NASA Daily News Summary 
For Release:  August 16, 2000
Media Advisory m00-158


SUMMARY


NEWS RELEASES


  COSMIC GAS CLOUDS YIELD PUZZLING CONCENTRATIONS OF WATER 



VIDEO     ***ALL TIMES EASTERN***


  VIDEO FILE FOR AUGUST 16, 2000

  UPCOMING TELEVISION EVENTS



*****************************


NEWS RELEASES


COSMIC GAS CLOUDS YIELD PUZZLING CONCENTRATIONS OF WATER 

The amount of water and molecular oxygen found in interstellar 
space has astronomers running hot and cold.  NASA's Submillimeter 
Wave Astronomy Satellite, or SWAS, has detected water vapor 
throughout interstellar space. However, in the very coldest 
reaches, where temperatures are found just 30 degrees above 
absolute zero, astronomers measured water vapor concentrations of 
only a few parts per billion.  

"That's far less than predicted by most theories and presents a 
real puzzle to our understanding of the chemistry of interstellar 
clouds," said Ronald Snell, Professor of Astronomy at the 
University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and a member of the SWAS 
science team.


Contact at NASA Headquarters, Washington, DC:  Dolores Beasley 
(Phone: 202/358-1753)
Contact at Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, Cambridge, 
MA:  Megan Watzke (Phone: 617/495-7463)

For full text, see:
ftp://ftp.hq.nasa.gov/pub/pao/pressrel/2000/00-126.txt 



----------------------------


If NASA issues any news releases later today, we will e-
mail summaries and Internet URLs to this list.

Index of 2000 NASA News Releases:
http://www.nasa.gov/releases/2000/index.html

Index of 1999 NASA News Releases:
http://www.nasa.gov/releases/1999/index.html



*****************************


VIDEO FILE FOR AUGUST 16, 2000


    ITEM 1 - NEW MISSION CONTROL TRAINING ROOM - JSC 
    ITEM 2 - EARLY IMAGES FROM SAFARI MISSION - GSFC (REPLAY)
    ITEM 3 - VIDEO GAME FOR ADD KIDS - LARC (REPLAY)
    ITEM 4 - DEEP SPACE 1 ANIMATION - JPL (REPLAY)
    ITEM 5 - AUGUST 8TH SEAWIFS IMAGE OF WESTERN FIRES (REPLAY)



----------------------------


ANY CHANGES TO THE VIDEO LINE-UP WILL APPEAR ON THE NASA VIDEO 
FILE ADVISORY ON THE WEB AT 

ftp://ftp.hq.nasa.gov/pub/pao/tv-advisory/nasa-tv.txt

WE UPDATE THE ADVISORY THROUGHOUT THE DAY.

The NASA Video File normally airs at noon, 3 pm, 6 pm, 9 pm
and midnight Eastern Time.



-----------------------------


UPCOMING TELEVISION EVENTS


August 16, Wednesday
- 1:00 - 2:00 p.m. - Video Game Technology Helps Children with 
  Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder Live News Interviews -
  LaRC

August 17, Thursday
- 6:00 - 10:00 a.m. - Chandra's First Anniversary Live News 
  Interviews - MSFC
- 1:30 - 2:30 p.m. STS 106 TCDT Q&A


For a complete list of upcoming live television events, see 
http://www.nasa.gov/ntv/breaking.html



-----------------------------


Unless otherwise noted, ALL TIMES ARE EASTERN.

NASA Television is available on GE-2, transponder 9C at 85 degrees
West longitude, with vertical polarization. Frequency is on 3880.0
megahertz, with audio on 6.8 megahertz.

Refer general questions about the video file to NASA Headquarters,
Washington, DC: Ray Castillo, 202/358-4555, or Fred Brown,
202/358-0713, fred.brown@hq.nasa.gov

During Space Shuttle missions, the full NASA TV schedule will
continue to be posted at:
http://spaceflight.nasa.gov/realdata/nasatv/schedule.html

For general information about NASA TV see:
http://www.nasa.gov/ntv/



*****************************


Contract Awards

Contract awards are posted to the NASA Acquisition information
Service Web site: http://procurement.nasa.gov/EPS/award.html



*****************************


The NASA Daily News Summary is issued each business day at
approximately 2 pm Eastern time. Members of the media who wish
to subscribe or unsubscribe from this list, please send e-mail
message to:

Brian.Dunbar@hq.nasa.gov



*****************************


end of daily news summary