scholarly journals Australia and the International Astronomical Union: the 1973 Sydney general assembly

2020 ◽  
Vol 31 (2) ◽  
pp. 118
Author(s):  
Nick Lomb
Keyword(s):  
General Assembly ◽  
Executive Council ◽  
International Astronomical Union ◽  
World War ◽  
World War 2 ◽  
External Threats ◽  
Financial Difficulties ◽  
International Astronomical ◽  
International Body ◽  
General Secretary

Formed in 1919, the International Astronomical Union is the international body representing professional astronomers. Australia joined the union soon after its formation but, due to financial difficulties, dropped out for a few years until re-joining just before World War 2. The main non-financial contribution any country can make to the union is to host one of its general assemblies that are held in different countries and cities every three years. After Australia’s bid to host a general assembly in 1967 or 1970 was unsuccessful, another bid was made for 1973. This second bid was accepted by the union’s executive council and confirmed in a letter from the union’s general secretary. The five years of planning and organisation for the assembly were made difficult by several external threats. The main one was the late proposal from Poland to move the 1973 assembly to Warsaw to celebrate the 500th anniversary of the birth of Copernicus. A compromise of an extraordinary general assembly in Poland following the ordinary one in Australia led to reduced numbers of overseas participants in Sydney. Despite this and other problems, the 1973 general assembly was regarded as highly successful.

scholarly journals “The sky seems heavy with clouds”: Arthur S. Eddington and the IAU

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (S349) ◽  
pp. 178-183
Author(s):  
Florian Laguens
Keyword(s):  
Second World War ◽  
International Astronomical Union ◽  
Scientific Career ◽  
World War ◽  
International Astronomical ◽  
Second World

AbstractThis paper addresses the relationships between Arthur S. Eddington, former director of the Cambridge Observatory (1914-1944), with the International Astronomical Union. It is demonstrated that the Union was related to every major moment in Eddington’s scientific career. New historical elements are brought forward, in the last section of the paper, to demonstrate Eddington’s action in favour of German colleagues during the Second World War.

scholarly journals The first President of the IAU, Benjamin Baillaud

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (S349) ◽  
pp. 139-146
Author(s):  
Jean-Louis Bougeret
Keyword(s):  
Celestial Mechanics ◽  
Executive Committee ◽  
International Research ◽  
Research Council ◽  
International Committee ◽  
General Assembly ◽  
International Level ◽  
International Astronomical Union ◽  
International Astronomical ◽  
The University

AbstractBenjamin Baillaud was appointed president of the First Executive Committee of the International Astronomical Union which met in Brussels during the Constitutive Assembly of the International Research Council (IRC) on July 28th, 1919. He served in this position until 1922, at the time of the First General Assembly of the IAU which took place in Rome, May 2–10. At that time, Baillaud was director of the Paris Observatory. He had previously been director of the Toulouse Observatory for a period of 30 years and Dean of the School of Sciences of the University of Toulouse. He specialized in celestial mechanics and he was a strong supporter of the “Carte du Ciel” project; he was elected chairman of the permanent international committee of the Carte du Ciel in 1909. He also was the founding president of the Bureau International de l’Heure (BIH) and he was directly involved in the coordination of the ephemerides at an international level. In this paper, we present some of his activities, particularly those concerning international programmes, for which he received international recognition and which eventually led to his election in 1919 to the position of first president of the IAU. We also briefly recount the very first meetings and years of the IAU.

scholarly journals Proceedings of the Joint Discussion: Parameters of the Earth's Gravitational Field

1966 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 607-609
Author(s):  
A. H. Cook
Keyword(s):  
Gravitational Field ◽  
Executive Committee ◽  
Working Group ◽  
General Assembly ◽  
International Astronomical Union ◽  
Earth’S Gravitational Field ◽  
International Astronomical ◽  
Astronomical Constants

The Chairman, W. Fricke, President of Commission 4, opened the Joint Discussion by drawing attention to the purpose and proposed procedure for the meeting. The Joint Discussion had been arranged by the Executive Committee of the Union in order to avoid the necessity for separate discussions by each Commission that was affected by the Report of the Working Group on the IAU System of Astronomical Constants. The Organizing Committee therefore proposed the following resolution:‘The members of the IAU at this Joint Discussion recommend to the Executive Committee that the following resolution be put before the General Assembly: “The International Astronomical Union endorses the final list of constants prepared by the Working Group on the System of Astronomical Constants and recommends that it be used in the national and international astronomical ephemerides at the earliest practicable date.’”

scholarly journals Proceedings of the Joint Discussion: Arguments in Favor of the Revision of the Conventional System of Astronomical Constants

1966 ◽  
Vol 12 (2) ◽  
pp. 604-606
Author(s):  
W. Fricke
Keyword(s):  
Executive Committee ◽  
Working Group ◽  
General Assembly ◽  
Conventional System ◽  
International Astronomical Union ◽  
International Astronomical ◽  
Astronomical Constants

The Chairman, W. Fricke, President of Commission 4, opened the Joint Discussion by drawing attention to the purpose and proposed procedure for the meeting. The Joint Discussion had been arranged by the Executive Committee of the Union in order to avoid the necessity for separate discussions by each Commission that was affected by the Report of the Working Group on the IAU System of Astronomical Constants. The Organizing Committee therefore proposed the following resolution:‘The members of the IAU at this Joint Discussion recommend to the Executive Committee that the following resolution be put before the General Assembly: “The International Astronomical Union endorses the final list of constants prepared by the Working Group on the System of Astronomical Constants and recommends that it be used in the national and international astronomical ephemerides at the earliest practicable date.’”

scholarly journals The history of IAU Symposia

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (S349) ◽  
pp. 401-405
Author(s):  
Areg M. Mickaelian
Keyword(s):  
Latin America ◽  
Middle East ◽  
General Assembly ◽  
International Astronomical Union ◽  
Host Countries ◽  
Astronomical Society ◽  
International Astronomical ◽  
History Of ◽  
Scientific Meetings ◽  
Astronomy And Astrophysics

AbstractThe history of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) meetings goes back to 1922 when the first IAU General Assembly (GA) was held in Rome, Italy, following the IAU creation in 1919. However, until 1953, no individual symposia were organized and the GAs were the only official gatherings for astronomers. All together, eight IAU GAs were held during 1922–1952. The IAU Symposium 1 was held in 1953 in Groningen, Netherlands. Starting with 1955, several IAU symposia were regularly held in different places, and since 1959, the IAU also began to organize colloquia to discuss relatively smaller topics. Twenty IAU colloquia numbered as I–XX were held in the period 1959–1971, and another series of IAU colloquia was organized in 1968–2005, numbered as Nos. 1–200. At present IAU symposia are the only official scientific meetings, nine of them being organized every year. IAU S349 “Under One Sky: the IAU Centenary Symposium”, held in Vienna during the IAU GA XXX, was the last one by number in 2018. Thus, the IAU has a 65-year history of symposia and all together 348 such meetings have been held, on average 5–6 annually. At present most of the IAU symposia during the years of GA are being organized in the framework of the GA, there being typically six symposia during each GA. All together, 31 IAU GA have been organized during the years 1922–2018, including 30 regular ones and one Extraordinary GA (1973 in Warsaw, Poland), typically once every three years. Since 1974, the IAU has also organized regional meetings in Europe, Asia and Pacific (APRIM), Latin America (LARIM), and the Middle East and Africa (MEARIM). The European ones were discontinued in 1990 after the creation of the European Astronomical Society (EAS) and the organization of the yearly JENAM/EWASS. The 348 IAU symposia have been organized in 43 countries. We give the statistics of all IAU symposia by year of organization, by various topics of astronomy and astrophysics, and by host countries and cities.

scholarly journals Inter-Commission Working Group on the Prevention of Interplanetary Pollution

1997 ◽  
Vol 23 (1) ◽  
pp. 263-274
Keyword(s):  
Solar System ◽  
Interplanetary Space ◽  
Planetary Science ◽  
General Assembly ◽  
Space Vehicles ◽  
The Moon ◽  
International Astronomical Union ◽  
International Astronomical ◽  
Solar System Bodies ◽  
Interplanetary Mission

At the 1988 Baltimore General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union, members of several Commissions dealing with planetary science expressed deep concern that no work was being undertaken to identify and avoid pollution problems in interplanetary space beyond the Moon. At that time NASA had convened a conference on problems in cislunar space due to the large and growing numbers of orbiting fragments hazardous to space vehicles. In translunar space this is hardly a problem. However an alarming number of future interplanetary mission proposals were considered for other reasons to be potentially harmful to various solar system bodies and interplanetary space itself.

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