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California Institute of Technology Engineering & Science Winter 1991 7 _ 4 In this i.sue I;', ~l. 1,150/" q-, >'h 11 1,3t J,~, ~ ~ 0 '., ';.. '".l.l b: -)1 f' I.f): ., 0.',)9 First Lights > 1-" I , - , ,,LJ~'7 Scientific Fraud ) !J." } .::; :"I~ I ::.t:u!o l.~ 4-f, j t.f;; . - '-I~ /2.- .o1l-/r, I) .... ,; "'. t'+t -. 'b~, 1.1 If • ~ ~ ;,, ~I loJ I( 1",_ Technology Lf~IOr 3f7U " i~ "" If l!f Transfer /1 11 " • , ;,).lJ h~ ,, ~ ~ "!> ~, "_ /.>, Is ~I ).. a.- I ~ 4; 7 Semiconductor I I >'f , ,, 1> "II , .... ., Quality Control 'Is i" ,, 0,./, 'i 'l{'1- , ~ ' '''1 i' r 'I $7(, '>'/11 "-1, > • ~'i 1,0:, ~ ~ .., ~I -: /' q, ' " c. t. , u- f'! ~~~ ":lk.i e ... ,- , 11J 3 0 'f l.- , . fo'l' '" ~. "f I ~. (,. I ~ - '>- , ? tl6 . o I,! .,.!- .. - 31.r~{, ) .' J S"7 J. ) , F., a The 10·meter Keck Telescope saw first light in November 1990. California Institute of Technology Winter 1991 Volume LlV, Number 2 2 First Lights The lO-rneter Keck Telescope, with one quarter of its mirror segments installed, produces its first image; its predecessors had different definitions of "first light," as well as different problems. 10 Scientific Fraud - by David Goodstein Caltech's vice provost offers an opinion of what it is and what it isn't, and defends a couple of famous physicists against false charges. 20 Deposit Insurance The layers that make up a computer chip are deposited inside a sealed chamber. A new way to see what's going on within the chamber can improve chip quality. 28 Commercialization of Technology: Key to Competitiveness -by James D. Watkins The Secretary of Energy explains what government can do to bridge the gap between research and development on the one side and practical applications and the marketplace on the other. Departments 36 Books: Aim; Cesaire: Lyric and Dramatic Poetl), 1946-1982 translated by Clayton Eshleman and Annette Smith 38 Lab Notes: Plasma Donor; But \XTilllt Work on a Hibachi? On the cover: A page from Robert Millikan's lab notebooks for his 43 Random Walk oil drop experiments measuring the charge of the electron shows Engineering & Science (ISSN 0013-7812) is published quarterly, E. Micheal Boughton that this one worked Fall, \Vintet, Spring, and Summer, at the California Institute of Pre.ridn7! of the Alt~1J717i Association out to his expecta Technology, 1201 East California Boulevard, Pasadena, California Thomas W. Anderson tions and would be a 91125. Annual subscription 58.00 domestic; $20.00 foreign air good one to publish. mail; single copies $2.00. Third class postage paid at Pasadena, Vice President 1G1~ InJtitll!c Relations Is this fraud? No, California. All rights reserved. Reprcduction of material contained Robert 1. O'Rourke says David Goodstein herein forbidden without authorization. © 1991 Alumni Associa ASJi.rtan! Vice Presidei7t fOI" Public Rc!t1tioilJ in an article beginning tion, California Institute of Technology. Published by the Califor nia Institute of Technology and the Alumni Association. Tele on page '10. Note that phone: 818-356-3630. Postmaster: Send change of address to Millikan initially wrote Caltech 1-71, Pasadena, CA 91125. STAFF: Editor - Jane Dietrich at the bottom "Could Writer - Douglas Smith PICTURE CREDITS: Cover, 7, 15, 16, inside back cover discard this because Copy Editors - Michael Farquhar, of bad variations in v, - Caltech Archives; inside fronc cover - Carol Lachata, Julie Hakewill, Betsy \"I?oodford & v." and then JPL; 2, 4, 5 - CARA; 10, 12, 14, 15, 19 - Cathy Hill; crossed that out and Production Artist - Barbara Wirick 20, 23-27 - Channing Ahn; 26 - Harry Atwater; 22, decided to "publish BUJiness Manager - Debbie Bradbury this because typical 27, 28, 30, 33, 34, 38-42 - Robert Paz; 39 - Mike Circu/t1tion iHan,1gcr - Susan Lee and good." Brown. Photographer - Robert Paz First Lights IIWhere was the gambler that would stake so much . .. 012 a single throw?" Their hundred inch reflector, the clear says Edward Stone, Caltech professor of physics pool, and chairman of the board of the California The polished flawless pool that it must be Association for Research in Astronomy (CARA). To hold the perfect image of a star. And, even now, some secret flaw-none "It tells you that you have a concept that works." knew "It's the first time you can see astronomical Until to·morrow's test-might waste it all. objects well enough to know you can do Where was the gambler that would stake research: says physicist Terry Mast (BS '64), one so much,- of two scientist members of the Keck project. Time, patience, treasure, on a single throw? Even when scientists can define the schedul The cost of it,-they'd not find that again, ing of first light, it's still a big gamble on a sin Either in gold or life-stuff! All their youth gle throw-especially when it involves a revolu Was fuel to the flame of this one work. tionary design and costs $94.2 million. The Once in a lifetime to the man of science, Keck Telescope, "lhen completed at the end of Despite what fools believe his ice-cooled this year on Mauna Kea in Hawaii, will be the With 9 hexagonal seg· blood, ments in place out of There comes this drama. largest in the world. Its la-meter <33-foot) seg an eventual total of mented mirror consists of 36 hexagonal mirrors, 36, the 10·meter mir· If he fails, he fails ror of the Kecl!: Tele· Utterly. each about 6 feet wide, 3 inches thick, and scope demonstrated weighing 880 pounds, packed closely together in that its revolutionary So English poet Alfred Noyes, in his epic a honeycomb arrangement. Because the mirrors concept would work. poem Watchers of the Sk)', versified George Ellery have slightly different curvatures dictated by their Hale's invitation to attend "first light" at the respective places in the total hyperboloid, an lOa-inch Hooker Telescope on Mount Wilson in innovative procedure called stressed mirror pol 1917. What poet could resist such an oppor ishing (which involves forcibly distorting the mir tunity? First light-the moment when starlight rors, polishing them, and then allowing them to first falls upon a telescope's mirror-was a more relax into the desired aspherical shape) had to be clearly defined event in those days, and it was a developed. Cradled in position by devices that simple task to bring a poet along to capture the minimize mechanical stresses, the mirrors have emotion of the moment. But, while the first their alignment controlled electronically to an reflection of starlight might appeal to poets, it's accuracy of a millionth of an inch to act in con not necessarily very interesting to scientists today. cert as a single optical surface. Exquisitely deli With the complex technology of current instru cate sensors and actuators on the back of the ments like the la-meter Keck Telescope, "first mirrors perform this alignment twice a second. light" is no longer simply a matter of opening up Jerry Nelson (BS '65), professor of astronomy the dome and taking a peek. "First light really at DC Berkeley and the Keck's project scientist, is the first time the telescope works as a system," had been developing the innovative design for Engineering & Science/\,\Tinter 1991 3 eighr years before a $ 70 million gift to Cal tech ftom the W. M. Keck Foundation made its construction possible. Much doubt and criticism has been expressed along the way. ~Th e exciting thing about building this telescope: says Mast, who has been wirh the project since its begin ning, "is that you 're not sure the parts will all play together, even though you've tested them individually." They found out on the night of November 24, 1990. With a telescope that "grows" mirror by mirror, it's difficult to say exactly at what poinr it should be considered ready for first light. How many mjrrors were enough co demonstrate that the whole system worked? Whatever the decision, there would be a ~ momem of truth· when it would be clear whether it was successful. CARA decided to regard the first astronomical image with the 9-segmem array of mirrors as first light. This was one quarter of the instru For its first celestial ment's eventual size and equal in light-gathering photograph. taken with a CCD engineer power to Caltech's 200-inch Hale Telescope on ing camera at the Palomar Mountain, providing a valid comparison prime focus. the Keck for determining the success of the new technol Telescope was trained on NGC 1232. ogy-the optics, the polishing procedure, and a spiral galaxy 65 mil the control sys tem. lion light years away. On the night when all this technology came This is a color enhanced mosaic of together the Keck scientists picked one of a list four successive expo of phorogenic (rather than scienrific) objects ro sures. Blue repre look at. NGC 1232 (also known as Arp 41), sents the faintest regions. while white a spiral galaxy 65 million light years away, was indicates the galaxy's located in a region of the sky within the tele brightest area. Bright scope's range (the drive and control system for spots in the spiral arms are compact pointing the telescope was not yet fully opera star-forming regions. tional), and it would do just fine for revealing 4 Engineering & Science/Winter 1991 The W. M. Keck ObS81'vatory (left) sits with a group of inter national companions atop Mauna Kea, an extinct Hawaiian Yol cano, where the astro nomical "seeing" is ideal.