Georgia Tech Alumni Magazine Vol. 59, No. 02 1984

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Earth, Air, Fire, Water: Science & the Environment v^r

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Georgia Tech V O L U M E 59. NUMBER 2 4 ^ P ALUMNI MAGAZINE. SPRING 1984 / i

->• STAFF John C. Dunn, Editor John B. Carter Jr.. Director of Marketing Kathleen C. Moak, Editorial Assistant, Graphic Design Alan David, Photographer

PUBLICATIONS COMMITTEE Charles A. Smithgall III '66, Chairman Charles R. Brown 6 2 Steve M. Mitchell '65 GEORGIA TECH ALUMNI ASSOCIATION ATLANTA, GEORGIA 3 0 3 3 2

OFFICERS M. Lamar Oglesby '50, President Don L. Chapman 6 1 , Past President E. Rembert DuBose '48, President-Elect Geoffrey C. Gill '64, Wee President Ben J . Dyer 7 0 , Treasurer Robert H. Rice '49, Executive Director

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he classical Greeks, in their search to understand the world, came up with the concept of the four "elements" —earth, air, fire and water. In a modern context, major areas of research involve these areas as man faces the challenge of science, technology and the environment. Our understanding of the world is ever-expanding. On the cover a map shows the world as it was understood just a few hundred years ago, contrasted by photos taken from the space shuttle Columbia commanded by Tech astronaut John Young on his second shuttle voyage in the fall of 1983. The shuttle photos, courtesy of NASA, show Hong Kong (left) and the Suez Canal. The cover design is by Georgia Tech Office of Publications.

While this issue looks at science and the environment, it is necessarily confined to representative areas of research and study.

CONTENTS 9 Science: "The Universe Is Our Laboratory" 1 4 Electronic Research Varies from Exotic to Mainstream

TRUSTEES

Term Expires 1 9 8 4 Arthur P. Barry Jr. '58 Dr. Fred Berman '57 David Center '36 William E. Cherry 70 James R. Dellinger Jr. '53 W. Leon Hardeman '54 Steve M. Mitchell '65 Lawton M. Nease III '65 G. David Peake '61 Oliver H. Sale Jr. '56

Term Expires 1 9 8 5 Bobby Joe Anderson '50 George O. Burns '61 Lamar H. Franklin '36 Richard C. Kessler '68 Joe K. McCutchen '62 L.W. Robert IV '60 Rush S. Smith Jr. 7 2 Charles A . Smithgall 111 '66 John C. Staton '60 H. Hammond Stith Jr. '59

2 2 Solar Energy Research Shines at Tech 2 8 David S. Lewis, CEO, General Dynamics 3 6 Our Atmosphere: The Air We Breathe 4 3 A Hydrogen Society 4 7 H 2 0 : How Much Is Not Enough?

5 0 Acid Rain: The Making of a Monster 5 2 Combustion System Tuned to Sound 5 4 Earthquakes 5 7 Studying Matter on an Atomic Scale

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Science The Universe Is Our Laboratory'

By J o h n Dunn

G

reek science traditionally began to flourish in the 6th century B.C., making an indelible mark on the western world.

"The beginning of what is considered western philosophy is also the beginning of what is considered western science," said Dr. Stanley R. Carpenter, associate professor of Social Sciences.

"It is an interesting period to us because these early individuals—call them philosophers, call them scientists— began to look for explanations for things which they experienced every day in terms other than supernatural terms.

They looked for explanations to come from some principle that was at the heart of the environment they were living in.

"This constitutes abandoning the idea that we were somehow simply here, or that things were occurring, at the caprice of the gods," Carpenter added. "It represents an attempt to discover some underlying principle that would unify our experiences and make some sense out of them."

On the basis of fragmentary evidence, Thales, one of the Seven Wise Men of ancient Greek philosophy, is generally held to be the founder of western philosophy and science.

In seeking to determine an underlying or unifying principle for everything,

Thales asked the first scientific question, as far as the west is concerned: "What are things made of?" His conclusion: water.

"He's obviously incorrect, but it's not a bad answer," observed Jon J. Johnston, assistant professor of Social Sciences. "Water has the various forms that material things take in the world—solids, liquids gases. And it is essential to life."

It was Thales, Johnston added, who also made the statement, "All things are full of gods.

"When he said that," Johnston explained, "what he meant was that the causes of things are in the things themselves . . . So this is the beginning of a conception of nature as something that human beings can understand by themselves, quite apart from any religious conceptions.''

It was the beginning also of a period of development in Greek thought. Some early philosophers proposed other unifying principles, such as air or fire.

The Greek philosopher Empedocles (490-430 B.C.), whom Aristotle is said to have called the inventor of rhetoric and whom Galen considered to be the founder of Italian medicine, postulated a pluralist physical theory. Empedocles believed the physical world was made of four substances or building blocks—

earth, air, fire and water, out of which all structures in the world are made by their combinations in different proportions.

"The importance is not so much their choice-of materials, or their choice of what would be the underlying explanatory substances, if you will, that's not the important point," Carpenter explained. "The important point is they were attempting to provide explanations which were rational, which were based on observation . . . of the world. It suggested that there was an underlying order to things; life was somehow predictable and not capricious and subject to the whim of the gods."

The four "elements" allowed man to explain dryness and dampness, hot and cold.

"It was necessary to go to the four elements—earth, air, fire and water—in order for some thinkers to account for the variety of things," Johnston said.

"Nevertheless, there was always a tendency to reduce the four elements to one, because one has simplicity whereas four doesn't.

"Equally important to the future history of science, and in some ways even more important were two other answers to the question."

One response came from Pythagoras: "All things are made of numbers." The

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other came from the doctrine of the atomism—that the material universe is composed of simple indivisible minute particles called atoms.

"The Pathagorean notion that all things are made of numbers is far more sophisticated than saying reality consists of a kind of stuff," Johnston said. "The story goes that Pythagoras was listening to a blacksmith hammer and discovered that the music made by the hammer varied in proportion to the weight of the hammer. So, just as there are harmonies in music, nature consists of harmonies which are in mathematical proportion.

This is where the notion of music of the spheres comes from."

However, Johnston said, the Phythagoreans as a sect or group of thinkers "tended to collapse when they discovered irrational numbers. But this was the beginning. After all, what do you do in electrical engineering, physics or chemistry? You do mathematics. The Pythagoreans believed that numbers . . . unlocked the key to the universe."

Atomism, as presented by such Greek philosophers as Democritus in the 5th century B.C., "was that reality consists of infinitely small material forms, moving in space and that the gross differences between things consists of the ways in which atomic combinations have taken place," Johnston said.

"The Greeks had a great deaf more confidence in what you have to think than in what yomobserve," he added.

"You have combined the mathematical emphasis of Phythagoras and the atomism of Democritus and how close are you to where we are now?"

Johnston asked rhetorically. "It didn't quite happen that way, of course. The Greeks were interested in science for the, sake of pure understanding—sheer, non-utilitarian grasp for the riddle—of what things are, why they change and what they are like."

The two great Greek figures who had

Dr. Jon J. Johnston an overwhelming impact on science and philosophy were Plato (427-347 B.C.) and Aristotle (384-322 B.C.). They also had very different concepts.

Plato respected Hippocrates the physician, the first to separate science from philosophy. But the trend of Platonism was generally away from observational activity. Plato regarded the mathematical form of the universe as evidence of the rational mind of its creator. He is attributed with saying, "God ever geometrizes."

"Plato's concept of nature was mathematical," Johnston said. "For Plato, there is a world of becoming, a world of things we observe and see. On the other hand, there is a real world—a world of pure, mathematically perfect forms which, taken all together, form the object of science: the object of knowing."

By way of example, Johnston said, "If I draw a line on the chalkboard, it is not perfectly straight. Nevertheless, I have a conception of straightness. It's a pure conception, and as such, the object of knowledge. For Plato, observation might suggest what the truth is, but never contains it."

Aristotle, who was a pupil of Plato's, disagreed. For Aristotle, living things were a type of existence, and existence was evidence of design. Aristotle devoted his genius to systemitizing and

organizing the whole field of knowledge.

"Aristotle's conception of nature was biological," Johnston related. "Aristotle saw mechanical explanations as a problem, because they could not account for biological change, development and growth. What he required of the universe was a conception of purpose; a conception of striving—such that each member of each individual species strove to complete itself—not consciously, but there was a built-in purpose. Why do some acorns become oak trees and why do some acorns become squirrel feed? Each species in nature has its own principle of development and the order of nature itself is guided—not consciously—but patterened according to purpose."

Aristotle, too, was influenced by the Pythagoreans, and emphasized the "perfection" of the circle and of the sphere, on which therefore, the world is modeled. Aristotle believed the heavens were a series of concentric, crystalline, mechanized spheres arranged around the earth as a central body. It was the basis of mankind's theory of the universe for 2,000 years.

After Aristotle, the scientific center for the world was Alexandria, and mathematics was a major emphasis.

Even under the dominion of the Roman Empire, however, science remained Greek in spirit.

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"Science is doing the best you can with no holds barred . . . "

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Dr. David Finkelstein The Middle Ages were on the whole a barren scientific period. Greek scientific works appeared in Arabic in the 10th and 11th centuries. The emphasis of Arabic scientific developments were in alchemy, mathematics, astronomy and medicine.

Interestingly, it was the recovery of Greek classical literature in the 14th

century that marks the Renaissance and early modern science.

"The first impetus of the Renaissance was the study of ancient classics—forging back into the past," Johnston said.

"Those early Greek and Roman documents really did give man a sense of freedom: a sense of enormous powers that he didn't know he had."

Francis Bacon, a typical Renaissance figure, coined the motto of modern science: "Knowledge is power." That is, power over things for the benefit of man, Johnston added.

"In the Greek sense science is a vehicle of pure understanding; in the modern sense, science is power over things," Johnston said.

Johnston continued rhetorically, "Don't you improve the lot of man simply by understanding? No, it's not the same. That dichotomy is reflected at a lower level in the distinction between pure and applied research."

The modern concept of the role of science encompasses both schools of thought—theoretical and pragmatic.

The scope of science is so vast it easily accommodates both areas of professional emphasis.

Dr. David Finkelstein, professor in the School of Physics and editor of the International Journal of Theoretical Physics, addresses science from a theoretical perspective. His work on the one-way property of strong gravitational fields has influenced modern research on black holes in space.

"I would say science is doing the best you can with no holds barred to find out what's going on," said Finkelstein. "I really don't believe in the scientific method, for example, aside from it meaning to use all of the resources you have—including those of science."

Concerning physics, Finkelstein said, "I remember when I was a kid . . . Back then we thought there were two different things: matter and energy. I guess they still are, but not as different as we used to think. We thought they were both conserved; they were in the world, and we just had to study their interactions.

In fact, neither are (conserved). Probably nothing is."

In this century, there have been two revolutions in physics—the quantum theory and the theory of relativity. The quantum theory, as defined by Webster,

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is the concept of the subdivision of radiant energy into finite quanta and applied to the numerous processes involving the transference or transformation of energy in an atomic or molecular scale. The Theory of Relativity, again according to Webster, is based on two postulates: (1) that the speed of light in a vacuum is constant and independent of the source or observer and (2) that the mathematical form of the laws of physics is the same in all inertial systems and which leads to the equivalence of mass and energy and of change in mass, dimension and time with increased velocity.

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Dr. John L. Lundberg

Finkelstein considers the quantum Physical Society, said he takes "a very theory to be a second relativity. pragmatic view of science."

"There isn't a picture of the whole "Theory and experiment are inseparworld that brings both of these bodies of able," Lundberg said. "And since we're principles at once," Finkelstein said. not clairvoyant, observation precedes "We're still schizophrenic when we look theory." at nature. In some areas the quantum Lundberg observed that science is theory works, in other areas, relativity much older than the Greeks, who he works. Just in the last couple of said were influenced by the Egyptians decades, we've entered a domain where and the Phoenicians. we are forced to apply both bodies of "The Greek culture as we know it, understanding in order to get anywhere. began in Egypt," he stated. "It started At last, some grand synthesis might with artisans and practical technology. become accessible. People have been Technology and science are experimental. looking for it for a long time, but "The physical sciences and the life without some kind of guide from sciences are experimental endeavors nature, it's tough . . . So I'm one of this based upon careful observation," he large platoon that's looking for the third said. "We forget this to our peril. relativity."

"Science has a utilitarian purpose," Finkelstein said he is convinced "this Lundberg added. "We're in this for approaching synthesis of relativity and what's good for man. I don't think we quantum theory", will result from "tak- realize how dependent upon applied ing quantum theory sufficiently seriously science and engineering we are. If we . . . I am positive that the way to begin is consider our primary necessities—first is to make it a totally quantum theory food, second fiber, third shelter, and perhaps forth some modicum of health from the beginning."

Finkelstein added, "The usual way care, in that order. We eat, thanks to we teach physics is that God created the plant genetics and synthetic fertilizers." world in six days and on the seventh, He Sulfuric acid and ammonia, our first quantized it. I figure He rested." and second chemicals in tonnage, are Dr. John L. Lundberg, Callaway' used to make fertilizer, Lundberg said.

"We eat that fertilizer in food.

Professor of Textile Engineering, a life Without that and plant genetics . . . at fellow of the American Institute of Chemists and a fellow of the American least half of us wouldn't be here. The

other half would be very hungry. The agricultural bonanza we enjoy is due in large measure to good applied science."

Because of applied science, Lundberg said, our money goes farther.

"Even in our present inflation, never have so many eaten so well for such a small fraction of their take-home pay.

The second necessity is fiber. Again, this is probably more remarkable even than the food story in the fraction of the take-home pay that goes to buy ourselves fiber."

What have fibers done?

"They have meant more to women's liberation than anything else," he said.

"Because prior to the coming of the synthetic fibers, it was necessary to spend—for a small family—a day washing, a day ironing, and about four evenings a week mending. We don't mend much anymore because we don't have to. The cost is down and the durability is up. We also have easy care fabrics, so we use automatic washing equipment."

What is Lundberg's definition of science?

"What I would say about science is the old definition of chemistry. What is it? . . . Chemistry (science) is that which is fun . . . and the universe is our laboratory. " •

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Electronic Research Varies From Exotic t o Mainstream

By Mark Hodges

Visitors at EES See Demonstration of Geoprocessing Capabilities

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ast May was like no other that Nick Currie has ever experienced.

For the entire month, he and two of his Georgia Tech colleagues lived at a seaside research (Station in northern Canada, mapping the radar signatures of a variety of large iceforms found on the frozen ocean. The purpose of this project was hardly academic. The results may lead, in fact, to a technique for locating dangerous ice on icy oceans.

Tankers prowl the Arctic seas increas-1 ingly, taking oil to the ouside world, and crews need a method to spot icebergs which are thick enough to damage their ships. Currie's team endured sub-zero temperatures, 70 knot-per-hour winds

and the ever-present threat of polar bears, and when their visit to the Arctic was done they had gotten a good idea of how different types of ice reflect radar beams. Through extensive measurements, they determined that large, multi-year accumulations of sea ice can be "seen" best at 10 and 16 GHz, two frequencies at the lower end of the millimeter wave spectrum. More importantly, they found that differences in the reflectivity characteristics of thick and thin ice may hold a key for telling one from the other from the deck of a ship.

This Arctic expedition was one of Georgia Tech's more exotic research endeavors, but technically speaking it

was squarely in the mainstream of a research and development program which has been building at the Institute since the end of World War Two. Until the early 1970's, research at Tech was nationally-recognized in some technical fields but modest in scope. However, in the past decade outside contracts have skyrocketed, from around $7 million in 1973 to the current level of $82 million, and Tech has become a nationally recognized research and development organization, particularly in the field of applied electronics research. Military agencies sponsor most of these programs, but projects such as Currie's are increasingly common. In fact, the

Tray of Electro-optical Components to Fly on an American Satellite in EES's First Space Experiment.

->percentage of non-governmentallysponsored research and development already stands at 20 percent of Tech's total contract research budget, and this figure is five times the average for U.S. research universities.

During this period of rapid growth, Georgia Tech has developed substantial bases of expertise in a variety of electronics specialties. However, radar continues to be far and away the most intensively-researched electronics topic on the Tech campus. Most of this work is done under the auspices of the Engineering Experiment Station, the Institute's full-time research and development center. EES has been active in the radar research field for around 35 years, and today its engineers not only design and build experimental radars but they also test and model them, measure t- i effects of the environment on their performance, characterize a variety of objects in radar signature terms and develop components for advanced systems. Much of this research is used to make radar systems work better, but the Station maintains one of the largest universitybased programs in the country attempting to develop techniques to offset the effectiveness of foreign mihtary radars.

This area of research is known as electronic defense. Less than a dozen engineers at Georgia Tech were specialists in this field 10 years ago, but today more than 250 work in the area at EES' Systems Engineering Laboratory.

Their research is sponsored by the Department of Defense, which constantly seeks to make American radars able to detect any foreign threat and to build U.S. radar units capable of evading the electronic defenses of enemies.

In recent years, the Station has focused considerable resources to improve the receiver processors in an aircraft cockpit. These instruments help pilots determine when their planes are being

detected by radar and how to combat this threat through jamming. Because many radars are likely to be in operation over a battlefield, the military requires radar warning receivers with highly advanced computer processing technology. Tech recently designed a new central processing unit for an Air Force radar warning receiver which offers an innovative feature known as "electrically erasable programmable read only memory" â&#x20AC;&#x201D; or, in acronym form, E 2 PROM. Until the development of this technology, military aircraft receiver processors could not be changed easily to reflect different types of threat environments. The data files of an E 2 PROM circuit board can be erased and changed like a cassette tape, without the crew of the aircraft having to remove the printed circuit board inside the receiver each time mission data bases must be revised. Tech's research has made it possible to alter the circuit board in minutes with a hand-held memory loader verifier. Moreover, one E 2 PROM board holds as much information as sue of the circuit boards it replaces.

In other radar fields, the Experiment Station has built many duplicates of foreign threat radars, then evaluated their performance capabilities for the Department of Defense. EES also has built unique radars which could support American troop activity. One recent example was a prototype radar designed to serve as an autonomous forward observation post for a mihtary operation. A tank would carry this system through a forest to a point close to a battlefield, then raise it on a pneumatically extend-

able mast to a vantage point just above tree level. There, the radar could observe battlefield operations with minimal susceptibility of detection.

In some cases, radar technology developed for mihtary purposes has led to civilian applications. For example, a project in which Tech engineers developed a radar method for locating land mines has spawned similar techniques for finding " l o s t " pipes underground and cavities below the surfaces of roadways. A similar transfer of technology involves advanced radar security systems built for mihtary needs whose features are applicable to the security requirements of industry.

Because radars send out electronic signals, they are "active" sensing devices, and subject to detection.

Radiometers are "passive"â&#x20AC;&#x201D;that is, they receive thermal radiaSIon from a given environment and locate objects without sending out signals of their own. Radiometry is valuable in applications where covert target detection is essential. It also is useful in meteorology, because of the ability of radiometers to sensitively map water vapor characteristics in the atmosphere.

Georgia Tech has worked in both areas.

Several years ago, EES engineers designed a radiometer for the nose cone of an explosive missile. The missile was to be guided by a built-in system which homed in on natural radiation emitted by the target, rather than by an independent guidance system. The system had good accuracy but a tracking range limited under normal circumstances to less than one-half mile. In another project for the Navy, the capabilities of radiometry in target detection and meteorological testing are coming into play. A millimeter wave radiometer developed at Tech is imaging ground Mark Hodges is editor of Research Horizons magazine for the Engineering Experiment Station.

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Data Acquisition, Processing and Display System Developed to Monitor Nuclear Power Plant Safety Parameters.

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targets from an aircraft flown at low altitudes. These measurements are expected to help the Navy determine how different atmospheric conditions would affect detection of ground targets from a satellite-born sensing device. Georgia Tech also has been involved in a continuing effort by NASA to map out the marginal ice zone in the Greenland Sea. Sea ice images are important because they show where the edges of ice formations lie and identify regions of densely compacted ice. This information is useful in sea traffic planning and safety.

In still another application, unrelated to meteorology or target detection, NASA funded Tech to study the effectiveness of a radiometer in detecting ice on the Space Shuttle's external fuel tanks prior to liftoff.

Georgia Tech works actively in missile guidance and as a result bomber pilots may have a better chance of surprising their enemies. Through the military's Battlefield Weather Program, EES is developing a methodology for predicting the performance of electro-optical sensors on guided missiles in a variety of weather conditions and geographic terrains. When imbedded in the nose cone of a flying missile, an electro-optical sensing device can give a bomber pilot a recognizable view of a landscape up to six kilometers away. With this picture on a display screen, the pilot can direct the weapon toward a target, then leave the scene before the weapon explodes and enemy retaliation begins. Unfortunately, electro-optical sensors operating at television or infrared frequencies are only effective in relatively clear weather with limited background clutter.

In another long-term program, Georgia Tech is building a library of, mathematical models of all the infrared i missile seekers in the American defense inventory and many seekers from the arsenals of foreign nations. These models will accommodate simulations

of countermeasures against many seekers and demonstrate ways in which American seekers can become more resistant themselves to countermeasures.

EES also is one of a few research institutions which have investigated new techniques for growing mercury cadmium telluride (HgCdTe) as a microelectronics chip material. The Army sponsored this research to determine whether HgCdTe chips can be used in large focal plane detector arrays to improve the sensitivity of infrared detectors in guided missile seekers.

Tech microelectronics specialists demonstrated that HgCdTe firms can be grown through molecular beam epitaxy, a process in which elemental sources are evaporated and their molecular beams directed onto a substrate where condensation into a thin film crystalline liquid occurs.

Most of Tech's missile guidance research calls upon expertise in electrooptics and the infrared region of the electromagnetic spectrum. The same base of knowledge is allowing researchers here to integrate LANDSAT satellite image with other geographic data and offer the possibility for more flexible, comprehensive mapping and land use analysis. In one recent demonstration of this capability, Georgia Tech developed computer software which will help determine the best locations, for siting air traffic control radars at military air bases. In the past, these siting surveys have been done by relatively cumbersome trial and error methods.

In a markedly different application of electro-optics technology, Georgia Tech

has prepared a materials degradation experiment which will fly for a year to 18 months on a satellite launced by the Space Shuttle. To conduct this research, EES engineers built a tray with optical and electro-optical components to test their resistance to the harsh extremes of space travel. These components and devices comprise the systems on a spacecraft which are responsible for navigation and communication. They also make it possible for a space vehicle to collect remote sensing data on concerns such as atmospheric thermal balance, agricultural crops, weather trends, fishing grounds, mineral deposits and missile launches. How the space environment affects different materials is uncertain. Simulations of space conditions have been created on earth but, like all such testing devices, these only approximate reality. Space poses a variety of known hazards, including micrometeorites (or "space buckshot"). No one is sure how many of these stray rocks are likely to strike a vehicle in earth orbit over weeks or monthsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;thus they are not certain the extent or type of cladding needed by a spaceship. Another known problem is ultraviolet radiation from the sun. UV light unfiltered by an atmosphere may degrade paints which coat spacecraft, altering their optical and reflective properties. This, in turn, could adversely affect the ability of the space vehicle to maintain a steady temperature.

Research in microelectronics has received special attention at Georgia Tech in the past several years. Tech's administration has brought the various disciplines together through a single coordinating organization on campus, including a Microelectronics Research Center at Tech. The study of mercury cadmium telluride is a good example of the semiconductor materials R&D capability at Tech. Another area of strength is in VLSI (very large scale integration), where researchers are making

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faster, more powerful computing possible through the design of custom VLSI chips. Studies of ion implantation underway at Georgia Tech have made it possible to increase the fatigue life of coppers, steels and titanium alloys by several hundred times. This research has produced key insights for predicting how ion implantation will affect the performance of materials. Other research in microelectronics at Tech includes esoteric-sounding specialties such as semiconductor devices, microfabrication of LVFEA Cathodes, materials and device characterization, device physics, band structure calculations and surface dynamics, analog sampled data filters, and microcircuit reliability and defect analysis. A group of researchers is also assessing the impact of this new technology on society.

Computer-related technologies at the Institute are wide-ranging. In the School of Electrical Engineering, research is underway on a laser/optical information processing technology which may be capable of handling up to 50 billion calculations per second. Laser processors will make this possible because they are capable of doing millions of distinct calculations at once. In contrast, electronic computers must make all computations one at a time. Moreover, while each distinct dot of light in a laser image can serve as a data processing channel, data is represented as voltage in electronic computers, a characteristic which limits the .system to sequential computations. Success in this effort will mean faster data processing so needed in areas such as air traffic control, defense early warning systems, and weather forecastingâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;to name a few.

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Another R&D program in the electrical engineering school seeks to ( develop techniques for representing the , electronic signals of a variety of images in digital form. One area of this research deals with computer techniques which could extract information from

Ronald A. Bohlander, Senior Research Scientist, Adjusts World's Highest Frequency Millimeter Wave Radar, Developed at Tech. images, convert it into digital form, then make analyses to find out if certain objects are in the image. Applications might include computerized detection of military targets or detection of medical abnormalities.

Computer security has become a research field of some prominence at Georgia Tech. Computer scientists here have demonstrated how insecure the computerized data banks maintained by the U.S. Census Brueau are. They also have suggested methods for keeping computerized information safe in systems with multiple users, each with varying degrees of access to the network's total resources.

The largest computer applications project currently underway is leading to an automated safety monitoring system for the nuclear control room of the Edwin I. Hatch nuclear plant in Baxley, Georgia. This network will diagnose the reactor's vital signs and present them on color graphics terminals. These displays leave the actual decision-making process to the operator but they substantially reduce the number of complex mathematical calculations necessary for assessing safety conditions. Another important feature of this system is its durability. The project represents the first attempt to adapt military-hardened computer hardware to the needs of a nuclear plant and the computer installed at Plant Hatch should be able to endure high levels of stress, even an earthquake of considerable magnitude.

Tech also is delving into the field of artificial intelligence, and several signifi-

cant programs already are underway.

One aims at improving target identification through the development of a technique for automatically surveying the environmental context in which an unclassifiable object is detected.

Through another project, researchers are trying to design an automonous navigation system which would allow pilotless helicopters to generate mission plans for various types of terrain.

Communications technology is a research specialty of long standing at Georgia Tech. Last year, engineers working in this field at EES delivered to the Federal Communications Commission (FCC) a completely automated, computer-controlled system which should dramatically improve the agency's ability to enforce government broadcast regulations. Housed in a van which will travel around the country, this prototype mobile measurement faculty will record pertinent data on the broadcast and mobile signals of FCC licensees. Before the prototype was installed, the commission monitored radio transmitter stations with manually operated equipment.

Another notable project is resulting in the first millimeter wave frequency direction finder ever commissioned by the Department of Defense. The millimeter wave region of the spectrum is promising for certain military applications, and this direction Finding system will strengthen the ability of American armed forces to located hostile radar emitters.

Communications research also deals

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with command and control problems, and an EES division specializing in this area has played a major role in the Army's efforts to computerize its intelligence-gathering operations. Traditionally, the military has equipped itself by defining a system which meets a given requirement, then developing hardware over a lengthy period. Under an acquisition procedure like this, computer systems elected for military use can be obsolete by the time they are fielded. To avoid this problem, the Army has acted on EES research findings and is employing engineers from the Station to help develop a large microcomputer-based intelligence analysis system through an evolutionary process.

Intelligence operators are experimenting with a series of application models in trial and error fashion. Through this process, the military will progressively refine the models to fit its ultimate need.

Georgia Tech is training Army .personnel to work through this cycle and also designing a computer work station for intelligence analysts.

One of the concerns of Tech specialists in the field of biomedical research is the effect of electronics

20

systems on health. The Air Force is sponsoring an R&D program at EES which seeks to determine more conclusively whether long-term exposure to low levels of microwave radiation is hazardous to humans. Eastern European scientists contend that headaches, abnormal fatigue and irritability are products of such an exposure. However, most American researchers believe no hazards have been shown convincingly through experimentation. Military agencies are particularly concerned with this question, since they are becoming increasingly reliant on electronic defense systems.

The Department of Defense is developing an increasing number of millimeter wave electronic systems as well, and this focus led the Station to build a system which determines the reaction of body tissues to various millimeter wave dosages.

Through this kind of research is relatively recent, similar concerns have motivated research at Tech for many years in heart pacemaker evaluation.

The electromagnetic environment is growing increasingly dense in America, and a group of engineers here has

Tech Maintains Two Planes for Research Requiring Airborne Data Measurements

assisted industry in making pacemakers which are not easily impaired by electronic disturbances.

Tech has not restricted itself to the negative impact of electronic radiation on the human body. Engineers have worked to find a reliable technique for thawing large body organs which have been cryogenically preserved. And in another project, the same group built hyperthermia equipment which uses harmless radiation to selectively heat and kill malignant tumors in deep-lying tissues. This system works on the premises that cancerous tumors get hotter faster than normal tissuesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; and therefore can be destroyed without damage to surrounding body layers. The hyperthermia prototype which was developed uses three pairs of antennas to heat cancerous tumors. They are attached to the body of the patient so that they can beam radiation into tumors from different directions, one at a time.

In this way, they believe cancerous growths will keep getting hotter while surrounding tissues stay at a safe temperature. â&#x20AC;˘

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Solar Energy Research Shines at Georgia Tech

By Martha Ann Stegar

Photovoltaic Panels Have Potential for Wider Use, Including Supplemental Source of Residential Electricity.

S

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olar energy as a major research area in the United States is only about 10 years old—an offspring of the 1973 OPEC oil embargo and resultant energy crisis. Georgia Tech has played a prominent role in this research from the beginning and continues to be one of the leading universities in the field.

For instance, consider the following superlatives: • In 1971, Georgia Tech researchers became the first U.S. scientific team to conduct experiments at the world's largest solar furnace, operated by the Centre National de la Recherche Scien-, tifique (CNRS) in southern France.

• Tech scientist J.D. Walton was the first person who was not a native of France elected to the board of directors

for the CNRS solar furnace.

• Between 1974 and 1976, Georgia Tech and the Martin Marietta Corporation designed and built the first large steam generator in the United States to use solar energy as the source of heat.

• Tech's 325-kW solar power tower, built in 1976, is still the second largest solar thermal facility of its kind in the U.S. • Georgia Tech is one of only two universities in the U.S. designated by the U.S. Department of Energy as a Solar Thermal Advanced Research Center, and its activities have gained it general recognition as the leading university program in the nation.

• Test programs at Tech's solar site have achieved a number of world "firsts," including using a Stirling engine/gen-

erator unit to convert solar energy to electric power and feed it to a commercial utility grid, as well as successfully testing a solar-unique design for heating air through direct absorption of sunlight.

• Georgia Tech scientists advised on design and construction of the world's first solar total energy system for an industrial plant, a knitwear factory at Shenandoah, Georgia, and played a lead role in monitoring and evaluating its operation.

• Tech engineers designed what initially was the largest solar system in the world for heating and cooling a building, the recreation center at Shenandoah.

They also monitored the performance of the first large-scale solar cooling system in the U.S., a retrofit of the Towns Elemen-

Tech has been heavily involved . . . in (helping develop the) world's first and largest industrial application of the solar energy total concept.

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tary School in Atlanta.

"Although we can point to a number of outstanding achievements that have made us a national leader," says Tech Vice President for Research Thomas E. Stelson, "the most impressive thing about Georgia Tech's program is the aggregation of activity. Our solar research program is larger in volume and more varied than that of any other U.S. university. We are involved in all aspects: solar thermal, photovoltaics, biomass, passive and active solar applications, among others. And we have maintained our volume of energy research despite the drop in federal funding. We have diversified our funding base, with a growing segment of it in the international arena."

Georgia Tech probably is most widely known for its solar thermal research and development activities, conducted principally at the Advanced Components Test Facility (ACTF). Tech's Engineering Experiment Station (EES) operates the ACTF for the U.S. Department of Energy. This 325-kW test facility consists of a 550-mirror field, a tower than can support a 20,000-pound test load, and complete computer controls; it can achieve temperatures up to 3500°F. The second largest such power tower in the United States, it is used by numerous industry, university and government research organizations for experimentation and testing on advanced hightemperature solar systems.

Tech's solar program received a major boost in September 1981 when the Department of Energy (DOE) awarded EES's Energy and Materials Sciences Laboratory a contract to operate one of two university Solar Thermal Advanced Research Centers in the country. "Previously, DOE emphasized demonstrations of existing solar thermal technologies," said Center Director Bob Cassanova. "The new thrust is to get universities and industries

more involved in problem-focused research which creates new technologies for more efficient use of solar energy and for conversion of solar energy to storable chemicals and fuels."

Most of the Center's research is conducted at the ACTF, and there aheady have been several breakthroughs. In one such project, solar tower staff members worked with scientists from the Lawrence Berkeley Laboratory (LBL) of the University of California to successfully test LBL's Small Particle Heat Exchange Receiver. "Unlike other solar heating experiments, which adapt techniques that were developed for fossil fuels," said ACTF Manager Tom Brown, "this is a unique method of heating air through the direct absorption of sunlight." The method involves swirling a very thin smoke and ah mixture into a cavity-type solar receiver, where the small carbon particles absorb the concentrated sunlight to produce process heat.

ACTF solar tower staff also is collaborating with GA Technologies (fomerly General Atomic), a San Diegobased company, on several aspects of an experimental thermo-chemical process to produce hydrogen from water, using solar thermal energy. "Since sunlight isn't available all the time, we look for ways to store its energy," Brown explained. "It's convenient to store energy in the form of a chemical bond.

Hydrogen is the fuel of choice because it's nonpolluting and can be stored and transported via existing distribution systems. It's also a good feedstock chemical in the petrochemical industry."

Last February, they successfully tested the solar thermal catalytic reactor used in part of the GA process. Sulfuric acid in the receiver was decomposed by direct solar heating to a process temperature of 1600°F, using iron oxide as a catalyst. In addition to conducting testing and evaluation at the ACTF site, Georgia

Tech helped with design aspects of the solar receiver and on instrumentation.

Tech solar engineers have played a significant part in the development of another high-tech solar device—a solar electric power generation module comprising a low-cost parabolic dish solar concentrator utilizing a Stirling heat engine which drives an induction electrical generator. EES performed the optical design and analysis, as well as the thermal and structural analysis, on the solar receiver. The Stirling engine/ generator unit was tested at Tech's ACTF, resulting in a solar "first": the use of an external combustion Stirling engine to convert solar energy to electric power and feed it into a utility grid.

Advanco Corporation, which was responsible for the overall design and development of the Dish-Stirling module under a cooperative agreement with the U.S. Department of Energy, has fabricated and assembled the first module on a site at Palm Springs, California, where it is tied into the Southern California Edison utility distribution system and will undergo at least a year of operational testing.

"The dishes are meant to operate as an interconnected array, in multiples of 32 dishes, " said Tom Elfe, who directed the Georgia Tech portion of the research. "This year, DOE will take the concept a step further and fund two small community power projects—at $4 million each—to use Dish-Stirling systems to provide electric power to isolated areas."

Tech has been heavily involved in another project using parabolic dish solar collectors, this one utilizing steam turbines to generate electricity for the Bleyle of America knitwear plant at Martha Ann Stegar is a writer in the Research Communications Office and editor of Station /Veins, a publication of the Engineering Experiment Station.

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Shenandoah, Georgia, about 25 miles south of Atlanta. A cooperative effort between the U.S. Department of Energy and the Georgia Power Company, it is the world's first and largest industrial application of the solar total energy concept, using a five-acre field of dish collectors to provide electrical power, process heat, and air conditioning.

Dr. James I. Craig of Tech's Aerospace Engineering School and Dr. Sheldon Jeter of Mechanical Engineering have played a significant advisory role in the system's design and construction. They set up a solar and weather data station at the site five years ago, and have been collecting and processing data, with the help of graduate students, ever since. The resulting insolation and meteorological profile was helpful in designing the energy system and in assessing the performance of the facility.

They also built a device to determine the optical performance of the concentrators under ordinary in-field operating conditions. Douglas M. Moore of EES has just completed a two-year assignment to monitor the system's performance during startup and test operations, providing a good deal of troubleshooting assistance.

Craig and Jeter now are involved in conceptual design and evaluation of an experimental parabolic trough system to cogenerate steam, electricity, and chilled water for cooling. Georgia Power may construct this system next year at the Shenandoah site.

The Shenandoah metorological measurement site also has been used, along with an instrumentation pad atop the new Civil Engineering building, as one of eight regional university Solar Energy Meteorological Research and Training Sites (SEMRATS) which were established by DOE around the country.

Georgia Tech is the SEMRATS center for the 12-state Southeastern Region.

"We collected five years of continuously monitored data on solar radiation parameters before the funding was terminated in December 1982," said Geophysical Sciences' Dr. Gerald Justus. "We are keeping the monitoring going in hopes that Congress will direct DOE to resume its solar energy resource assessment program. In the meantime, several industrial, commercial and governmental clients are using the data."

24

EES and the Florida Solar Energy Center have formed the Southeastern Residential Experiment Station, funded

by DOE, to investigate practical aspects of feeding electricity from solar cells installed on homes into electric power grids and the effects of their use upon utility companies. EES's Technology Applications Laboratory (TAL) is working with the School of Electrical Engineering and several southeastern utilities to define and solve the grid

A View from the Bottom: 325 KW Solar Thermal Receiver

interface problems of harmonics and "islanding," which directly affect power quality and lineman safety. EE Professor Athanasios P. Meliopoulos did the computer modeling for the entire feeder that goes to Georgia Power Company's photovoltaic house and is running analytical experiments. The team also is gathering data from photovoltaic houses in Alabama, Florida and Tennessee. The experimental work on harmonics, which affects power quality, has resulted in development of two novel ways to measure the impedance of Another technology that Georgia' a live utility line, according to Larry Tech is investigating is photovoltaics Banta, who is principal investigator for â&#x20AC;&#x201D;the direct conversion of sunlight to Georgia Tech on the project. electricity by means of silicon solar cells.

In the College of Architecture, Pro-

fessors Max Akridge and Chris Benton direct one of the nation's outstanding university research programs in passive and hybrid solar heating and cooling designs for buildings. A DOE-funded study of passive cooling techniques in a hot-humid environment several years ago led to selection of detached earth tempering as the most promising technique for further investigation. This concept promises to impart to aboveground construction many of the thermal advantages of below-ground earth tempered construction without its structural, moisture, site and cost liabilities.

Using both computer simulation and experimental approaches, Akridge and Benton have established the feasibility of cooling an insulated block of earth during the winter months and using it as a heat sink to provide cooling to residences during the summer months.

They installed an experimental field behind the Architecture building in which they buried 700 feet of 1.5-inch polyethylene pipe four feet below the surface and covered it with two inches of polystyrene insulation. The insulated field is cooled during the winter by circulating water through an above-ground air-to-water heat exchanger and then through the buried coil. In the summer, the cooled fluid can be circulated through building elements such as the floor, ceiling or walls.

Several years ago, while studying the thermal envelope housing concept (in essence, building a house inside a house), they developed a model for simulating and measuring the performance of earth cooling tubes. Results of this and the detached earth tempering studies are being utilized in two current innovative research activities. One project, sponsored by Georgia Power Company, concerns super-insulation as the most promising house construction method for hot-humid climates. In addition to investigating reduced amounts, proper placement, and better quality of glazing, they will address the indoor air pollution problems of super-insulation through the use of enthalpy exchangers.

They also are researching the feasibility of storing cooling with the aid of earthcontact heat pumps. "Water-source heat pumps have been used for years, but they are not feasible in Atlanta," Akridge said. "We're the first to try the earth-contact type for cooling purposes, and we're excited about its potential for very high efficiencies."

Tech's involvement in solar research

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dates back to 1971, when an EES ceramic engineer, J.D. Walton, initiated high-temperature materials testing at the 1000-kW solar furnace in Odeillo, France, in a cooperative relationship with the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique. This program to improve the survivability of American radars under thermonuclear pulse conditions is still ongoing. Walton then became interested in solar energy as a means of generating steam power and persuaded DOE to fund construction of Tech's solar power tower, patterned after Giovanni Francia's solar steam generating facility in Italy.

Walton also gained prominence in low-technology applications of solar energy for developing nations, particularly in Africa. For example, during the course of a project to evaluate the potential of solar-powered water pumps and solar cookers for Saudi Arabian villages, he visited sub-Sahara Africa and learned of the urgent need to find another energy source to replace wood for cooking. The heavy demand for wood was causing rapid deforestation.

He introduced the Georgia Tech "curly cooker," a simple to make, low-cost spiral solar concentrator based on Fresnel principles which was invented by Rick Steenblik, a mechanical engineering student at Tech, and has since been patented.

26

solar thermal power plant similar to the one at Shenandoah in only three years.

The 100 kWe system uses an organic Rankine cycle engine, and is augmented by a solar pond which acts as a solar concentrator. The pond uses the excess salt recovered from desalination of the brackish well water. Food is produced in greenhouses and on irrigated plots.

Solar water desalination is another major research area at KISR. Kuwait depends on desalted seawater for 95 per-

m

Another solar researcher with a | strong international reputation is Dr. 5 Atif Debs of the School of Electrical ÂŤ Engineering. Debs returned to the cam- 1 pus last September from a four-year stint as Director of the Engineering Divi- A View from trie Top sion of the Kuwait Institute of Scientific of Tower During Solar Test Research (KISR), where he was responsible for all non-petroleum energy research. "Solar was the biggest compo- cent of its water supply, and KISR is nent when I arrived," Debs said, "with looking at ways to reduce energy research amounting to some $3 million a consumption in this process. Research year. Georgia Tech had been engaged in | personnel are assessing new processes joint solar research with KISR for and perhaps will develop others. several years. In 1976, we designed and Although he has returned to Tech, installed the first, solar air-conditioning Debs is continuing his involvement with system in the Middle East for testing in KISR. He will participate in KISR's new Kuwait. Since then, KISR has built up study to develop a master plan for interexcellent local capabilities to design these connecting and jointly operating the systems. We also designed and fabricated electric power systems of aft the Persian a small solar furnace research facility for Gulf countries.

KISR." The Engineering Experiment Station's One of the most important projects Technology Applications Laboratory Dr. Debs directed in Kuwait was the, (TAL) is another Tech unit with longdevelopment of a solar total energy' term involvement in international solar system to make isolated desert com- activity. Currently they are helping the munities self-sufficient. He is proud of northeast African nation of Sudan to the fact that they were able to build a adapt and disseminate to its rural

population a number of renewable energy technologies, including lowtemperature solar heating and drying techniques and photovoltaics. In 1981, TAL provided an on-site engineer to direct construction and testing of solar water desalination stills in two rural locations in Haiti. TAL engineers also have evaluated energy conservation and alternate energy sources in Jamaica and Panama.

At home, TAL has been investigating the use of solar thermal energy on poultry farms since 1975. In 1978, research engineers installed a solar collector system atop a broiler growout house near Villa Rica, Georgia, that has been operating continuously ever since.

Vice President for Research Stelson sees a bright future for Georgia Tech in solar energy. "It's a relatively new and wide open field," he says. "There are still enormous unknowns, making it a good long-range area of technological challenge and innovation.

"Renewable energy is the fastest growing energy area right now. Currently, 6 quads out of the total 80 quads of energy used in the United States annually is renewable energy. (A quad is equivalent to lO1-* Btu.) Solar energy has the greatest prospects for the longrange future. It's not depletable, produces no toxic wastes, and is the most environmentally beneficial. It also is very economical if properly developed.

"Solar energy is somewhat like agriculture," Dr. Stelson explained.

"Certain crops grow better in some environments than in others. Georgia has an excellent solar climate, and it's basically an importer of energy from other states besides. With conventional energy prices up dramatically, we are looking at a cost of $10 billion a year to import energy. The state would benefit enormously from development of alternate, renewable sources of energy to supplement traditional sources. It would provide jobs and other economic benefits. So it is logical for Georgia Tech to play a leading role in developing these new technologies."

With creative, innovative researchers like those in the Engineering Experiment Station, the College of Architecture, and the Schools of Aerospace Engineering, Electrical Engineering, Geophysical Sciences, and Mechanical Engineering described above, Georgia Tech should have no difficulty in maintaining its leadership position in the world of solar research and development. â&#x20AC;˘

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David S. Lewis A Low Profile CEO in a High Profile Business

By Gene Griessman

Dauid S. Lewis, with Model ofF-WXL

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D

avid Sloan Lewis, Jr., AE '39, one of Georgia Tech's most successful and visible alumni, epitomizes the Institute's involvement in aeronautical research and practice.

In fact, it was the Institute's reputation in this field that lured him away from his native South Carolina, and from the University of South Carolina, where he had originally enrolled. Lewis has never strayed from that early love of flying machines. Even though he now is a successful executive—the chief executive officer of General Dynamics, which ranks 46 among the Fortune 500 companies—he still takes great pride in his "feel" for planes, and in his personal contribution to their development.

The best-known and most successful product of the company he heads is the F-16—the famed jet fighter so sophisticated that the government is very cautious about who is permitted to purchase one— but it is only one part of General Dynamic's arsenal. Its 92,000 employees design and manufacture the cruise missile, the Trident nuclear submarine, space-launch vehicles, and the M l tank. A writer once wrote that the three most awesome forces in the world are the U.S., the U.S.S.R, and General Dynamics.

As for the man himself, photographs do not seem to do him justice.

They do not convey his restless energy and attentiveness, the twinkle in his eye when he relaxes and breaks into a brief smile, or the deadly seriousness of his gaze when his ice blue eyes home in on yours—a gaze that must be terrible for any subordinate weighed and found wanting. He is not flamboyant by any means, a dresser in subdued colors. He is not jolly or particularly gregarious; he is cool, not hot—an executive who is at his desk by 7:10 of a morning, and eats lunch there most days. Lewis is meticulous about details, down to the fabrics on the seats of his corporate jet. He is a low-profile CEO in a highprofile business—a business where one stripped-down F-16 costs $12 million, and even with such a pricetag usually beats the competition. He plays in high-stakes poker games, where one competition can result in the gain or loss of thousands of jobs.

His executive suite on the 23rd

floor of Clayton, Missouri's tallest building is Spartan—almost austere.

At General Dynamics there is no doubt about who is in charge. Lewis may not be the "one-man show" a recent Business Week cover story called him, but he certainly is the number one quarterback.

What turned airplanes?

you

on

to

I was turned on long before high school, I guess. I was involved in the interest, in the romance of flight, aircraft, World War I—all the pioneering that went on in flying in the 20's and 30's. And I guess I had an engineering interest, too. So they just sort of fit together and evolved into the course I was going to take which is, of course, why I came to Tech in the first place You say that you had an engineering interest already. Was that because of your father's background a s a civil engineer?

Probably. There was some influence there although I never had any pressure from him. I just liked math and things like that and did a lot of model airplaning and all that kind of stuff which automatically piques your interest. That doesn't always happen. There are a lot of people that take engineering; they think they want to be engineers and they really don't.

You started at another university and transferred to Georgia Tech. Was that a deliberate choice because of career, or was there s o m e other reason that you chose Georgia Tech?

I went to the University of South Carolina. We lived in South Carolina, and I took engineering there, and that was what we could afford. Then I wanted to get into aeronautical engineering, and Georgia Tech was the only school in the South that had an aeronautical engineering course. I believe, at that time, there were five or six or seven Guggenheim schools around the country and Georgia Tech was one of them and had a fine reputation and I was fortunate to be able to go there.

You went to a southern school rather than a northern school or western school; has that ever been an obstacle that you had to overcome?

No, not at all. Several of us went to

the Glenn L. Martin Company, now a part of Martin Marietta, from that same class. I guess we had a little trepidation about whether we really had the education that some of these people from other schools that we were going to be competing with had. At that time, the company was expanding rapidly before the war. It was obvious that the war was coming and they had a massive expansion in the engineering departments with people from every technical school in the country—MIT, Michigan, Cal Tech and the others that had Guggenheim schools. We did well right from the beginning. I think that after a year or two, we felt in many ways that we had done better; that with our background and with the particular education that we had gotten, we were able to hit the ground running faster than a lot of people that had much more narrower courses in some of the allegedly better schools—much less practical education than we had had. It is interesting that MIT and Georgia Tech were the only two that got that extra nickel an hour—from seventy-five cents to eighty cents an hour.

You not only hit the ground running but you felt you were better prepared. What do you think gave you the edge?

I think that we had had, it seemed to me, more practical aeronautical education. We all had the same engineering background. But the courses at Tech— the wind tunnel courses, structural courses, even physics and all that agony of going through thermodynamics—all that seemed to be on a lot more practical basis and we were able to get into design and aerodynamic problems much quicker; I remember working in stability and control at the Glenn L. Martin Company, which is a very complex aerodynamic area, and, having worked in that department of aerodynamics for a few weeks, I finally understood the course. I went back and looked through my notes, which I had carefully memorized and I really didn't understand.

Immediately the two came together and I had the grounding that I didn't really realize I had. I didn't have the feel but I did get the feel very quickly; that is enormously important in this design area— that you have a real feel and appreciation for what is important in an airplane, aircraft, spacecraft design.

29

A lot of Georgia Tech grads talk about their years at Georgia Tech a s agony. I noticed you used that word. Do you think that the agony, the discipline at Georgia Tech has been a plus?

I didn't think it was all that agonizing.

I think the real agony was that I was afraid that I'd bust out of the place, and I worked harder and made better grades there than I did at South Carolina, as I remember.

Were you a good student?

Pretty good. I didn't miss out too much on what was going on the social circuit, either.

that are enormously important now were nonexistent when we started out, particularly the electronics, and all the things that go into fire controls . . . the use of computers, and everything. So it's hard to be as good a generalist, maybe as you could be in earlier years.

But as I talked about earlier, there's a feel for this thing—meeting the multiple requirements of something. I don't

And, did you meet all the girls in Atlanta?

I met as many as I could.

In rank order, what was important during your college years?

Let me tick off a few, and if you don't want to choose these, you might want to name others: Social contacts, lab, library, good professors, s o m e turning point experience.

Well, I would say good professors and what I would consider a more practically based curriculum, a good mixture of pretty deep and heavy theory which was hard to handle, with a good mix of practical lab work, you would say— even woodwork—that was one I didn't get an A in with Uncle Heinie. He didn't like a lot of the things I did in the woodwork department but I got through. I learned a lot and I used all that woodworking experience later in building things in the houses and so forth. He would have been proud of me. He wasn't when I was there.

I understand that you still try to keep abreast of technical aspects of design, plane submarines, whatever. One of the generalizations one reads about people who make it to the top in management is that they lose their technical competency. Have you tried to continue to be competent technically?

30

I've certainly tried. It's hard to do because the level of technology has accelerated so rapidly and some things

Why don't you do that on everything? Get good financial people, good contracts people, good manufacturing people and don't even come in?

Sounds like a g o o d idea.

"If you don't know your business, you'd better not be in management."

Were you a Greek?

I was an SAE.

bother to try to remain technically competent? Why don't you forget about that and hire good people who are? Turn it ail over to them, make them responsible and g o home earlier in the evenings.

think I have that in submarines. I understand basically the submarines. I don't have the feel, the flavor . . . I think I still do designing and building an airplane. And I really do believe that I've made some contributions to airplanes when I was over at McDonnell and we were working on the Phantom. I was still in engineering; I was head of advanced design when the F-4 first was born. When I came here, I think I made a contribution engineering-wise to the configuration and so forth of the F-16 and certainly to the production which, at this company, was not up to what it should be.

Do you fly yourself?

Not anymore. I did in the olden days.

Cubs, and that kind of stuff.

If you would look back over your career in this industry, what are you proudest of?

I don't know whether I'm proud of anything particularly. . . . What do you take most satisfaction in, then.

I think I've had more satisfaction in two different areas. The engineering area—clearly that—becoming what you might consider a reasonably wellrounded overall aircraft designer. In the management side, I think we've done some good with helping in organizations, management of companies, using all our energies to improve the facilities and people to give opportunities to build better management teams. Managers aren't very good by themselves . . .

I'll play devil's advocate. Why

It doesn't sound like a good idea to me. If you don't know your business, you better not be in management. And you can't know your business unless you really are reasonably immersed in every discipline or area or line of your business. You better be pretty good at it and you better know something about it or you're going to wind up one of these days in deep trouble. The great mode to delegate is insidious. If you say, 'Well, I'm a big executive and the important thing is to find some good people that you know, from their background, are good and put them in charge of a division and let them go. Get somebody else for the other division. Get a good lawyer, financial man . . .' What you find is that this is a creeping cancer because they recognize that the mark of a good executive is to delegate, so they delegate. So the general manager down at the division says, 'Well, I'm going to delegate to the engineers here and to the financial people and production. And the chief engineer says, 'The mark of a good executive is to delegate and I want to move up.' Maybe he won't go home early, but he'll say, 'I'll be above all the cares of the day.' Then, what you find, before too long, all the important decisions are being made at a level fairly far down, depending how far this cancer goes, by people who are willing to make them but who are not qualified by experience to make them. Maybe they are qualified by education to make them, but you have to have the combination of experience and education and background. And so, when things start going wrong, the reason these people rose to the top in the first place—all the experience and judgment is not coming into play. And pretty soon you find that that division is on fire and nobody knew it until the thing was in flames. They didn't catch it when the smoke first started up, when everybody could have gotten together to put out the fire. Sud-

/ i

Lewis Immediately After Flying F-16 Falcon in 1979 Paris Air Show

denly the whole barn is burning. "My God, how did we get here?" And there you are. I think that this is one of the most important management criteria in a company like ours—you better be sure that you have somebody running each of those divisions who knows that you know something about it, and who knows that you may come in and bore down at four or five levels below him.

Woe be unto him who doesn't know as much as you know.

that the corporate office where we have variously skilled and experienced people in all of these disciplines—a matrix organization, you might say,—they know. You try to unearth these things pretty quickly. The second requirement is that the general manager comes clean real quickly and doesn't try to hide it. I think that we've developed a relationship in this company that we don't shoot the messenger.

Are you willing t o c o m e in and bore at four or five levels?

You don't shoot the messenger?

You bet. And I do, not on a constant day-to-day basis, but where something is very important—where some decision, some corrective action is required or we're going into a new program or going into a new line of business—one that you visualize in the future is going to require a lot of assets, capital, or people, I get down pretty deep.

What happens if you discover that the barn's on fire and the manager didn't know it?

That's why I'm here and not at McDonnell Douglas. That's what happened to that company.

And what do you do?

Well, first of all, we do have fires all the time. We have problems arising all the time in almost every division and you can't not have that if you have anything that's operating out anywhere near the front edge of any kind of technology. If you're in the forefront of something, you're going to have problems. The first requirement is that the general manager recognizes them and

No, we don't shoot the general manager if something goes wrong and he's asking for help instead of hiding.

We want them to ask for help . . . We had a big problem with the Tomahawk about a year and a half ago. We put together what we called red teams and they went in there with only one goal—to take a fresh look with new people—most of them probably on the average more experienced or as experienced as the management team in the division under review. They had no hatchet job duties. All they were supposed to do was come in, try to find out what recommendations they could make to the general manager as well as to us, and get the hell out. In other words, the people, when they come in there, are not threatening anybody's job. Frequently, you find a weak spot in the organization, and they recommend that you do something about. But those people (on the red team) are not replaced back home. They may be six days or six months on the job. The general manager sees them come in and they normally are not considered a threat.

We have found that in almost every

division, we've had to apply this help and it works. It's a combination of the corporate office experts, and we do have them—the production problem on some program like we had on the Tomahawk Cruise Missile, for example. We had people in from Fort Worth who are airplane experts but the same principles apply whether you are building submarines, airplanes, highly sophisticated guided missiles, electronic equipment.

What's the biggest lesson you ever learned?

Probably that. You better know what you're doing in your job and don't count on people to know it for you, below you.

What gives you the most satisfaction these days?

Probably not getting into magazines and newspapers any more than we can help . . . I think the best satisfaction is really the fact that we have developed a team that is good, that is in constant trouble because they are on the front end of every technology in every division, that is self-confident enough to work together as a team, and right at this particular moment, they are all making money, which is not necessarily standard in this company nor in others.

And they are doing a good job. They have good reputations for professionalism.

I talk to students; I still teach. If you were in my class and you wanted to give them s o m e advice, what advice would you give to s o m e kids in a school like Georgia Tech?

31

You better be well-trained, because I think the competition among young people is enormously more than it was.

Not only are they more skilled, not only do they know far more than we knew, just on the technological level, but the job requirements are more severe relative to what you know in school. I would like to come back to that in a moment because it has some secondary effects. The most important things beyond that, which is an obvious thing, is you better be sure that whatever field you're going in—and you can't ever be positive—that is really something that you want to do. If you are not really interested in it, you're not going to be good at it. If you work a couple of years and conclude that this really isn't what you want to do, you better get out and do something else. You should always have guts enough to change your career before too long. If possible, really know whether you're doing this because your father did it or your uncle or somebody kind of talked you into it or whether this is a field you really want to be in.

D o e s controversy bring out the best in you?

Yes, I think I'm pretty competitive.

Do you like to lose?

No, absolutely not.

Do you?

Frequently. This is a competitive business, enormously competitive.

Do you like 'yes' men?

No, I don't. Absolutely not. I think I have a strong personality, which may intimidate some people, but I think they all know that it's murder to agree to something that they don't bring out without bringing out the other side. If that ever comes out, that's really unforgiveable.

You worked for a number of years with Mr. McDonnell. What did you learn from him?

Probably I would say that the years I worked with him had more influence on the way I run a business than anybody else. It was extremely difficult but enormously educational.

Can you elaborate on what you learned?

32

The basic principles. When something pretty slick comes in that's ironclad, you

better watch out. And when people have a problem and lay it out as a problem, then you better get in also because they are asking for help I g u e s s you're saying you double-check everything either way.

Most things. I used to chafe pretty hard at the detail that he would get into.

"You're never any good till you blow a few, make some mistakes and have to fight your way out . . ."

I would say that most of the time, whatever we brought in there to get approved went that way. But every now and then, after a long and detailed session, we would come out with the opposite answer and agree that it was the right answer. I follow a lot of t h a t . . .

Had I not gone to McDonnell, left the Glenn L. Martin Company of 80,000 people and gone to a company with 4,000, that may or may not ever survived . . . I wanted to work on what they were working on—new jet-type aircraft.

That probably was the best move I ever made.

How long did you work with him personally?

Well, I was there for 24 years.

Before we leave McDonnell, is there anything he taught you?

McDonnell was a great company.

They had some of the basic policies that we tried to use here which were not in place here. That is, don't pay any more dividends than you can help. Get all that money. Get the world's best facilities, the best facilities you can afford.

What about the world's best people? Will you pay big dollars to get the best people?

Yes. I don't believe the best people will not come no matter what you pay them if you don't have the tools—good buildings and equipment for manufacturing and, more important, laboratories. In today's arena, my gosh, the requirement for all kinds of scientific laboratories, equipment, ranges, radar ranges, working on all the aspects, as

well as the wind tunnels and the structural labs that were fashionable when we first got out of school—they still are very vital. If you don't have first class equipment and the greatest amount of computer power that you can afford, watch out. We are very big on providing personal computers to try to upgrade our engineering and financial—everybody in the company because they are being outclassed by recent graduates; this is one of our greatest problems right today—the obsolescence of experienced people with judgment. Somebody from Georgia Tech or MIT or any of the good schools, when they come in there, they have a capability that scares a lot of the more experienced ones; You can't say, 'Well, this guy has all this technological background in computer application and capability. Let him run it.' We push him as hard as we can but he doesn't have judgment enough. He's never done something right and he's never done something wrong and had to fight his way out of it. You're never any good till you blow a few, make some mistakes and have to fight your way out and have to figure out how to get out of a mess.

Did you do a bit of that?

Yes. I've had more than my share of that too.

What are you going to do about this problem?

We've started a new program where we allow anybody to buy their computers and we finance them at no cost, no interest cost for four or five years and they can go anywhere and buy any equipment they want except games.

They can buy any software, any hardware. We have limits on the amount of dollars. They take those home and become experts. Then, they come back to work and we've profited enormously—far more than these interest costs.

You pay the interest. You don't buy the computer, do you?

They own the computer.

You loan them the money at no interest?

Payroll deduction with no interest.

Think about that. Right now we have $8 million in employee loans. $8 million in one year. You talk about something that's taken off.

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Is this started?

something

that

GD

I don't know that we're the first to do it. We're the first (that) we know of.

We've seen some other people follow with different versions of it. We think that 10-12 percent interest we're paying is a bargain if the people become more proficient, more comfortable, more at home with the computers. The great paradox is that most of that money has been loaned to the younger people. But that's good too. Whenever we have been able to encourage the older ones, experienced ones, that's been good also.

The NMA named you executive of the year. Were you always a good manager?

I'm not sure I am now. They have to have somebody every year. I think that I support very strongly a lot of the things that I think are very important in training.

Business Week calls you a oneman show. Are they correct and do you mind?

I don't think so. I think I'm probably more visible in some areas than people think I should be. I don't think we have a one-man company. I think we have a terrific team. Maybe I am too visible.

You're in a highly visible company, a s you know, with lots of highly visible, sometimes controversial, projects. You deal with tough, hard-nosed people—generals, admirals, congressmen, newspapermen. Have you always been tough?

I'm not tough.

34

any customer. If he thinks you're doing your best and that you're able and you have a program to get out of trouble. If things are going well, nobody ever gets mad with anybody.

I know a little bit about you by reading about you and talking to your friends. They say that you do certain things that have made you

"If you're in the forefront of something, you're going to have problems."

successful. One is that you are early to rise and early to the office. Has that been a plus for you?

I think it's a plus. I'm an early person and everybody says, "Well, I'm not.

Why do I have to work for an early rising company?' I feel like somebody's up early while we're diddling around in bed, or whatever; they are out trying to take our business away from us or to beat us on a new competition. A lot of people say these government business things are just handed out to keep everybody happy. That's not true. It's enormously competitive and the gains are so big that, when you win a big competition, you're talking about two decades of work for thousands and thousands of people.

Are your secretaries here at 7 o'clock?

Before.

S o m e people would disagree.

B e f o r e 7. When d o your I think I have an obligation to present secretaries get here? our side. I have found that, with some My secretary gets here about seven exceptions, most of the people we've dealt with are not tough if they think and I'm usually about 10 after. you are really coming clean. If you've And you leave at? got a problem—a serious problem—and they know everything you know and Average, six. that you're trying to bury something and You mentioned attention to keep them from knowing about it, they get disappointed. They get pretty un- detail. That's important to you? happy. They may take strong actionI think it's enormously important. I cancel the program sooner than it would think that the most important other have been cancelled which is rare if it's1 thing and, maybe more important than an important program. But if they think i any of them, is that you have guts you're coming clean, they are not any enough to have integrity when you start tougher than anyone else. That doesn't out, and don't lose it. By that, I mean apply to government only; it applies to that when something goes wrong, you

take the blame for which you are responsible and take it openly. If you blow one, you take it. If you don't have integrity when you're starting out, you can't build it up later. You just suddenly can't become honest after being devious or tricky.

What has Georgia Tech meant to you?

I've run into Tech graduates in places of major responsibility in surprising companies, large companies, small, no technology, high technology. I found that the fact that we both went to Tech was an immediate door-opener for conversation. Maybe we had problems with some companies and found there's a Georgia Tech man across the table. I think that's eased the way. 1 was involved in earlier years more than now in alumni clubs. I think that they have been very helpful. Not with relation to the school so much, which is what they are set up for, but to get to know people in the community with the same interest or similar interest. We are held together by our interest in Tech and we do the things for which the alumni clubs are set up.

But in addition to that—this is a dividend—I've also been fortunate enough to work on a couple of things at Tech through the years, and found that very stimulating; sometimes I've been able to contribute a little bit. Another good thing, I had a son that went there and I thought that was great. They did me a great job by making a good engineer out of him. They did a great job for us.

How would you remembered?

like to

be

Maybe for a year or so. 1 don't know.

For doing what?

You can never understand what impact you have . . . I think that in the long evolution of business that you were a positive contributor, that you did some good for a lot of people, from the beginning to the end, hopefully, and didn't damage too many. I think that's about all you can count on. There can't be any monuments unless you pay for them and they are pretty hollow. •

Dr. Gene Griessman is Coordinator of Natonai Media Relations and is a visiting professor in the School of Sociology.

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OFFICIAL SPONSOR ALUMNI MAGAZINE

Our Atmosphere

The Air We Breathe

By Kathleen C. Moak

R

36

iddle: What is everywhere but cannot be seen, is felt but cannot be touched?

Answer: Air. Although the riddle is old and familiar, it is, as most riddles are, truthful in that it reveals something of the nature of its subject.

Air is everywhere. It is vital to our existence, yet strangely enough, the atmosphere was not studied as a.science in American colleges and universities until about 50 years ago. Georgia Tech's own atmospheric sciences division, in the School of Geophysical Sciences, has just celebrated its sixth birthday.

Dr. C.S. Kiang, MSPHYS '64, PhD '70, one of the founders of Tech's atmospheric science program and the director of the School of Geophysical Sciences, said that compared to the four classical elements of the universe, the earth, air, fire and water, as they were studied by the Greeks, atmospheric science is relatively young.

Compared with mathematics, physics and chemistry, atmospheric science is but a toddler.

Perhaps it has not been studied because of its nature. Dr. Franco Einaudi, chairman of the division of atmospheric sciences, poses a possible answer to the lack of data on the atmosphere through his inquiry, "You are taking your airplane ride and it's bumpy. But if you look under the airplane, what do you see?"

The answer, of course, is nothing. Air and even atmospheric turbulence, are invisible to man. "Measurements of atmospheric parameters have always been very difficult. Satellites and various sensing devices in the last two to three decades have triggered major developments in atmospheric sciences," ; Einaudi said.

Still, much remains unknown, making the study of atmosphere an imprecise science. "Even nowadays when you

forecast the weather you say '50 percent chance of rain.' We do not know; we cannot predict a forecast very precisely like physics or chemistry in the laboratory," said Kiang.

The really big advancements have come in the last 20 to 30 years. "Major progress in understanding the behavior of the atmosphere began with the recognition that the atmosphere is

Dr. Franco Einaudi nothing but a fluid which has certain analytical equations regulating its behavior," said Einaudi. "This has just been since the late '30s. Compared to other sciences, that is a very short time ago."

Much has happened in atmospheric science's short history. Today's technology, applied to atmospheric science, is a long way from the primative, almost "Black Magic" type of observations about atmosphere done in earlier times, according to Kiang.

"Most people think of the atmosphere in terms of their weatherman who forecasts the weather," said Kiang. But he is convinced that from the small things like listening to the weather report or watching the news to see if you'll

need your umbrella, to the long-range effects of aerosols on the ozone layer, acid rain, the greenhouse effect, or nuclear winterâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;we are all directly and critically linked to and involved with our atmosphere.

The question these scientists ask is, "If we are so closely linked to it and if it is so important, do we know enough about it?"

One common bond lies in their agreement to the answer of that question: No. You may even know more about it than you think, just from listening to that weatherman on the radio or nightly news. For instance, when you hear the wind speed reported, you are being given information about atmospheric dynamics (how the wind moves from one place to another).

The relative humidity, the shape of the clouds and the temperature are physical properties of the atmosphere.

And the calculations for the pollution count are done through atmospheric chemistry (the actual composition of the atmosphere).

This all may be fine and good you say, but why teach atmospheric science at a technological institute at all?

Kiang answers with an example of the current problems in technology, "We build our power plants then we find out we have an acid rain problem. We build aerosol cans and then we find out it's going to hurt our environment. So we always patch up whenever we develop the technology and then find out there is some environmental problem."

What Kiang would like to see is an educating of engineers and other designers of tomorrow's technology, so that our technology will be compatible with our environmentâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;to create technology that does not replace old industrial problems with new technological problems.

With that goal in mind, the atmospheric science department at Georgia Tech was established. With a reseaa and teaching staff of 19, the department plans to increase the now graduate-only program to 30 to 40 students, but has no plans to establish an undergraduate major in atmospheric science.

Instead, the department is opting for cooperative programs with other regional four-year colleges that cannot afford the expense of such interdisciplinary programs.

"Our atmospheric science program has become one of the most active

1

I Dr. Carl G. Justus research programs at Georgia Tech," stated Kiang. "Georgia Tech's program has one uniqueness: we have atmospheric chemistry, dynamics and physics all together. If we want to understand the atmosphere we not only have to learn how it moves, but also the physical processes and how the chemical processes happen. Then we can see the total picture of the atmosphere. I think we are one of the first schools in the world to have atmospheric chemistry, physics and dynamics all together."

T

o understand the importance of atmospheric dynamics, try to imagine the atmosphere if it did not transport and disperse itself. We would not be able to stay alive because of all the carbon dioxide that we exale from moment to moment. If we were sitting still, we would suffocate in our own exhalations. The motion of the atmosphere is critical for the transport and dispursion of all kinds of exhaust, from human breath to industrial emissions.

"Areas of research in our atmospheric dynamics program involve experimental and theoretical studies. The latter include analytical and numerical modeling," Einaudi explained. "Some of us work on larger scale motions; some of us are working on smaller scale motions."

The larger scale or "synoptic scale" motions involve looking at several thousands of kilometers of air and determining from them the wind and

temperature lines, which are naturally organized into a sort of periodic distribution, or pattern. "The atmosphere, just like the ocean," said Einaudi, "supports periodic motions.

In an effort to understand these large scale motions, Tech researchers have modeled them on computers.

Drs. Derek M. Cunnold and Fred N. Alyea, principal research scientists, build computer models that simulate the motions in the atmosphere, as well as the transport of minor chemical constituents.

These three-dimensional models use a tremendous amount of computer time.

However, Cunnold and Alyea have simplified the problem so that their models of the stratosphere can simulate one year in nature in just a few hours.

"What you would do in a model is to start with the basic equations of atmospheric motion, program those equations into the computer, and in addition program the chemical reactions that we know about.. .Then as my colleague Dr. Alyea likes to say, 'You turn the sun on,' and you let the model run.

After about a month of simulated time the model will come into some sort of equilibrium. It's reached a state where you get fluctuations but the means only change very slowly.

"In the atmosphere, fluctuations about the mean are very important. The average person is not interested in how many days during the month it is likely to rain, but whether it will rain today."

The smaller scale or "mesoscale"

motions, from a few kilometers to approximately 500 kilometers, are studied because many of the weather events such as storms occur at these levels.

"You have flown in bumpy weather?" asks Einaudi. "You have felt turbulence. Very often that turbulence is associated with wave events, whether it is just below the Jet Stream-height of about seven to 10 kilometers high or in the boundary layer, which includes the first few hundred meters above the ground."

Dr. Carl G. Justus, professor, agreed that mesoscale dynamics is one of the current "hot topics" in atmospheric science and an area with many of the newest developments. Understanding mesoscale problems greatly depends on getting enough information on spatial resolution, and satellites are a good way to get that information.

"For instance, we know we're going to get some rain showers this afternoon, but where are the thunderclouds actually going to develop? As you know, you can have severe thunderstorms develop in an area and hardly know it a few miles away. Tornadoes, too, are a very localized phenomenon," Justus said.

"Every evening now on TV you can see the satellite pictures. That information can be used for a lot more than just flashing up and saying, 'See where the clouds â&#x20AC;˘are.'

"To someone who's a practiced interpreter of satellite images you can actually understand a lot about what's going on . . . it's amazing how many different things you can see and get information out of from satellite imagery.

"In data-sparse areas of the world, in developing countries where we don't have direct access to how their agricultural operations are doing, satellites are a good tool for assessing that so you can get a measure for how much an area's agricultural production is likely to be affected by drought situations, for example," said Justus.

Forecasting drought situations in developing nations could also be economically beneficial to the U.S., a large exporter of grain, because wheat sales to those countries could be planned accordingly.

Another use for satellite data is the prediction of severe weather such as floods or tornadoes, so that warning can be gotten to the would-be-damaged areas in time to save lives and property.

This research is conducted through the

37

PROFS program in Colorado, and has 40 to 50 automated weather observing stations spread out over a 50-mile area.

All stations report to a central location that can computer analyze and graphically display incoming data.

Currently Justus is looking at ways to screen out clouds from the satellite signals. He has also operated the solar radiation monitoring site on the roof of the Civil Engineering Building on the Tech campus for the last five years under the Solar Energy & Meteorological Research And Training Site program. Although funding was cut off recently when the DOE's alternate energy programs were reduced, some minimal data collection and site operation is still ongoing.

Cunnold also is active in analyzing satellite data, especially data which provides information on the ozone layer in the atmosphere and is currently teaching a course in satellite data analysis.

"We're interested in the region of the atmosphere from 30 to 50 kilometers above the surface. Satellites fly typically 600 kilometers above the surface of the Earth, so obviously any sensing they do of the stratosphere is remote. But they provide the tremendous advantage that you've got coverage once a day in a location, and you get global coverage as opposed to sensing it with a balloon or a rocket," he said.

"What you measure is some sort of radiation from the atmosphere. Then you're going to have to interpret that in terms of some atmospheric constituents such as ozone."

Solving these basic atmospheric equations on a computer gives us clues not just for weather forecasting, but for making predictions about the distribution of chemical components and elements in the atmosphere, as well.

Said Einaudi, "If you put a grain of something in the wind it just goes with it, so if you know what the wind does, you know where that grain of dust will go."

Professor Robert G. Roper's research is conducted along those same lines. He is also interested in tracking the motions of the wind, except instead of using grains of dust, Dr. Roper uses meteors, measured by a doppler radar, as his tracer.

When the meteor moves through the mesopause level, 80 to 110 kilometers from the Earth's surface, it burns up, leaving an inonized trail for a quarter to a half a second. The radar tracks that 38

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trail as it is blown along by the wind.

"By looking at many of these echoes all over the sky one can build up a picture of what the wind motions are at these heights," he explained.

Roper has been conducting his research for the better part of a decade at Georgia Tech. His transmitter on campus and receiving site at 150 Technology Park, Atlanta, continuously collect data, 24 hours a day, seven days a week, and are not bothered by weather conditions. In other words, you don't actually have to be able to see the meteors for the equipment to record them.

An important finding from his work is the discovery of the effects of a dynamic phenomenon in the polar stratosphere, known as "Explosive Stratospheric Warming," on the atmospheric circulation at the mid-latitude mesopause level.

Roper also operated a station on Puerto Rico that contributed to an international radar network. As early as 1974, he began to measure a different circulation on his data from his colleague's measurements in Illinois and New Hampshire. "Originally I wondered if something was wrong.

Obviously when you don't measure what everybody else measures the first thing people say is 'You're wrong.' " Actually, Roper had discovered that the regime of wind blowing around the

Drs. Derek M. Cunnold (left) and Frank IS. Alyea equator, in the opposite direction from the regime that blows in mid-latitudes, could extend as far north as Atlanta (34°N).

"There had really been no clue to that before because my station happens to be one of the most southernly stations in the northern hemisphere," he said.

Another aspect of Roper's worldwide scientific involvement is his participation in the International Commission on the Meteorology of the Upper Atmosphere.

"If it hadn't been for Tech and E-Funds and the Georgia Tech Foundation for travel money, I certainly would not be able to be as involved internationally," he acknowledged.

Roper is in his second term as president of the commission, and through the commission's meetings he is able to confer with other leading atmospheric scientists from all over the world.

Two years ago he visited one of the foremost observatories in the Soviet Union, at Dushanbe, Tajicistan, on the Afghan border.

"Soviet scientists do more of this type of work than is done anywhere else in the world. They have quite a dense network of meteor radars continuously measuring the circulation over Eastern Europe and Siberia.

Measuring the motions of wind, as it is done at Tech and elsewhere, forms the basis of study for those who seek not to just locate and measure wind, but to

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Dr. Bob E. Roper actually put the wind to work—in other words, wind energy.

"Of course, that also relates to the aspects of atmospheric dynamics, since you have to be concerned how air flows over hills and terrain and how it interacts with the wind machines and how the machines can extract energy from the air," said Justus.

Justus was involved with the Department of Energy-funded Wind Resources Assessment Program at Georgia Tech until DOE support for alternate energy research was cut. Now the wind turbine sits, inoperative, next to the solar power tower on campus.

The aim of the study was to identify where wind is likely to be good for wind energy production. In some areas there may be strong winds but they may interact with the terrain in such a way that they are too gusty or turbulant to be very useful. Because wind is so variable wind machines have to be carefully located—just a few hundred yards could mean the difference between getting optimum amounts of energy and failure.

"If you go out and buy a gallon of gasoline, you know exactly what kind of energy content you're getting. You can decide whether to buy premium or regular—that affects the energy content somewhat, but if you go out and put up a wind machine you don't know how

much wind resource you have to extract with that machine. Of course, the machine can extract only a fraction as much energy as is really there in the wind," Justus explained.

In California, utilities are encouraged through tax incentives to buy power from companies that are developing alternate energy sources such as wind farms.

"To use wind as an energy source," Justus emphasized, "we have to first better understand the interaction of the winds at the Earth's surface."

F

rom the surface of the Earth, up through the clouds to the stratosphere, the air is the carrier of many things—radiation, water droplets, and dust particles, to name a few.

The physical study of the atmosphere centers on things like how these droplets form, how rain is formed and how particles in the atmosphere absorb the sunlight.

Dr. Gerry Grams, professor, examines how dust particles in the upper stratosphere interact with light. Light can be reflected back toward space and lost, it can be absorbed within the stratosphere, or it can reach and warm the lower levels of the atmosphere and the Earth.

"If the particles weren't there, this light could be reflected by clouds back

into space and prevent normal heating at the Earth's surface," Grams said.

"When major volcanoes erupt it is possible to get from five to 10 degrees of warming in the stratosphere, caused by the absorption of sunlight by the particles, and approximately a half a degree temperature reduction at the surface, because that light was reflected back to space."

Since 1980, Grams' state-of-the-art "polar nephelometer" has made regular trips into the atmosphere on the wing of a U2 airplane to collect data. The cylindric nephelometer houses a laser, a lens system, a 512-element detector and a disk operated microcomputer system.

"Nephelometer's origin is from the Greek word for clouds, so it's the clouds of little particles that are being inspected with this instrument," he explained. The word polar refers to polar scattering diagrams, or using polar coordinates to specify the amount of tight scattered as a function of the angle from the original direction of the tight beam.

The instrument was flown as part of a NASA-funded program to document the effect of particles injected into the stratosphere after the eruption of major volcanoes such as Mount St. Helens and El Chicon, Mexico. Within a few weeks after the El Chicon eruption, there was so much material in the stratosphere that it was affecting approximately 20 percent of the sunlight going through the stratosphere from approximately 10°S to 30°N latitude.

Grams' study of these particles, or aerosols, in the atmosphere has implications for those working on the "greenhouse effect," the increase in the Earth's temperature caused by increases in CO2 concentrations. The relatively rapid changes in the atmospheric aerosol concentrations (compared to the slow but steady increase in CO2) will allow researchers to test their theories on the CO2 effects on the Earth's temperature, since both aerosols and CO2 have simitiar effects on the Earth's radiation balance. Aerosols also have a significant effect on cloud formation and rainfall patterns.

'Aerosol' means a suspension of a droplet or a solid in the air, so anything that's suspended in the air is officially an aerosol, from smog particles to your car exhaust to even fogs and clouds," he said. "A few years ago there was a lot of discussion about how aerosols affect the ozone layer. That controversy always

39

causes confusion for people who hear the word 'aerosol.' When you spray the aerosol can, the droplets ejected from the can—paint, deodorant, and so on—are the aerosol particles.

"The problem with the ozone layer versus the aerosol can is the compressed gas in the can that was used to propel the particles in to the atmosphere— those gases, not the particles, are predicted to work their way upward through the atmosphere and to eventually get into the ozone layer where the destructive reactions can occur."

He is interested in initiating efforts to build a state-of-the-art laser radar system for observing aerosol layers which could also be adapted and used by those studying the ozone layer at Tech.

As a graduate student at M.I.T., Grams was one of the first to use laser radar for atmospheric aerosol studies.

He would like to advance this instrumentation to such a point that there will not always be a need for a highly trained specialist to read the signal and interpret the data. "What we see is an opportunity here to make a laser radar that's as easy to use as the weather radar, " he said.

This laser radar technique can also be used to detect harmful particles put into the air by industry, to allow researchers to study a layer of sodium atoms at 90 kilometers altitude, and to detect "gravity waves" in that same layer and at higher altitudes—waves that are oscilliations in density in the atmosphere, somewhat like the oscillations you see at the top of the ocean surface where air is able to move up and down.

"What do we do for an encore?"

Grams asked rhetorically.

Hopefully, the laser radar technique will find its way aboard a space shuttle so data can be collected on phenomena such as the sodium layer or the dust layer in the lower atmosphere that comes from the Sahara Desert every early summer.

"In fact, I've done some studies on the feasibility of using a laser radar on the space shuttle," Grams said. "The laser radar field is looking very interesting again." asers are also used by Professor' Doug Davis, Dr. John Bradshaw, and Mike Rodgers to measure trace gases—gases that are present in the atmosphere in only one part per billion

L

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or trillion ratios. Though their ranks are few, they play a critical role in the chemistry of the atmosphere and can contribute to such things as the greenhouse effect and acid rain.

Davis and his group have been concentrating for the past several years on developing a new generation of instrument which has the capability of measuring trace gases in the atmosphere in parts per trillion and parts per quadrillion concentrations.

Dr. Gerry W. Grams

Many trace gases previously have been unmeasurable at the levels they actually exist, so it has been difficult, if not impossible, to test theoretical models—models which attempt to simulate the chemistry of the atmosphere in terms of a large number of elementary reactions containing up to 200 chemical species.

"Until recently we haven't had the sensitivity or the time resolution required for measuring many trace gases. In other cases, although we've had the sensitivity, there have been serious questions about the reliability of the measurement in terms of its selectivity," he said.

Davis' new approach, the "two-photon laser-induced fluorescence," is the only one of its kind in the world and yields the sensitivity, time resolution and selectivity needed to measure trace gases.

"This approach has come into its own

during the last year. We've had several opportunities to test it in the field under a variety of atmospheric conditions, for example, clear air, fog, clouds and rain.

Under all these conditions, this new technique has performed exceptionally well. Thus far, it's primarily been used in field measurements of nitric oxide, but it is now being modified to do other trace gases," said Davis.

A very heavy focus of Davis' group has been to develop technology to measure the OH species. This species is perhaps the single most important trace gas molecule that controls the flow of chemistry in the atmosphere. The newest generation of the two-photon approach for measuring OH should be operational by the end of this year.

Another of Davis' major projects involves the studies of chemistry of lightning and clouds in general. Lightning is thought by some to be a major source of nitric oxide but there have been no direct measurements. Davis and his staff have made the first direct measurements of nitric oxide within clouds during lightning events from their new atmosphere field station atop Stone Mountain, Georgia.

High levels of nitric oxide in electrified clouds have also been confirmed recently by Davis and his group over the central Pacific Ocean, as part of NASA's Global Tropospheric Experiment program. Davis said that these measurements, though few in number, already have shown that lightning is a significant global source of nitrogen oxides.

This is fundamentally important in resolving such national and international problems as acid rain.

Because Davis firmly believes that the development of new laser detection techniques will be a major driving force for the field of atmospheric chemistry, as well as for other fields of geophysical science, he is currently in the planning stages for establishing an Advanced Laser Applications Center at Georgia Tech.

Dr. William Chameides, associate professor and editor of the Journal of Geophysical Research, seeks to understand these chemical interactions, but ultimately, he is concerned with placing these events in their proper place in the natural chemical system, especially as they relate to the biosphere.

His computer models compile Davis' information, taking into account such

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factors as population and pollution increases, in order to "piece together one small part of a larger picture of a global resource, the global environment, and understand its interactions so that we can get to a point where we can manage our resource, use the resources to the best of our abilities to help as many people as we can, and make intelligent decisions about using the resources," Chameides said.

Georgia Tech is one of the founders of the concept of the global environment and actively participates in the Global Atmospheric Measurements Experiment of Tropospheric Aerosols and Gases, a worldwide network that collects chemical atmospheric data.

Many important reactions occur as species are dissolved into cloud droplets, so Chameides' work in cloud modeling is intensive. Elements go into the atmosphere and are oxidized there by a "free radical," a very, very reactive molecular fragment. Then they are removed from the atmosphere in rain when they are in a soluable state.

Chameides' investigations of clouds have had several spinoffsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;for instance, the studies of acid rain and atmospheric methane, another of the greenhouse gases.

Methane has been on the increase in the atmosphere for the last 400 years and in the past 15 years has been increasing at a rate of about one to two percent per year. Because methane "is intimately involved with the chemistry of the atmosphere," said Chameides, an increase probably means there are some perturbations to the chemistry of the atmosphere. This increase also hints as to how rapidly things are being cycled through the atmosphere.

Reasons for methane increases can be as simple as the fact that there are more rice patty fields in the world today (methane is produced in swamps, and patty fields) or that the cattle population has increased (methane is also produced in the stomachs of cattle).

Another possibility is that carbon monoxide, a compound that destroys the free radial OH, has increased in concentration due to man's activities. That has caused OH to decrease, and if OH decreases, methane increases.

Since OH is the atmosphere's cleaning agent, one of the interesting implications of the fact that OH has decreased is that the atmosphere's ability to clean itself, to get rid of all this stuff that's

Whatever our society and other societies around the world decide to do to protect our environment, the atmospheric scientific community will continue to observe, measure, document and model, in hopes that we will be able to, one day, manage our environment.

"And in the long term, maybe 100, 300 or 500 years from now maybe that's, in fact, what we'll be doing," suggested Chameides. "The kind of work that I like to think I'm doing is laying the groundwork for that."

Dr. Doug D. Dauis

Dr. BUI L Chameides

coming into the atmosphere from the surface, has lessened. As a result we could have higher concentrations of greenhouse gases and higher concentrations of toxic chemicals.

"We know that the biological processes have a large effect on the atmosphere. We also know the atmosphere affects the climate and that affects the biological processes to some extent, but we're really not sure about the other end of it, which is the atmosphere's effect on the plants or microbes or the bacteria that affect the plants in the environment, involved with these trace chemicals. And that is a very real possibility, but one that hasn't been worked out," he said.

C

onsider again though, how much is not known about the atmosphere and the relatively short time atmospheric science has been studied, and these innovative instruments and techniques, in a clearer perspective, become technological leaps and bounds.

Said Chameides, "Sometimes I think of it like this: if you've ever seen a map of the Western Hemisphere around Christopher Columbus' time, around the 1500s, they knew that the Mississippi River was there and that specific oceans were there somewhere, and Mexico and the Gulf of Mexico. But the pieces were put together all wrongâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;the Rocky Mountains were missing, Canada wasn't right, and South America was lopped off in the wrong spot.

"I think that's the place we are, in terms of understanding atmospheric chemistry, understanding the atmosphere, and understanding the environment on a global scale. We know some of the pieces, we know some of the interactions, but we don't know all of them."

While scientists continue to study the environment to learn what technology's effects will be, to learn how to forecast the weather from week to week and climate changes from year to year, and to essentially, find out what the changes will be, they agree that the environment is a natural resource that can be used wisely or irresponsibly.

"We have a lot to learn concerning the atmosphere. Our basic objective is to understand why nature behaves the way it does. The main scientific motivation in my mind is simply to answer the question why nature behaves that way.

"You're not going to ask a mathematician why he studies equations, or if you do he says, 'Because 1 want to find the solution.' " â&#x20AC;˘

A Hydrogen Society

.>

By J o h n Dunn

n the late 1950s, several Georgia Tech students and their friends came up with a scheme to pull off a typical college prank.

They took a car and modified it so it was equipped with two fuel tanks. The traditional gas tank was drained and sealed, and a hidden tank was actually used to fuel the car.

f

W

ith the stage set, the group of boys piled into the car and drove it around the corner from a neighborhood service station.

They got out, pushed the vehicle into the station, and informed the attendant they were out of fuel. Instead of gasoline, however, the students insisted that the attendant fill the tank with water. Protesting, and with a great deal of reservation, the attendant finally obliged them.

When the tank was full, one of the students, with a casual but deliberate action, produced a pill and then dropped it into the tank of water.

The students nonchalantly climbed back into the automobile, and as the astonished attendant watched, cranked it up and drove off.

What was an outrageous prank of yesterday, however, may not be so farfetched in the near future.

Hydrogen, the primary ingredient of water, may very well become the energy medium of tomorrow窶馬ot only to power automobiles, but also to power our aircraft, electrical generators and compressors, as well as meeting home and industrial needs.

In fact, according to B.R. Livesay, principal research scientist in the Engineering Experiment Station at Georgia Tech, hydrogen as an energy medium may be the hope for the future, especially as the world supply of fossil fuels continues to dwindle.

"The simple element hydrogen has many properties which make it one of

our brightest hopes for ultimately developing the safe and renewable energy systems needed to serve an advanced technical society," said Livesay.

"It is an exceptionally safe and adaptable energy medium," he added. "We may be standing on the threshold of the hydrogen economy."

There are a number of reasons why hydrogen is attractive as an energy medium. It is available abundantly in water and can easily be recycled through the processes of nature. It is a comparatively pollution-free fuel, and therefore, does not pose the environmental threat of many other energy media. And it is an extremely efficient fuel.

"Let me say one thing up front that is

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often misunderstood, however," Livesay said. "Hydrogen is not an energy source—it is an energy medium.

In other words, it's a chemical substance, which combines with other chemicals to release energy."

But then, he added, gasoline, petroleum and coal are all energy media, not energy sources. The sun, time— hundreds of millions of years— and natural processes have created and stored the substances petroleum and coal. They have become natural resources of stored energy.

Hydrogen has to be produced, and by comparison, it is not now as economical.

"That's the problem now, producing hydrogen," said Livesay. "You don't mine it as uncombined hydrogen, and you don't get it stored for free like you do petroleum or coal."

Research is needed to find an economical method of producing hydrogen. And research is needed concerning storage of hydrogen. However, Livesay said the potential of hydrogen as a fuel is too great to be ignored.

According to Livesay, hydrogen could replace petroleum products in almost any fuel application. And he observes, petroleum is of great importance to industry in manufacturing.

Petroleum is essential as a raw material for use in plastics, clothing and highstrength composites.

The conservation of petroleum is extremely important, he said.

"I grew up in Texas. I remember as a child visiting Cisco, Texas—a booming area that had about 100,000 people. I returned about 10 years ago, and it was down to about 20,000 people. All of the oil fields in that area—which were huge oil fields—have run out."

What happened in Cisco, Texas, of course, is happening elsewhere in this * country and around the world. Unless we begin conserving our limited resources, he fears, "people in future

generations are going to despise our generation. We're going to look very, very bad in the course of history. Look at what our generation is doing. We're taking this tremendous resource in terms of stored petroleum . . . and we're burning it, and doing it very inefficiently and very fool-heartedly. We are burning up, in a period of less than 100 years, 90 percent of the petroleum which nature required 200 to 300 million years to produce.

"It is in this context that hydrogen becomes important. The point is, the petroleum and the coal are fantastic gifts to us that we must not continue to squander."

"Hydrogen is extremely attractive because it is versatile, abundant and renewable."

Because of the existing availability of petroleum and coal, he said, now is an appropriate time to conduct the research necessary to find an economical means of producing hydrogen.

Livesay does not believe nuclear energy will solve the world energy needs.

Both fission and fusion present problems, he said.

The problems of fission, the "splitting" of the atom, and its highly dangerous radioactive wastes, are well known. The process, currently used in commercial nuclear power plants, is also vulnerable to the degradation of reactor materials and possible nuclear accidents.

Furthermore, uranium, the fuel for nuclear fission reactors, is a limited and nonrenewable resource.

On the other hand, Livesay said there

have been high hopes that nuclear fusion would provide the ultimate source of the world's energy needs. But now he has reservations.

Fusion releases vast amounts of energy by fusing heavy hydrogen atoms.

The major byproduct of nuclear fusion is non-radioactive helium, which appears to remove the radioactive waste problem. And the heavy hydrogen atoms required to fuel nuclear fusion are found abundantly in sea water.

"There are vast technical problems to be solved before the practical feasibility of fusion reactors can be demonstrated," he said. "If we are able to produce a workable fusion reactor we will then be faced with formidable materials problems. Current concepts require huge stainless steel vacuum chambers with precise dimensional tollerances. The neutrons produced in the reactor will, in time, distort the chamber by radiation damage so that it will no longer hold a vacuum and also make the stainless steel highly radioactive so that it is of no further value. The earth doesn't have enough chromium and nickel for the necessary stainless steel chambers.

However, if the nuclear problems are solved, hydrogen again becomes an ideal medium to distribute and use this energy."

Hydrogen is extremely attractive, not only because of environmental considerations, but because it is versatile, abundant and renewable.

"If you had an economical way of cracking the water molecule you would produce hydrogen gas," Livesay said.

"There is a world of things you can do with it. It will just about operate our complete society energywise."

Hydrogen is currently produced from non-renewable energy deposits. "For example, it is derived from natural gas in large quantities for the manufacture of nitrogen fertilizers, and can be produced using coal—with most of the hydrogen actually derived from water

â&#x20AC;&#x201D;and other hydrocarbon products, including waste materials.

"The production of hydrogen using coal is said to already be costcompetitive with gasoline as a fuel, but production plants have not been built to make this source a reality."

Researchers are also using polymer electrolyte systems that indicate ultimately electrolysis conversion efficiencies which will be about 90 percent, he said.

"Hydrogen can be separated by highly efficient electrolysis processes using their excess or off-peak generating capacity of either conventional or nuclear power plants," Livesay added. "Ideally, solar radiation will ultimately be employed to dissociate hydrogen from the water molecule through some direct or indirect mechanism. There is some work underway to test closed-cycle thermochemical systems for hydrogen production. These could be heated, using solar concentrator fields."

Experiments first conducted in Japan have demonstrated the direct photoelectrolysis of water by solar radiation at certain semiconductor surfaces. Livesay said while present photoelectrolysis systems are inefficient, the concept works and the potential benefits are tremendous if a mechanism having reasonable efficiency can be developed.

The most promising solar-electric conversion devices now involve photovoltaic device and wind generators, he added.

"Wind generators provide a very clean form of solar energy conversion, but they have created problems because of the noise they make," he added.

However, a study sponsored by the National Science Foundation before the energy crisis of the early 1970s, concluded that by the year 2000, the U.S. could be generating twice the electrical power currently produced by coal if it started building wind generators.

They proposed developing a belt of

Dr. B.R. Livesay with High Pressure Magnetometer Hydrogen Storage Alloys. wind generators down the middle of the country where high winds are normal, and also along windswept coastal areas or high mountain areas.

Again, Livesay points to the need for design developments as well as advanced materials research for wind generators.

By whatever method, if hydrogen is produced economically, it could revolutionize our society. It could easily be stored and like natural gas, it could be piped anywhere. If fact, the nation's network of natural gas pipelines, with some modifications, could be adapted as the system for distributing hydrogen nationwide. And hydrogen could be mixed with natural gas to enrich it and greatly expand natural gas reserves.

Dr. Livesay's research at Tech has involved efficient methods of storing hydrogen.

for Investigating

"The technology has long been available for hydrogen storage using both highpressure cylinders and cryogenic methods," he said. "During the last 15 years significant advances occurred in hydrogen storage technology with the discovery of reversible hydriding alloys having favorable thermodynamic and kinetic parameters."

These hydrogen storage alloys absorb large quantities of hydrogen at near ambient temperatures and pressures.

Hydride storage is also much safer than high pressure or cryogenic methods.

"Prior to the last several years hydrogen absorption in metals was normally considered catastrophic due to the hydrogen embrittlement problems with high performance structured alloys.

Now that energy has become a critical factor, the ability of alloys to form

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hydrides may become one of the most tively store hydrogen in cars, Livesay beneficial of all materials phenomena." said.

This phenomena could be espeically "The fundamental understanding of important in developing hydrogen fuelprocesses and problems involved with ed automobilesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;while not as simple as metal hydriding is not very complete," dropping a pill into a fuel tank of water, he added. "Most of the reversible it is nonetheless a fascinating process. storage alloys have no other applications It is not difficult to convert a standard and thus study of their properties did automobile engine from gasohne to not begin until a few years ago. We do hydrogen. Experimental hydrogen cars know that doping of the basic storage have been built at a number of univer- alloys with certain metals modifies sities, including Georgia Tech.' Tech critical storage parameters. We students built a hydrogen car for testing therefore have methods by which we purposes and Dr. Livesay was consulted may be able to tailor alloys to achieve for advice on the hydrogen fuel system.

The hydrogen was stored in a metal alloy known as iron titanium which was encased in a steel container. Dr. Livesay explained, hydrogen atoms are small The future of hydrogen enough to slip between the atoms of the could mean major metal alloy's crystal structure. The innovations for the presence of hydrogen causes the embrittled iron titanium to expand and crumautomobile and the home. ble into a powdery substance, but the transformation does not affect the metal's capacity to hold hydrogen. Interestingly, the metal powder holds a many specific engineering design regreater mass of hydrogen than a tank of quirements. The scientific study of these the same volume containing only liquid hydrogen. The iron titanium releases the alloy modifications is a classic example hydrogen when heated, and injects it of how fundamental research investigadirectly into the automobile engine tion can have an immediate and where it reacts with oxygen and pro- dramatic impact on concurrent duces the heat to run the car. Hydrogen engineering developments."

Research concerning hydrogen cars is may then be replaced in the tank by exposing the alloy to more hydrogen gas. also being conducted at the commercial level. Mercedes Benz in West Germany The exhaust is water vapor.

The storage tanks of hydrogen cars, has done major developmental work in however, may weigh several hundred this area, employing both magnesium pounds more than a standard 20-gallon alloys and iron titanium in their vehicles.

When air is used to burn hydrogen it tank filled with gasohne. This adds creates a problem, however. Burning air strain on the automobile engine.

Magnesium alloys are among the brings some of the nitrogen into the most promising hydrides from the combustion chamber too, and results in standpoint of availability and weight, some nitrogen-oxygen compounds that but the current magnesium storage , are undesirable. alloys must operate at somewhat "While the nitrogen-oxygen comelevated temperatures. pounds are bad, you don't have hydroResearch needs to be continued to carbons, so it is much easier taking those find lightweight metals which can effec- compounds out of the exhaust than tak-

ing out all of the hydrocarbons which are detrimental to the catalytic converters used to remove the nitrogen compounds now," he said.

The future of hydrogen could also mean a major innovation for the home.

In addition to home heating, electricity could be generated through fuel cells. A major U.S. firm has been developing a solar-fuel cell system which could be produced as self-contained units that would be installed in the home and could actually be part of the mortgage.

Such a direct conversion system could pay for itself over a 20-year period, Livesay said.

Although the private sector is involved in some of this type of research, Livesay said it will require major research support to fully realize the potential of hydrogen.

"The money is not likely to come from the private sector because the payoff is too far down the road," he said.

How far down the road? If major support was forthcoming, when would hydrogen be available in abundance?

"Certainly not before the year 2000," Livesay projected, "if we put on a concerted effort. But we should continue to develop energy in whatever form we can. We're going to be so hurt (by energy shortages) that we need to do whatever we can. Biomass, for example, may provide a localized solution where we happen to have a lot of biological material. If we have that source in certain areas, we should use that resource.

We also need to be much more clear in the design of our buildings, transportation systems, etc., so that we use energy more efficiently."

The wonderful aspect of hydrogen, in addition to its versatility, is its abundance and renewable quality, he reiteratedâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;its ability to produce energy, and when combined with oxygen in the air, be released into the atmosphere and come down again with the gentle rain. â&#x20AC;˘

H20

W

ater makes up 96 percent of the human body, covers three-forths of the Earth's surface, and in Georgia, falls from the sky at an average rate of 50 inches per year.

The seemingly logical conclusion from this is that water exists in such abundant quantities that it is available for man's unlimited use.

Fifty years ago such was the mainstream of thought on our water supply. Now we are having to rethink our attitudes, because 50 years from today water could be tight.

The question is not so much "Are we running out of water?" but rather "How do we use the water we have?"

The competing demands of industry, energy and public use for the same water must be balanced in such a way to make sure that we do not run out.

An essential part of the planning for better water management is legislation.

Western states have less water, so they have had to strategically plan water usage for years. Southern states lag behind Midwestern and Western states in this arena since the South normally has a generous enough rainfall to fill all its water needs. In the 1970s, though, water resource legislation was written to address our modern problems of hazardous waste, drinking water control and water pollution.

Currently, the Environmental Protection Division of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources is developing a plan that will integrate all phases of water management in the state—so that as water is in increasing demand, there will be enough to go around.

Studying water problems and their solutions is the job of the Environmental Resources Center (ERC) at Georgia Tech. In 1964 the federal government established a law which placed a water resources research institute in each state.

Tech's ERC is that facility for the state of Georgia.

The ERC investigates the more

How Much Is Not Enough?

By Kathleen C. Moak

general water problems of the state, as suggested by its advisory group. The advisory group is made up of the Georgia Environmental Protection Division, federal agencies such as the Corps of Engineers, the Environmental Protection Agency and the U.S. Geological Survey, and others interested in water management.

Once a year, the group advises the ERC as to the problems in its area that need research. These problems are tabulated and sent to all colleges and universities in Georgia inviting responses from researchers. The researchers respond in the form of proposals which, if selected, are funded usually for two to three years.

Where does the money come from?

One of the stipulations of this system when it was established 20 years ago, was that the costs must be shared between the state and federal governments. Specifically, the Georgia ERC receives about $100,000 per year from the federal government for its expenses.

Considering the magnitude and necessity of water, Dr. Bernd Kahn, director of the ERC, called the amount spent on water research, "unnaturally small, relative to the problem."

Though substantial amounts of time and money are spent on water research, there is always more to do, because those two parts hydrogen to one part oxygen can get very complicated.

"It seems fairly fundamental that you know all about the water cycle—the rainclouds come in and it rains; rain hits the ground. Some water runs on the surface of the ground to rivers. Other water goes underground and can be

• i

taken out at wells. Some of it moves underground. Ultimately, the water goes into the ocean, part of it evaporates, rain clouds form, and the cycle starts again. As a minimum we should know a great deal about how rain water is distributed in the state, where this water goes, how it flows in surface rivers, how it accumulates into large underground 'aquifers' (a formation with large water-saturable, permeable material) —and yet, we've just sort of scratched the surface," said Kahn.

Research begins with those basic elements of the water cycle. Kahn suggested the huge supplies of underground water in south Georgia as a good example. In the past, just about anyone could dig a well of just about any size, anywhere and get water.

Lately, in some southern areas of the state, the water level has begun to sink because of the tremendous amounts of water being drawn from underground.

In some spots, salt water from the ocean has started to seep into these underground fresh water reserves because too much pressure is put on the ground to get water out of wells. When that happens, the ground water in these south Georgia aquifers becomes polluted and can be spoiled forever.

Monitoring this kind of ground water pollution is an intrastate and an interstate problem. In Georgia the first legislation on ground water management did not come until 1972 with the Georgia Groundwater Use Act. What researchers want to know is, can the amount of water that will come out of a well be predicted before it is dug, in order to prevent this?

Dr. Mustafa Aral, associate professor, Civil Engineering, is currently leading a research project with ERC funding that will identify parameters in layer aquifered systems.

Wells are also extensively dug in southwest Georgia for use in centerpivot irrigation of crops. To yield a good crop

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48

by today's standards, farmers need a steady water flow that rain cannot give.

As a result, hundreds of major wells have been dug which in turn decreases the water level. Too many of these kinds of wells could have devastating results.

"There are places in Texas and Oklahoma where they have, unfortunately, destroyed the whole aquifer. They pump and pump until there's no more water there, so they go deeper and pump there and after a while the ground starts sinking and collapsing," said Kahn.

"What was there forever to use is now no longer there. You want to prevent that from happening and only during the past couple of years the Geological Surveys have done enough studies here to be able to define how much water you can pump before you get into trouble."

Even that information is fairly localized, because as Kahn pointed out, test wells cannot be drilled every 500 feet in all directions to examine what happens to the water level. "You get a general idea but you have to speculate as to what happens in the 20 miles between this well and that well. So, we have a lot of work to do on this very fundamental question of the water cycle."

The importance of water is not confined to the laboratory. A shortage would affect our pocketbooks as well, because industry, especially agriculture, cannot function without it. The economy of Georgia is heavily dependent on agriculture and as farms become more efficient, they use more water.

Therefore, suggested Kahn, effective management of our water resources means efficient agriculture. Water availability is also a priority for attracting industry. The more efficient our agriculture the more industry we are able to attract. The more industry we have, the more prosperous the state will beâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;and that's something we want.

The question is not so much "Are we running out of water?" but rather "How

do we use the water we have?"

When an area has plenty of water or more water than it needs, the need to stringently plan water usage does not exist. Said Kahn, "You take out a lot of water, put in a little pollutantâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;basically you have no problem."

For an area like the city of Atlanta, though, which takes out a lot of water from the Chattahoochee River and has a tendency to put a lot of pollutants back into the river, the situation warrants study. As the city grows we need to know the extent of its water needs, and at what point the city could run out of water.

If there was a drought, we would need to know how much to conserve for drinking water, industry and other uses, and who would have priority to access.

We also need to know how much water we need to keep the pollutant level from becoming excessive, or how much pollutant we can discharge.

In an April 1983 study* for the ERC, Drs. F.G. Pohland, J.P. Gould, R.E. Ramsey and E.S.K. Chian stated that "leachate," contaminated water from rain passing through waste disposal sites, can contaminate ground or surface water, polluting wells and killing fish.

Although the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act of 1976 placed strict limits on the handling of hazardous material, the study found that ground water pollution from such sites was still widespread.

*Idenlifteation and Assessment of Effluent Residuals in Treated Leachate from Landfill Disposal Sites

Industrial water pollution not only fills our waterways; but it also has infected our skies. Acid rain is one form of water pollution, though more difficult to solve because chemicals in the air carry pollutants to different geographical areas.

Kevin C. Beck, associate professor, Geophysical Sciences, studies the characteristics of acid rain and surface water responses at Stone Mountain, Georgia, for the ERC. As Kahn pointed out, pollution is not an absolute. There are different degrees of pollution for different water uses. For instance, a stream with a light pollutant might not be good for swimming, but would be suitable for fishing. With more pollution, fishing would not be feasible, but the water could be used for boating.

Finally there comes a point where the water is not usable. That trend has been reversed in the last decade with a great deal of water resource legislation and educating the public about a clean environment.

Kahn believes that the concern over the past few years about a clean environment has been very beneficial.

"You could say it is one of the important trends of the times, that rivers that used to be unfit for anything are gradually becoming useful and pleasant again.

"You might have some mixed feelings on the one hand about industry or agriculture's uses of water versus fishable and swimmable waters. But how much effort should really be put into keeping the environment pristine?

In many instances, it's feasible to have your industry and your agriculture and at the same time have a clean environment. The only reason this wasn't always this way is that people simply didn't care to pay any attention and to save a few pennies they ignored what went out the pipe," said Kahn.

"Ecosystems are very effective as they are. Organisms in them use minerals as

/••J

Dr. Bernd Kahn nutrients, but if man adds too many materials to them, he can run into trouble."

We now know from experience with such matters how to treat water for pollution removal, said Kahn. "On the other hand, you can be too systematic with the environment. For instance, suppose we straighten a river to simplify the flow and make it more convenient for boating.

"It may be that all those bows and snags are important for maintaining the aquatic population to feed the fish.

These are things that need to be worked out . . . and that's what research is all about."

Kahn sees no imminent danger of excessive pollution or water shortages in Georgia. One good sign is that there are still many places in the state where industry can locate and not deplete the public and industrial supplies.

There will come a time though, that our "in stream" uses of water such as boating, swimming and hydroelectric power and our "off stream" uses such as chinking water, irrigation and thermoelectric power will have to be carefully planned and managed. We will have to know the effects of our decisions— from everyday things like washing cars to major concerns such as digging industrial wells—on our water supply

and water quality.

As demands for water increase, these decisions and laws will become more important.

"It's possible not to ruin our water supply. It would be terrible if in the pursuit of prosperity we undermine the future generations' natural resources.

That's something we can prevent from happening with research," said Kahn.

Or, in the words of another American scientist, Benjamin Franklin, "When the well's dry, we know the worth of water. " • 49

T

50

hose raindrops that have been falling on our heads and our crops since time began are now often preceded by the word "acid" and have become an international concern and the subject of research in Tech's School of Geophysical Sciences.

The effects of acid rain, like most of our environmental problems, are just becoming apparent as we witness harm to many lakes and streams through a declining fish population, dying forests, and the corrosion of building materials and art objects such as outdoor statues.

While acid rain is believed to stem in part from natural causes, industry, electric utility power plants and the automobileâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;often cited as parties in other environmental destructionâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;are once again named as the root of evil in their emissions of sulfur dioxide and nitric oxide which cause transboundary pollution problems.

Dr. C.S. Kiang, professor and director of Tech's School of Geophysical Sciences, is a leading authority on acid rain and as a Sigma Xi National Lecturer for the past two years, has given more than 40 talks on the acid rain phenomenon.

"Acid rain is one of the worst environmentally related problems in North America," he said, "and politically very interesting." But, he pointed out, "It's not only a national problem, it's an international problem."

At a recent Water Resources Conference held at Tech, Kiang said, "I think acid rain is one of the typical phenomena that we call the monster generated by Dr. Frankenstein. We develop all of the science and technology, then we don't know how to deal with the monster we have created."

Through atmospheric measurement, laboratory testing and computer modeling of environmental conditions, Tech's researchers are able to study all of the interrelated components of the atmosphere and hope to provide scientific evidence that will give direction in how to best abate the acid rain problem.

"We would like to understand what the natural background is before we can assess the anthropogenic impact," Kiang explained, "and acid rain is just one of the many possible environmental problems generated by our modern society."

Drs. Doug Davis, Bill Chameides, Mike Perdue, Kevin Beck, John Hall, Luther Roland and John Bradshaw, and research scientist Mike Rodgers, all of

Acid Rain The Making of a Monster

By Jill C. Sewell

the School of Geophysical Sciences, are among those at Tech working together to find out more about the overall chemical properties and fundamental processes involved in our environment.

As part of their studies they are "looking at the precursors to the acid rain species," said Davis, who was instrumental in establishing the Atmospheric Sciences Division within the School of Geophysical Sciences.

"These species are present in the cleanest environment," he added. "It's a question of their relative amounts.

You have to realize that we have only one atmosphere and there are regions of that life support system that can go out of tilt.

"That chemistry has been going on for millions of years out in the middle of nowhere," Davis pointed out. "But now the concentration levels are sufficiently high that they've begun to have an impact on us."

Taking a "natural phenomena point of view," as Davis said, the Tech team is taking measurements to detect a variety of trace gases present in the environment and using its overall knowledge to look at the chemical transformations at work in acid rain and other pollutant formationâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;how it is transported across the continents, and specific episodes of environmental problems. Computer simulations, sensitive instrumentation such as the laser-induced fluorescence sensor which detects nitric oxide and sulfur dioxide, and field stations for obtaining measurements of precipitation on top of the Chemical Engineering Building and on top of Stone Mountain are among methods they are employing to research the atmosphere. Very few universities or national labs have Tech's capability for studying all of the atmospheric chemistry components, Kiang said.

Acid rain surfaced as a major environmental issue in the late 1970s when Eastern Canada, New England

and New York's Adirondack region began to report signs of acidity in its lakes. The issue became a political problem because Canada said the United States was to blame for the pollution because of its industries downwind.

"We recognize that both the long range and the local source contribute acidity to a receptor," Kiang said. "But we are very cautious in the scientific community because based on available computer models at this moment, we cannot determine with reasonable accuracy the relationship between the emission from a specific source and acid precipitation in a specific receptor area.

So I think that at this moment more research has to be done."

Kiang said acid rain will be one of the most important environmental issues to be discussed by Congress next year.

President Reagan has objected to coming down on industry with multibilliondollar pollution controls until there is more scientific evidence about exact causes and effects of acid rain.

The degree of acidity is measured in units of pH, which ranges from 0 to 14.

Battery acid, for instance, has a pH of 1, vinegar has a pH of 3, pH 7 is neutral and is present in distilled water, and ammonia has a pH of 12. pH is determined by a mathematical formula based on the concentration of hydrogen ions.

The lower the pH number, the higher the concentration of acid.

In 1975 the Adirondack Lakes in New York had a pH of 4.8 and New England's rain was determined to have a 4.2 to 4.3 pH. While the acid rain problem has been most apparent in the eastern regions of the United States

Jill C. Sewell is assistant director of the Georgia Tech News Bureau and managing editor of The Whistle, the Institute newspaper.

Dr. C.S. Kiang and in Sweden, Norway, the United Kingdom and West Germany, it seems to occur everywhere, either for natural reasons or man-made reasons.

Georgia's pH is currently reported as 4.3 to 4.4, Kiang said. Fish normally live in a 6 to 8 pH value, but when it goes below 6 you will find less "little fish," because the hatchatability rate is down.

While Europe has had continuous data on acid rain measurement for more than 20 years, U.S. data is not as consistent, Kiang said. "However, there is definitely a downward trend in pH value. Most data we collect only indicates a trend," he explained. "It only tells us about an annual average. We need to understand the impact of specific episodes."

In addition to an insufficient amount of precise information, Kiang said there is the problem of deciding "who dumps the garbage and who receives it. We cannot establish a good source/receptor relationship. We don't know which to blame for it."

Another puzzling area has been the chemical transformations that occur within clouds to change trace gases into acidic compounds. Through computer simulations, Bill Chameides is learning more about the interactions at play that precede acid rainfall.

"A variety of reactions go on within cloud droplets that generate acids," he explained. Reactive gases and sunlight are forces that determine what those reactions are.

Yet another acid rain mystery that Chameides feels has a better answer through his computer modeling is whether the problem is "linear" or "non-linear." If it is a linear situation, reducing sulfur dioxide emissions would lead to an equal reduction in acid rain.

But if acid rain is a "non-linear" problem, reducing emissions will not lead to a 1:1 reduction in acid rain.

"It appears to be non-linear," Chameides said. "If emissions were reduced by 50 percent, it would reduce the amount of sulfuric acid by less than 50 percent, based on computer models."

This question is at the heart of the political side of acid rain in trying to determine who is to blame and who will pay for reducing emissions. "My personal belief is that we're not ready to have emission controls," he added.

"We should learn more before we spend a lot of money.

"We need to understand the individual processes. Emissions lead to acid rain, but we're not really sure what the actual steps are.

"We've had to develop very sensitive instruments for detection of the chemical species," he said. "We're continually checking out this instrumentation and getting measurements."

In addition to the laser-induced fluorescence sensor located in the field station on top of Stone Mountain, airborne measurements are made all over the world to study the global environment. The Engineering Experiment

'Station's two Convair airplanes will be used as a platform for testing new airborne instrumentation as well as regional studies of atmospheric chemistry. Chameides pointed out that the Stone Mountain location is a prime spot for taking p r e c i p i t a t i o n measurements as it is often engulfed in clouds.

Omfop of the Chemical Engineering Building, Dr. Kevin Beck is looking at the chemical transformations during specific acid rain episodes by using a plastic vessel resembling a large punch bowl with a hole in the bottom. The bowl sits atop a wooden stand and allows Beck to collect rain in a row of bottles which sit underneath. Through traditional methods of spectrophotometry and atomic absorption spectometry, which involve using light to determine what chemicals are present and in what amounts, he is gathering data on Atlanta's atmospheric conditions.

"The pH does get below 4," he said, explaining that a drop of 1 in pH means 10 times the increase in hydrogen ions.

The hydrogen ion is highly reactive and when present in high concentrations, can split many chemical compounds apart. Therefore solutions with high acidity are extremely corrosive.

However, alkaline solutions are equally corrosive.

"Many rainfall events are in the low 5's and high 4's," Beck said of his rooftop measurements. "We're certainly not anywhere near the situation in New England, but we do occasionally, for whatever reason, get down to 3.8 or 3.9.

There are occasions when we are being invaded by very acidic rain."

Tech is trying to set up a cooperative research program with Spelman College to systematically study the Atlanta area acid rain situation over a period of years, Beck said.

In addition to looking at the fluctuations in levels of atmospheric gases, Tech is looking at the effects of lightning on the atmosphere. "Lightning produces very high levels of nitrogen oxide and nitrogen oxide is one of the precursors of acid rain," Davis explained.

Kiang stressed that, "In the future, technological development must consider resource and environmental impact before we develop the technology and the research. The role of our school is to provide better information on resource and environmental assessment."â&#x20AC;˘

51

Combustion S y s t e m Tuned t o Sound

By Charles Harmon

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"modified organ pipe," patterned to some degree after the destructive German V-1 buzz bomb rocket which was launched to attack England during the latter stages of World War II, may soon become music to the ears of the nation's energy consumers, courtesy of a team of Georgia Tech School of Aerospace Engineering combustion experts.

The "pulse combustion" project, which is headed by one of the world's leading combustion researchers, Regents' Professor Dr. Ben T. Zinn, may yet be another in a long series of special benefits which can be directly traced to technological breakthroughs associated with the nation's space program. It is indeed another example of how Tech's combustion activities cross many boundaries ranging from energy applications to fire prevention.

"One of the basic problems in trying to burn coals, oils, or any fuel for energy production is to burn the fuel in an efficient combustion process," said Zinn. "To attain efficient combustion, the fuel and oxidizer, which in this case is air, must be mixed efficiently before chemical reactions and energy release can occur."

Zinn said that much of the research underway today in the combustion field involves a search for better ways of getting very efficient mixing.

"One of the ideas that we hit upon in order to get good mixing was to use sound waves," says Zinn, who refers to the principles used in the German V-1 buzz bomb.

"Basically you can look at the buzz bomb as being modified organ pipesâ&#x20AC;&#x201D; burning fuel in an organ pipe. Based on this idea, we have developed a pulsating combustor which can burn unpulverized coal using sound waves."

Zinn said the sound waves enhance the mixing.

"As a result we get much better com-

bustion eficiency," he added. The object is to get complete combustion of the fuel with as little air input as possible.

"Generally, when you supply a combustor with the amount of air which is required theoretically (i.e., stoichometrically) to consume the available fuel, you will find out that some of the fuel did not burn because of the inefficiencies of the process. As a result, combustors must be supplied with more air than theoretically required to make sure that they burn all the fuel."

Zinn said that this additional air generally results in loss in thermal efficiency of the system which manifests itself as an increase in its operating costs.

"One of the objectives of our research is to burn all of the fuel with a minimum amount of excess air. State of the art combustors which burn coal usually use more than 20 percent excess air in order to burn more than 95 percent of the available fuel."

Zinn said that during recent successful tests the developed pulsating combustor burned 96 percent of the available unpulverized coal with no excess air "which we think is a technological breakthrough."

Zinn said he used sub-bituminous coal for the tests, which is a lower quality coal.

"These results are most encouraging," he said. "We got 96 percent combustion efficiency, which means that we burned 96 percent of the fuel, while using only the theoretically required amount of air.

When we tested with five to six percent excess air we burned more than 98 percent of the available coal. These are fabulous results. We are very excited about this. I don't know if anybody has ever achieved similiar results." \ What are the implications to consumers?

"The implication would be much better utilization of the coal with substantial savings for industrial users and utility

Dr. Jechiel Jagoda (left) and Dr. Ben T. Zinn

companies, which then could be passed along to consumers."

Zinn admitted that there are still some problems to be resolved but he feels that he has demonstrated that "at least, from a combustion point of view, we can do it."

He said that one of the problems which he is working on deals with ash accumulation.

"When you burn coal, you also generate ash and we need to develop a system for getting rid of it. When we solve this problem, the combustor will be ready for commercial applications."

Zinn said that one important advantage of this combustor is that it can burn unpulverized coal.

"At present, utilities and many industrial users have to pulverize the coal into a powder-like substance before it is burned. This requires both capital expenditures for the pulverizing equipment and increased operating costs for pulverizing the coal. Our combustor can burn particles ranging from one eighth to one half inch in diameter which eliminates the costs associated with pulverizing the coal."

Zinn's project has been funded by the U.S. Department of Energy and about $300,000 has been invested in the effort to date.

The organ pipe-like combustor which Zinn is using for his experimentation is 5 Vi inches in diameter and nine feet tall.

"The key is to burn the coal in the proper location. The energy released by

Dr. Zinn (right) and Graduate Student Muh-Rong Wang with 'The Organ Pipe' the combustion process excites the fundamental acoustic mode of the combustor. The pipe begins to sing and the presence of acoustic oscillations enhances mixing and heat transfer processes which, in turn, result in a highly efficient combustion process. Thus, we have achieved a closed loop. The combustion process excites acoustic oscillations which, in turn improve the combustion."

And the music that is played is not exactly the "Ramblin Wreck."

"Well, it's one tone, 70 Hz. It's not noisy," said Zinn.

He said he is pleased that his work in aerospace engineering can have such an impact in other areas.

Zinn's pulsating combustion research was inspired by his early research on combustion instabilities in rocket motors where similar pulsations occur inside the combustion chambers.

Charles Harmon is director of the Georgia Tech News Bureau.

T

here are many other applications that space age technology has impacted. Dr. Jechiel Jagoda of Aerospace Engineering has worked with his colleague Ben Zinn on such projects, and has also tackled several other projects on his own.

Jagoda, a physicist who has studied in England and worked in France, came to Georgia Tech because of his great interest in combustion and Tech's excellent reputation in the field. He is currently the principal investigator on a project sponsored by the Environmental Protection Agency which deals with the fundamental processes of the formation of smoke.

"They (EPA) are interested in the formation of smoke for a number of reasons," said Jagoda. "First of all, smoke carries chemicals which are known to be carcinogenic. If you look at the statistics of home and building fires, most deaths occur due to smoke inhalation rather than people being burned.

The other problem, if you have smoke, is the increase in the spread of the fire.

The reason for this is that with non-

sooty flames, there's relatively little heat being transferred away by radiation to a more distant part of the room or building."

Jagoda said that with smoke "you have solid particles within the flame" and they will cause increased radiative heat transfer. This process accelerates the spread of the fire to surrounding parts of the room because heating to or above ignition temperatures occurs more rapidly."

"The reason for doing this research," said Jagoda, "especially as it relates to soot, is in order to find ways to reduce soot formation in flames, which, in turn, will reduce deaths during fires as well as limit the spread of the fire."

Jagoda said the research process can also be extended to study the release of soot from diesel engines which will help to reduce engine emissions.

"If you don't know how they are formed, you're going to have a hard time reducing the emissions."

There are other reasons for doing away with smoke said Jagoda.

"The military is interested in reducing smoke because of the signature that is would create from either an airplane or a stationary source. They don't want to give themselves away. Then there are other times when you want to have smoke. The carbon black industry is one instance' when you really want to create as much soot as possible because they are in the business of making soot. Of course, carbon black is used in all kinds of industrial processes like making tires.

Boiler operators also prefer sooty flames to increase the radiative heat transfer to the water tubes, but they need to get rid of the smoke before it leaves the stack."

Much of the fire research underway in the School of Aerospace Engineering is funded by the military, but it certainly has significant civilian implications.

The U.S. Navy is funding a couple of such research projects under the supervision of Dr. Zinn which are being followed closely by Jagoda. One project is concerned with the testing and evaluating of different materials, such as paints and wall insulations, for their capacity to generate smoke during fire situations. The second Navy funded project is looking at the corrosive effects of the generated smoke and gaseous combustion products. â&#x20AC;˘

53

Earthquakes Techs Seismic Network Studies Activity in Southeast

By Pam Rountree

E

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arthquakes can be among the most cataclysmic events ever experienced. A high intensity earthquake can cause mass destruction of property and large loss of life, while ones of lesser intensity may seem as inconsequential as the rumbling of a passing truck.

Georgia Tech has established a seismic network to study earthquake activity in the Southeast and keeps a watchful eye on earthquake activity around the world.

The chance of an earthquake occurring varies greatly in each region.

Historical records of earthquake occurrences and their locations show that most are in well-defined zones marking the boundaries of the earth's crustal plates. They are not randomly distributed and occur in a small amount of the earth's volume.

Plate tectonics is the framework in which earthquakes are understood on a global scale, said Dr. Ted Habermann, assistant professor in the School of Geophysical Sciences. Plate tectonics states that the earth's uppermost layer, approximately 20 to 70 kilometers thick, is comprised of a small number of rigid plates.

"Essentially all earthquakes, including the big ones, happen at boundaries between those plates," said Habermann.

There are three types of boundaries that can exist. One is where two plates are "spreading apart." Classic examples of this type are the middle of the Atlantic Ocean, where the United States is moving away from Europe and Africa.

This type of boundary generally does not have large earthquakes.

The second type of boundary is where one plate is moving alongside another plate. The San Andreas fault in California is one of this type. "The Pacific * plate is moving to the northwest relative to America. They are essentially sliding past each other. That type boundary

does have big earthquakes," Haber- Europe." Italy, attached to the African plate, is ramming into the Alps. mann said.

The third type of boundary is where As with Africa, the Baja Peninsula is two plates are running into each other. another area where spreading is occurring, "What happens in that type of situation and in time will result in Baja's being is that one of the plates, usually the literally "torn off" of the continent. In oceanic plate, goes underneath the other addition, Australia is running into the one. Many times this is the ocean run- ocean below Thailand. ning into a continent, and the ocean Central and South America is also a goes down because it's heavier." region where the ocean is moving Habermann added that occasionally underneath. Both have histories of large there are continents running into other earthquakes.

The population centers in these areas continents. "India for instance, is running into Asia and Africa is running are smaller and more widely spaced than other regions and this lessens the risk of into Europe."

Almost all around the Pacific, South "social damage." However, Habermann America, Japan, the Aleutians and explained, the architecture is less sturdy Alaska, the ocean floor is moving and the construction is generally not as underneath. This, according to Haber- good so a relatively small earthquake mann, is the area where the greatest could cause substantial damage and death. earthquakes occur.

"You see that happening all the time He added that the plates move relative to one another, that is, spreading apart, in Iran, the Middle East or Italy. An colliding or moving alongside. This move- earthquake with a magnitude of five or six would have only small effects in most ment is accomplished by earthquakes.

"You can think of it very simply as of California, but in areas such as these, sliding two rocks together. Those pieces it could kill thousands just because of of rock will hang up and will not slide unstable architecture," he said. smoothly, but rather jerkily. Those jerks California's San Andreas fault is are earthquakes." another area known for its earthquakes.

Habermann noted that most people When one piece of fault moves across another piece, the movement can be do not understand what is going to "very large," 10 to 20 meters or 30 to 60 happen in a "great earthquake" within feet. "That's a big earthquake. In the area. "Last year's Coalinga earthCalifornia there is the potential for up to quake was a magnitude 6.2, resulting in five meters of slip on the San Andreas approximately a third of a meter of fault in some regions. You're talking displacement. When people mention the about 15 feet and that's substantial," he 'great earthquake,' they're talking about three to five meters of displacement. added.

That releases roughly 400 or 600 times more energy and you're talking about a ed Habermann specializes in the major catastrophe." area of "global seismicity." The In terms of representing earthquakes African continent, he said, gen- to the public "we're not talking about erally has very few earthquakes, little problems like bends in their pipes however, the Rift Valley area is gradually or cracked chimneys, we're talking splitting apart. "The earthquakes where Africa is going into Europe are happening primarily in the south of Greece, where Pam Roundtree is contributing the Mediterranean is going underneath editor of The Whistle.

T

Dr. Long at Tech's Seismic Station about destruction," Habermann said.

Part of the problem, he added, is that people just do not realize the potential problems caused by earthquakes and how great they can be.

Japan has the problem of being over the area where the Phillippine and Pacific Ocean floors are going underneath Asia. Tokyo, the world's largest city, is directly on the spot where those two areas intersect, and there hasn't been a great earthquake there since 1923. As a result, there is the potential for a catastrophic event with possibly two or three meters of displacement, Habermann said.

"You hear so much about the race for supremacy in electronics, Silicon Valley versus Japan. Both are dangerous places to have long-term industries. It's

very likely that the occurence of an earthquake could decide the winner in the race."

The U.S., Habermann noted, is less centralized than Japan and would probably have a better chance of surviving such an earthquake, but both are now "prime problem areas" in the world.

There are two stages of finding out about an earthquake. One is detection, which means having enough instruments close enough to the earthquake to see its waves. The other is reporting, meaning having a system in existence for translating those detections to actual locations and times.

With the advancement of technology people assume that scientists are doing a better job of detecting earthquakes around the world. However, Haber-

mann said that the data shows that this is not so, that in fact fewer and fewer earthquakes are being detected.

The reason he said, is that the Department of Defense at one time spent a fair amount of money on detecting earthquakes because they were interested in locating nuclear bomb blasts, which are detected in the same way.

In the late 1960s, when the Defense Department "dropped out" of the public sector and the data became secret, scientists lost a lot of information. This has made it very difficult to study earthquake prediction globally.

T

he Georgia Tech-Geological Survey of Alabama Seismic Network (GT-GSA) has been in operation in Alabama since April 1981 and in

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southeastern Tennessee since April 1982.

Since its inception, 83 earthquakes have been located by monitoring at the Tech seismic station, housed in the Old Civil Engineering Building.

The GT-GSA network has seven stations in Alabama and five in Tennessee.

According to Dr. Leland T. Long, professor in the School of Geophysical Sciences, the 12 stations will be monitored for approximately another one to two years at which time the results will be re-evaluated. He added that two more "small arrays" located at Carters Dam and Rock Mountain, help "fill in" the system, so that actually the network includes 14 stations.

Dr. Anton M. Dainty, associate professor in the School of Geophysical Sciences, added that the contract for stations in Alabama and Tennessee is with the Alabama Geological Survey and they in turn have a contract with the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The Georgia Power Company also supports some of the stations. The NRC is interested in the seismic hazard for nuclear power plants, and Georgia Power, as well as the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, is concerned with the seismic hazard associated with reservoirs.

Dainty said that the study is also concerned with the observation of a Virginia Tech scientist who, based on historical studies of earthquakes, said that there seemed to be two zones in the southeastern area. One, the Southern Appalachian Seismic Zone, runs more or less along the high Appalachian Mountains. The other is the South Carolina-Georgia Seismic Zone, which comes off at right angles from the other.

This zone includes within it the Charleston, South Carolina earthquake of 1886, the most destructive earthquake i recorded in the Southeast. \ The Charleston earthquake rated a "magnitude 6.6-6.8. Significant damage occurred as a result and it was felt over most of the eastern U.S.," Long said.

"Unfortunately no one can really explain why that earthquake occurred at Charleston. It remains something of an enigma because its mechanism isn't

"Unfortunately, no one can explain why the Charleston earthquake occurred."

explained; there's no measurable movement."

Long added that evidence of the earthquake is observable. "Sand boils, which are disturbances at the surface where the sand layers become liquified, break through like a volcano and flow out, forming a quicksand-type surface," can be found over a wide area northwest of Charleston.

Studies have not yielded an explanation for the earthquake and the U.S. Geological Survey has had to conclude that they see no reason to constrain the possibility of a Charleston size earthquake to Charleston.

In the network's Alabama array, Long said, the earthquakes have not been forthcoming, as well as the anticipated level of seismicity. However, the activity has been consistent with historical data.

The Richard B. Russell Reservoir, Long said, "is potentially a very exciting adventure. Exciting because a number of reservoirs in the same type of rock not very far away have induced significant seismic activity."

Clark Hill Reservoir, south of Russell, has been strongly presumed to have induced many earthquakes.

Recently the Corps of Engineers closed the gates, and the water levels of the

Russell Reservoir have gone up quite rapidly. "The typical delay time for filling of the reservoir and the initiation of seismicity is around a month or two," said Long. "We'll be anxiously watching our seismographs to see if we can detect the initiation, and we hope to get some good close-in data."

"In Tennessee, the earthquake monitoring results are very interesting because they are not random," said Dainty. "You can actually see that there are four lines or trends of earthquake epicenters. We're still looking for explanations, but I think we've taken a step forward in showing that epicenters are not scattered randomly."

Dainty said that in the eastern U.S., damage from a large earthquake is distributed over a wider area than in the West, and that the intensity of the vibration is transmitted more efficiently.

As far as buildings go, he explained that as long as you are dealing with small buildings, such as a well-built frame house, it is pretty resistant to earthquakes. "It's only when you start getting tall buildings that you really get into trouble, especially if they're not designed for strong sideways forces."

Most of the eastern U.S. has not paid great attention to earthquake building codes, Long said, and as a result there are many older buildings that are "perhaps not capable of withstanding moderate-sized earthquakes. The saving point may be that the probability of an earthquake of that size occurring, based on historical seismicity, is very low."H

S t u d y i n g Matter On an Atomic Scale

By Dr. Edward W. Thomas

S

tudy of Earth, Air, Fire and Water by the ancient Greeks and Medieval Europeans led us to the industrial revolution. Physicists of the nineteenth and early twentieth century provided the scientific foundations on which are founded today's modern technologies of silicon chips and gene manipulation. The basic research by physicists in one generation gives rise to the emerging technology of the next.

Who knows what new technologies will emerge in the twenty-first century from our present studies of subatomic particles? The majority of the physicists at Georgia Tech are striving for a basic understanding of the underlying principles which govern structure and reaction of matter on an atomic scale.

The motivation for this work is often to be found in the support of other technologies so we seek to relate these microscopic understandings to the prediction of macroscopic behavior observed in technological and engineering environments. What happens as we attempt to use microscopic understanding for predicting behavior of complex macroscopic systems? Perhapsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;inevitably â&#x20AC;&#x201D;chaos!

Probing beams are a major tool in the arsenal of techniques that we bring to bear for the determination of structure on an atomic scale. The diffraction technologies used by Professor R.A. Young in the crystal physics group are an example of how probes must be chosen to match the problem under study. Recent interests include the structure of apatite cyrstals and kaolinite, both consistent with the theme of this issue in that they are naturally occurring minerals found in the state of Georgia.

Apatites are a class of crystalline solid used as models for the inorganic portion of human teeth; the connection to dentistry provides the major impetus and funding for study of this material.

Kaolinite is a white clay used in processing of quality papers, fine china and many other industrial processes; 85 percent of the U.S. supply is mined in the state of Georgia.

A particularly useful method for studying atomic scale details in crystals is to fire at the sample a probing beam of X-rays and to monitor the angular distribution of the scattered radiation.

X-rays interact with the electrons around the atoms and the relative intensity of scattered components identifies the nature of the atom, leading in principle to a complete determination of microscopic structure.

There is, however, a limitation in studying apatites and kaolinite because both these crystals involve hydrogen which does not show up with an X-ray probe due to the small number of electrons in its structure. We must then seek yet another probe which does detect hydrogen. Neutrons, which may be obtained from a nuclear reactor, provide a probe that detects the nuclei of a material rather than the electrons.

Detection of hydrogen is facilitated by replacing the hydrogen of the material with the isotope deuterium whose nucleus contains an extra neutron.

The diffraction pattern of the neutron probe may now be analyzed in an analogous manner to that of X-rays to complete the analysis of crystals by showing us the location of the hydrogen as well as confirming the positions of other atoms. Professor Young has recently completed the first complete

/â&#x20AC;˘I

crystal structure analysis of the kaolinite material and finds that hydrogen, bound as an OH radical, occupies no less than eight different locations in the crystal structures.

Solid materials, molecules and even liquids represent assemblies where relative positioning of atoms is fixed and these positionings determine the properties of the assembly. Also of importance is how the assembly was created by a sequence of events that we would refer to as a reaction. An example drawn from the author's own work is the study of how hydrogen atoms on surfaces recombine to form hydrogen moledules and then emerge into free space. This type of reaction is important in the quest for controlled thermonuclear fusion or the harnessing of nuclear "fire" which is being studied by Dr. Weston M. Stacy, Nuclear Engineering and Health Physics.

Hydrogen fuel may escape from the high temperature reaction region of a thermonuclear reactor and impinge on the walls of the surrounding chamber.

The hydrogen penetrates the wall material, slows down to thermal energies, diffuses back to the surface and then recombines to form molecules and emerges from the surface to re-enter the reactor.

The whole process is known as recycling and is a major factor in the fuel cycle of a thermonuclear reactor.

For stainless steel, the constructional material of the reaction vessel, recombination is the rate limiting process in the cycle.

Many experiments showed that the recombination process on steel was rather slow resulting in a prediction that all the available fuel in a reactor would

57

^

be locked in the walls within two months of operation so that the reactor would have to shut down; a power station that works for only two months is clearly of little use to a utility company. We have studied this recombination process by measuring with one technique the hydrogen emerging from the surface as molecules; the relationship between the two measurements gives the reaction rate.

It appears that the recombination process is a sensitive function of the surface condition of the steel. If one removes the oxide layer created on the steel during the manufacturing process then the recombination rate increases by a factor of ten thousand, recombination is no longer the rate limiting step in recycling of fuel, and the fuel stays in the reaction vessel where it belongs rather than in the walls of the power station.

A conditioning process for initial operation of the fusion device can be specified that will insure removal of the oxide layer. While this represents a very useful result for the designer of thermonuclear power stations we must admit that we have no detailed microscopic understanding of why the reaction rate changes. Thus we have successfully solved an engineering problem but are left with a scientific puzzle.

These physical measurements of structure and reaction rate provide information averaged over many individual particles; limited temporal and spatial resolution of the experimentalist's probes generally preclude the study of individual atoms. More detailed insight can be obtained only by constructing theoretical models that involve the individual atoms of the system and then predicting the average properties observed experimentally. If agreement is obtained between model predictions and experiment then presumably the model is an adequate description of the individual atoms.

Of particular importance here is Professor Uzi Landman's development of large scale computer simulation techniques in which the evolution of large assemblies of interacting particles (typically 1500 atoms) is followed by time scales as short as 10"15 seconds and monitored using analytical and animated methods. In many respects these simulation studies are an

"The importance of the simulation technique is that it permits us to study the microscopic dynamics of complex systems with a degree of finesse beyond current experimental techniques." exploitation of the recent giant advances in computer technology to provide an extension of our experimental capabilities. With interaction potentials determined by a separate quantum mechanical treatment the prediction of dynamical behavior is a matter of applying the simple equations of classical mechanics to an enormous array of interacting particles.

Recent studies, by the simulation group, of the electronic structure and interactions in metals, lead them to predict that the first few crystal layers are substantially different from those of the bulk material. There is an oscillatory variation in spacings between atomic layers, which for the (110) crystal face of aluminum involve the first layer relaxing outward to increase spacing to the second layer by 10 percent of the normal bulk spacing; the second to third layer spacing contracts by six percent the next spacing increases by three percent.

Recent experimental studies of this crystal by diffraction techniques fully confirms the prediction.

A rather unique demonstration of the

invaluable capabilities of novel computer simulations is the study of the ultra-rapid solidification of materials following pulsed laser or electron beam annealing; the technique is used for removal of imperfections in semiconductor materials and for the preparation of novel metallic alloys. The simulation shows that rapid melting and solidification occurs by a molten shock front propagating at speeds of about 5 meters per second. Detailed analysis of the shock front reveals novel microscopic structure of the propagating solid-melt interface which may play an important role in the kinematics of the annealing process.

The great importance of the simulation technique is that it permits us to study the microscopic dynamics of complex systems with a degree of finesse that is beyond current experimental techniques. The behavior of each individual atom can be followed to disclose its location in structure and its behavior in reactions.

Conventional wisdom suggests that if one understands the microscopic interactionsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;giving structure of bound systems and reaction rates of unbound systemsâ&#x20AC;&#x201D;then one should be able to predict with infinite precision the behavior of macroscopic systems where many particles interact simultaneously.

Dr. Joseph Ford, Regents' professor, is one of a growing group of scientists who claim that this is not necessarily the case. One can, for example, consider the case of weather forecasting where predictions almost always diverge from reality after a period of about 10 days.

This is not due to any particular lack of microscopic information but is because complex systems become inherently chaotic as they evolve.

As a practical and simplistic example of a complex system let us construct a mathematical model of the insect population in a square foot area of a lawn. Population grows from one year

â&#x20AC;˘ 1-S -> N " : .

Dr. Edward W. Thomas to the next by an amount presumably proportional to the number of insects available to breed. But population will decrease due to over crowding leading perhaps to an unwillingness to mate. We could represent this situation by a simple non-linear equation of the form r x; - s xm2.

Here x is the population per square foot and index j indicates the yeary withy + 1 indicating the next year. The factor r\s a per-capita birth rate and 5 is a loss coefficient related to overCTOwding.

Choosing values for birth rate, loss coefficient and starting population one can very simply calculate how population builds up from one year to the next.

Choosing a birth rate r of two, a death coefficient of one tenth and starting at year zero (J = 0) with a population of five insects per square foot we predict that population increases in successive years through the progression 5, 7.5, 9.96, etc., reaching an equilibrium of 10 per square foot in a few years. The reader would x

j+l

probably regard this as a perfectly reasonable and rather unexciting result.

Consider now changing the birth rate from two to four. With again a starting population of five per square foot we arrive at the sequence 5, 17.5 39.4, 2.4, 9.3, 28.4, etc.; with a starting population of six we get 6, 20.4, 40, 0.06, 0.3, 1.0, etc., insects per square foot. Any field worker turning in results like this would be accused of inaccuracy or inattention to his duties. Yet the results are a perfectly predictable consequence of our model.

The birth rate of four and loss coefficient of one tenth gives rise to an unstable sequence of numbers that is very sensitive to the choice of initial conditions.

These apparently random behaviors are termed chaos and occur because the governing population equation is mathematically non linear. In certain limited circumstances, such as a birth rate of two and a loss rate of one tenth the population build up is a well behaved sequence. This is, however, a special case and not the rule.

The Georgia Institute of Technology is

not particularly interested in calculating the insect population of its lawns but we do have an interest in phenomena such as water flow, combustion of fuel in engines, motion of clouds and other macroscopic situations that in practice are governed by non-linear equations. The work of Professor Ford shows that while short term behavior may often be fairly regular and lead to an illusion of predictability the long term behavior may be apparently random and chaotic.

For any real macroscopic system there is an uncertainty, however small, in the specification of initial conditions and in general this will lead to a chaotic behavior, however accurately we understand the microscopic interactions of the individual particles. Thus we may never achieve the stable plasma configuration required to produce thermonuclear power nor will we arrive at reliable long term predictions of the weather. Chaos is a fundamental limitation.

What then can die physicist say about the subjects of earth, air, fire and water?

Certainly with enough diligence we can determine how materials are structured and how species react. With theoretical simulations we can even understand structures too small to be individually detected or reaction too fast to be individually measured.

Thus the microscopic reactions and structures that contribute to earth, air, fire, and water can in principle be understood. In some circumstances the predictions of macroscopic engineeringtype parameters leads to predictable and useful results. We must, however, be always wary of the frequent situations where order degenerates into chaos and prediction of macroscopic behavior is impossible. â&#x20AC;˘

Dr. Edward W. Thomas, Ph.D., University of London, is professor and director of the School of Physics.

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