Word: radars
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Dates: during 1950-1959
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...respiration rate were radioed directly from his chest to a monitoring physiologist. Film strapped to his forearms and chest would pick up the tracks of any cosmic particles that might crash through to his skin. A C-47 with a paramedic aboard started to track his flight. Down below, radar blips traced his path and a meteorologist turned a weather eye on the heavens. To help science, Simons carried along a good-luck charm from his wife bearing an outline of the moon and the inscription: "When you land here, it's time to return." Heading for the moon...
...night also brought danger. Far below, thunderstorms were moving in from the west. The tracking C-47 could not climb through the weather to follow the balloon, and radar was useless. The radio that reported Simons' heartbeat and respiration rate had died, and the main radio seemed to be weakening. Calmly, Dr. Stapp told Dr. Simons the news: if he stayed up he would have to monitor his own pulse and breathing, take his own position checks and thus could not risk more than a short nap. Answered Simons: "Let's continue the flight...
Columbia's innovation focuses on the basic problem of all radar: how to amplify the returning echo of the electromagnetic wave after it bounces off the target, without simultaneously amplifying the random electrical interference that is also picked up by the receiver. Heretofore, the usual method of improving reception has been the brute-force approach of multiplying the power of the signal. But this multiplication requires costly and cumbersome equipment, is impractical for such isolated sites as the arctic...
Nicknamed ORDIR (omnirange digital radar), the new signal technique cannot be applied to existing radar systems. ORDIR's range is still secret, but it will "multiply" the present top range of radar, which can now pick out an airplane at 200-300 miles. In addition, ORDIR's high sensitivity is expected to track such rapid velocity objects as intercontinental missiles and earth satellites. Eventually, aircraft may be equipped with miniaturized ORDIR. But the system is still being developed and refined; no production contracts have been made...
Revolutionizing radar may just be the start for ORDIR. The device's distinctive signal can be applied to many communication systems, will be especially helpful in weak signal situations. One possible use in the future: flashing a signal to earth from a satellite. Concludes Columbia's Dean Dunning: "The system seems to alter the whole concept of how we're going to communicate over long distances and in outer space...