Sex in Space:Part One: How Do We Manage To Do It?

To begin with, unless we're talking about masturbation, we need access to a partner. Early ventures into space were not conducive to sexual activity. The first human space flights were one man flights. When, in 1963, the first woman cosmonaut went into space, she flew with another man, but she was in one-person capsule and he was in another, and the flight did not include any docking maneuvers. Through the 1970s, crews contained only men until Salyut 7, which was a mixed crew (1982). 1983 Sally Ride, since then mixed crews common, and in 1992, a married couple. Did any of these flights include sex in space? Who knows? There's no official confirmation. Is it possible? Theoretically yes, but difficult: microgravity, effects on physiology, radiation, psychological effects. Read on...

Launch Pad Diary July 12

Electromagnetic spectrum, light, astronom.ical tools. How we know about the stuff in space - by looking (i.e., using light and by analyzing other radiation). Astronomy is observational and technology-driven; we usually make new discoveries through improved instruments.

Light shares wave-particle duality with electrons and has wavelength, frequency, and speed. Speed is always c (in vacuum) but wavelength and frequency (related) can vary. (Light slows down in other media: atmosphere, water, etc., which changes wavelength, maybe 30%, must be corrected.) Experiments have slowed the speed of light with things like super-cooled cesium to less than speed of sound. Different colors of visible light correspond to different wavelengths.

Red dwarf star same spectrum as filament of incandescent light bulb (temperature about 3000 K). Landscape looks normal, not red. Don't see colors at light intensities either very high or very low.