Omissions in GLAST story

In the News Focus story “GLAST mission prepares to explore the extremes of cosmic violence†(23 May, p. 1008), Y. Bhattacharjee committed two grave oversights. First, no mention is made of any contribution to GLAST from outside of the United States. In fact, Italy, France, Sweden, and Japan all made essential contributions. The Large Area Telescope, for example, was essentially made and paid for by Italy, France, and Sweden. Japan supplied most of the necessary silicon. Scientists from these countries have been, and continue to be, essential members of the GLAST team. Second, the figure on page 1009, which provides a brief summary of high-energy astronomy missions, omits two important missions: Italys (and Hollands) BeppoSAX (1996 to 2002) and Italys AGILE. BeppoSAX has substantially added to our understanding of gamma-ray bursts and hard x-rays; the BeppoSAX team was awarded the 1998 Bruno Rossi Prize of the American Astronomical Society. AGILE is also dedicated to x-ray and gamma-ray astronomy and uses the same silicon type of detectors that GLAST will use. Now in orbit for more than a year, AGILE is certainly a precursor to (and pathfinder for) GLAST. As a final clarification, in the same figure, the Swift mission is a joint trilateral mission with NASA, Italy, and the UK, not NASA alone, as indicated.