scholarly journals History of Astronomy in Australia: Big-Impact Astronomy from World War II until the Lunar Landing (1945–1969)

Galaxies ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 9 (2) ◽  
pp. 24
Author(s):  
Alister Graham ◽  
Katherine Kenyon ◽  
Lochlan Bull ◽  
Visura Don ◽  
Kazuki Kuhlmann
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Solar Observatory ◽  
History Of Astronomy ◽  
World War ◽  
Scientific Publications ◽  
Quarter Century ◽  
Lunar Landing ◽  
History Of ◽  
Consecutive Time ◽  
Astrophysics Data System

Radio astronomy commenced in earnest after World War II, with Australia keenly engaged through the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research. At this juncture, Australia’s Commonwealth Solar Observatory expanded its portfolio from primarily studying solar phenomena to conducting stellar and extragalactic research. Subsequently, in the 1950s and 1960s, astronomy gradually became taught and researched in Australian universities. However, most scientific publications from this era of growth and discovery have no country of affiliation in their header information, making it hard to find the Australian astronomy articles from this period. In 2014, we used the then-new Astrophysics Data System (ADS) tool Bumblebee to overcome this challenge and track down the Australian-led astronomy papers published during the quarter of a century after World War II, from 1945 until the lunar landing in 1969. This required knowledge of the research centres and facilities operating at the time, which are briefly summarised herein. Based on citation counts—an objective, universally-used measure of scientific impact—we report on the Australian astronomy articles which had the biggest impact. We have identified the top-ten most-cited papers, and thus also their area of research, from five consecutive time-intervals across that blossoming quarter-century of astronomy. Moreover, we have invested a substantial amount of time researching and providing a small tribute to each of the 62 scientists involved, including several trail-blazing women. Furthermore, we provide an extensive list of references and point out many interesting historical connections and anecdotes.

Brain Science under the Swastika

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Lawrence A. Zeidman
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Mass Murder ◽  
Body Parts ◽  
Human Beings ◽  
Research Subjects ◽  
World War ◽  
Scientific Publications ◽  
Brain Science ◽  
Forced Sterilization ◽  
History Of

Eighty years ago the greatest mass murder of human beings of all time occurred in Nazi occupied Europe. This began with the mass extermination of patients with neurologic and psychiatric disorders that rendered them “useless eaters” to Hitler’s regime. The neuropsychiatric profession was systematically “cleansed” beginning in 1933, but racism and eugenics had infiltrated the specialty in the decades before that. With the installation of Nazi-principled neuroscientists, mass forced sterilization was enacted, which slowed down by the start of World War II and the advent of patient murder. But the murder of roughly 275,000 patients by the end of the war was not enough. The patients’ brains and neurologic body parts were stored and used in scientific publications both during and long after the war. Also, patients themselves were used in unethical ways for epilepsy and multiple sclerosis experiments. Relatively few neuroscientists resisted the Nazis, with some success in the occupied countries. Most neuroscientists involved in unethical actions continued their careers unscathed after the war. Few answered for their actions in a professional or criminal sense, and few repented. The legacy of such a depraved era in the history of neuroscience and medical ethics is that codes exist by which patients and research subjects are protected from harm. But this protection is possibly subject to political extremes and only by understanding the horrible past can our profession police itself. Individual neuroscientists can protect patients and colleagues if they are aware of the dangers of a utilitarian, unethical, and uncompassionate mindset.

Astrophysics at Mount Stromlo: the Woolley Era

1984 ◽  
Vol 5 (4) ◽  
pp. 597-605 ◽  
Author(s):  
S. C. B. Gascoigne
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Solar Observatory ◽  
The Sun ◽  
World War ◽  
History Of

Mount Stromlo Observatory came into being on 1 January 1924. First known as the Commonwealth Solar Observatory, it was founded primarily for studying the Sun and solar-terrestrial relations, though from the outset it was much concerned with various aspects of geophysics. There was also a stellar programme, but after a promising start this had to be discontinued. The solar-geophysical regime continued, with success, until World War II. The Observatory went through the War with a new director, and at the end of it embarked on a new and unfamiliar course to develop into the fully-fledged astrophysical institute it has become today. This transition marks an important chapter in the history of Australian astronomy: I have tried here to describe some of its aspects, as they seemed to me.

The Film World’s Cooperative Store: Institutions and Films of the 1930s and 1940s

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
C. Claire Thomson
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Meat Products ◽  
Public Information ◽  
Early History ◽  
World War ◽  
International Context ◽  
German Occupation ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Uk ◽  
The Impact

This chapter traces the early history of state-sponsored informational filmmaking in Denmark, emphasising its organisation as a ‘cooperative’ of organisations and government agencies. After an account of the establishment and early development of the agency Dansk Kulturfilm in the 1930s, the chapter considers two of its earliest productions, both process films documenting the manufacture of bricks and meat products. The broader context of documentary in Denmark is fleshed out with an account of the production and reception of Poul Henningsen’s seminal film Danmark (1935), and the international context is accounted for with an overview of the development of state-supported filmmaking in the UK, Italy and Germany. Developments in the funding and output of Dansk Kulturfilm up to World War II are outlined, followed by an account of the impact of the German Occupation of Denmark on domestic informational film. The establishment of the Danish Government Film Committee or Ministeriernes Filmudvalg kick-started aprofessionalisation of state-sponsored filmmaking, and two wartime public information films are briefly analysed as examples of its early output. The chapter concludes with an account of the relations between the Danish Resistance and an emerging generation of documentarists.

Recasting Bourgeois Europe

2015 ◽  
Author(s):  
Charles S. Maier ◽  
Charles S. Maier
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
Social Vulnerability ◽  
Group Representation ◽  
Political Stability ◽  
Status Quo ◽  
European History ◽  
World War ◽  
History Of ◽  
Country Analysis ◽  
Economic Stabilization

The author, one of the most prominent contemporary scholars of European history, published this, his first book, in 1975. Based on extensive archival research, the book examines how European societies progressed from a moment of social vulnerability to one of political and economic stabilization. Arguing that a common trajectory calls for a multi country analysis, the book provides a comparative history of three European nations—France, Germany, and Italy—and argues that they did not simply return to a prewar status quo, but achieved a new balance of state authority and interest group representation. While most previous accounts presented the decade as a prelude to the Depression and dictatorships, the author suggests that the stabilization of the 1920s, vulnerable as it was, foreshadowed the more enduring political stability achieved after World War II. The immense and ambitious scope of this book, its ability to follow diverse histories in detail, and its effort to explain stabilization—and not just revolution or breakdown—have made it a classic of European history.

THE ROLE AND ROLE OF OIL POLICY IN SAUDI ARABIA IN POST WORLD WAR II ECONOMIC LIFE

2019 ◽  
Vol 20 (2) ◽  
pp. 37-41
Author(s):  
Maftuna Sanoqulova ◽  
Keyword(s):  
Saudi Arabia ◽  
World War Ii ◽  
Economic Life ◽  
World War ◽  
Post World War Ii ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
Oil Policy

This article consists of the politics which connected with oil in Saudi Arabia after the World war II , the relations of economical cooperations on this matter and the place of oil in the history of world economics

Charles de Gaulle and European Community

2020 ◽  
Vol 2020 (10-3) ◽  
pp. 70-81
Author(s):  
David Ramiro Troitino ◽  
Tanel Kerikmae ◽  
Olga Shumilo
Keyword(s):  
World War Ii ◽  
European Community ◽  
World War ◽  
Charles De Gaulle ◽  
The United Kingdom ◽  
History Of ◽  
The Common ◽  
Post War ◽  
De Gaulle

This article highlights the role of Charles de Gaulle in the history of united post-war Europe, his approaches to the internal and foreign French policies, also vetoing the membership of the United Kingdom in the European Community. The authors describe the emergence of De Gaulle as a politician, his uneasy relationship with Roosevelt and Churchill during World War II, also the roots of developing a “nationalistic” approach to regional policy after the end of the war. The article also considers the emergence of the Common Agricultural Policy (hereinafter - CAP), one of Charles de Gaulle’s biggest achievements in foreign policy, and the reasons for the Fouchet Plan defeat.

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