md., U.S.A. Grunsfeld, an astrophysicist by training, now serves as deputy director of the nearby Space Telescope Science Institute.
• Finally, I stumbled upon this nifty Q&A with Emory Kristof, the National Geographic contributing photographer-in-residence whose photographs appeared in the cover story of OPN’s October 2005 issue. You can also check out his photo gallery, “Discovering the Titanic,” and some of his images are included in “Milestones in Underwater Photography” as well.

2010-07 July, Astrophysics, Energy, Photography steven chu, energy, energy policy, solar power, hubble, hubble space telescope, photography