Mathematics at NBS…a policy committee report

SEP 01, 1956

The following is taken from a report of the Policy Committee for Mathematics, one of the Technical Advisory Committees to the National Bureau of Standards established in response to recommendations of the 1953 ad hoc committee (“the Kelly Committee”) which was asked to evaluate the Bureau’s functions and operations in relation to the national needs. Part of the duty of the Policy Committee is to report to the Director of NBS on the operation of the Bureau’s Mathematics Division, which includes the Numerical Analysis Section, the Computation Laboratory, the Statistical Engineering Laboratory, and the Mathematical Physics Section, and part of it is to keep mathematicians and physicists aware of the Bureau’s activities in the area of mathematics and in touch with its needs and problems. Committee members are: Mina Rees (Chairman), David Blackwell, E. U. Condon, Mark Kac, Philip M. Morse, A. H. Taub. They were nominated by the mathematical societies and by the Physical Society. Their report to NBS Director A. V. Astin was submitted on March 15, 1956.

DOI: 10.1063/1.3060091

Mina Rees

At the time of the establishment of the Bureau of Standards Technical Advisory Committee for Mathematics a discussion of the role appropriate to the Mathematics Division (Division 11) of the Bureau was undertaken by the Committee. Although the excellence of the Bureau’s staff in the mathematical areas in which it had been operating was striking, adequate mathematical consultant services to other Bureau activities seemed to require the establishment and development of a section on mathematical physics. Therefore the Technical Advisory Committee recommended the establishment of a new section. There are now four sections: Numerical Analysis (11.01), the Computation Laboratory (11.02), the Statistical Engineering Laboratory (11.03), and Mathematical Physics (11.04).

More about the Authors

Mina Rees. Chairperson, Policy Committee for Mathematics, National Bureau of Standards.