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Article

Ultraviolet astronomy enters the eighties

SEP 01, 1980
A decade of observations by Earth‐orbiting satellites has led to the discovery of compact, hot components in many stellar systems and extended coronas surrounding our Galaxy and others.
Stephen P. Maran
Albert Boggess

Ultraviolet astronomy, once the province of instrumentalists, has become an accessible and necessary technique for all astronomers. In the first three years after the 1972 launch of the Copernicus satellite about 100 astronomers used its ultraviolet‐spectrometer data, outnumbering by a factor of ten the core group of Princeton University scientists who superintended the instrument. In the first two years of observational programs with the most recent ultraviolet satellite, the International Ultraviolet Explorer (IUE), this involvement of non‐experimenters has mushroomed, with more than 500 scientists participating.

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References

  1. 1. A. Boggess et al., Nature 275, 372 (1978).https://doi.org/NATUAS

  2. 2. A. J. Willis (ed.), The First Year of IUE, University College London (1979).

  3. 3. R. D. Chapman (ed.), The Universe at Ultraviolet Wavelengths: The First Two Years of IUE, NASA, Washington, in press (1980).

  4. 4. P. S. Conti, R. McCray, Science 208, 9 (1980).https://doi.org/SCIEAS

  5. 5. L. Spitzer, Jr., Astrophys. J. 124, 20 (1956).https://doi.org/ASJOAB

More about the authors

Stephen P. Maran, Laboratory for Astronomy and Solar Physics, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

Albert Boggess, Laboratory for Astronomy and Solar Physics, NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center.

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This Content Appeared In
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Volume 33, Number 9

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