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Sci-fi author's DNA to be in space
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Arthur C Clarke will not be on board himself and the timing might be off by a couple of years, but a message penned by the the most celebrated science fiction writer of our time and a DNA sample extracted from his hair will set off on a space odyssey in 2003.
Born in Britain and now living in Colombo, Sri Lanka, the 83-year-old author of “2001 -- A Space Odyssey” is one of 55,000 people who have signed up to take part in a project organized by Houston-based Encounter 2001 LLC to send a message into deep space for anybody out there who may be interested.
“It's like a cosmic message in a bottle, an archive of humanity,” said Encounter 2001 spokesman Chris Pancheri.
The spacecraft is tentatively scheduled for launch by an Ariane V rocket in French Guiana in the third quarter of 2003.
Checks will be conducted during a three-week orbit of the Earth, then a giant “solar sail” will be unfurled which will carry the craft on a 13.5-year journey beyond Pluto and on into deep space.
“Fare well my clone!” is the brief handwritten message which Clarke will send along with the DNA sample and a photograph of himself to any extraterrestrials who may intercept the craft.
Pancheri said the project will cost about $25 million, which Encounter 2001 hopes to recoup through sponsorship deals.
The idea has proved popular among schoolchildren, he said, who view it as a new twist on the practice of burying time capsules so that they can be discovered by future generations. (SD-Agencies)
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