40. Radio Astronomy

Abstract

Radio astronomy continues to develop at explosive pace. In addition to containing many notable pieces of observational work carried out with improved sensitivity, angular resolution and spectral detail – and aided by data-handling techniques of increasing sophistication – the last three years have seen a flow of new and sometimes startling results. These are exemplified by the discovery of organic matter in the galaxy, and by the first observations pertaining to what are almost certainly neutron stars. The latter, of course, came with the dramatic discovery of pulsars, which are the subject of an Invited Discourse at this General Assembly.Following the custom of this Commission, I have asked different members to review the work done in each of the main fields. On this occasion a special section has been added on pulsars; since the announcement of their discovery in February 1968, the rate of publication within so narrow a field could scarcely have been equalled in the history of science. As in the past, radio studies of the planets are incorporated in the Report to Commission 16.