ASTEROID PROSPECTING: WHAT'S HOLDING UP A SPACE-AGE GOLD RUSH

Novo destaque para a coluna What's New do físico Robert Park:

 "There was a front-page article by Joel Achenbach in the Washington Post last week about Planetary Resources, the world's first asteroid mining business, started by space visionary Peter Diamandis and his colleague Eric Anderson. Deep-pocket investors are said to be hyperventilating. Why wouldn't they? Untold thousands of asteroids are whizzing around the Sun right now – and they're free. Just leave your business card on an asteroid and it's yours. But, although asteroids are free, "whizzing" is not. What are these guys thinking? You must chase asteroids down to extract stuff like platinum and diamonds, if there is any, and haul it to Earth. Meanwhile the price of rocket fuel is up and tiny errors in trajectory could lead to huge damage suits or start wars.

 But why bother? Some of the best asteroids are already here; Earth has been collecting them for eons. Just look for craters and start digging. Consider the Chicxulub asteroid buried beneath the Yucatán Peninsula. It got rid of the dinosaurs 65 million years ago, clearing the way for the evolution of Homo sapiens. Mining the Chicxulub asteroid should keep Planetary Resources busy for centuries. Asteroids already have a really bad rap, but I think Chicxulub may be seen as evidence that God is a businessman."

 Robert Park