Highlights of Astronomy: As presented at the XXth General Assembly of the IAU, 1988 by Derek McNally

It is the customary practice to report the major events of a General Assembly -the Invited Discourses, Joint Discussions and Joint Commission Meetings in Highlights of Astronomy. Vol. 8 reports the highlights of the XXth General Assembly of the International Astronomical Union, 1988 August 2-11, Baltimore, USA. The present volume contains the 3 Invited Discourses and papers presented at 7 Joint Discussion Meetings and 6 Joint Commission Meetings. Two Joint Commission Meetings will be reported elsewhere -JCM5 Spectroscopy of Individual Stars in Globular Clusters and the Early Chemical Evolution of our Galaxy (in summary only here, published by the Imprimerie de l'Observatoire de Paris) and JCM7 Star Clusters in the Magellanic Clouds (see Transactions of the IAU, Vol.XXB, report of Commission 37). I am most grateful to the authors of the invited discourses R.M. West and V.I. Moroz, M. Schmidt and M. Rees for sending me the manuscripts so promptly. I am also indebted to the Chairmen of the Joint Discussion and Joint Commission Meetings for their organisation of the meetings and for the assembly of their material for publication. Unfortunately the deadline for receipt of manuscripts coincided with an extended postal strike in France which seriously hindered the preparation of the volume for publication.

Invited Discourses.- Halley's Comet.- I: Ground-based Observations.- II: Space Studies.- 2. The Rise and Fall of Quasars.- 3. Galaxy Formation and Dark Matter.- Joint Discussions.- 1. New Developments in Documentation and Data Services for Astronomers.- 1. Introduction.- 2. Developments in primary publishing.- 3. Developments in information retrieval and distribution.- 4. Developments in data archiving and retrieval.- 5. The changing role of astronomical libraries.- 6. Summary.- Acknowledgements.- References.- Additional paper: The selection of scientific and technical records for permanent retention.- 2. Formation and Evolution of Stars in Binary Systems.- New observational clues on binary formation in the galaxy.- A search for planetary-mass companions to nearby stars.- Spectroscopic binaries among low-mass pre-main sequence stars.- Binary frequency among pre-main sequence stars in Taurus and Ophiuchus.- Brown dwarfs in binary systems.- Cloud collapse and fragmentation.- Criteria for collapse and fragmentation of rotating clouds.- Mathematical status of the fission theory.- Numerical simulations of fission.- The J vs M relation for binary stars.- The formation and evolution of binaries in globular clusters.- Binaries from unstable triples. Dynamical processes of formation.- Undisturbed evolution in binaries.- Disturbed binaries: the early phases.- Binary Wolf-Rayet stars.- Progress of common envelope evolution.- Millisecond pulsars.- Evolution of cataclysmic binaries.- The AM Her period spike.- A new progenitor model of type Ia supernovae.- Concluding remarks.- 3. Supernova 1987A in the Large Magellanic Cloud.- Editorial.- Supernova 1987A: light curves and their interpretation.- Evidence for asymmetries in SN1987A.- Gamma-ray lines from SN1987A and interpretation.- Interpretation of the CO bands of supernova 1987A.- Three dimensional hydrodynamical simulation of type II supernova.- NLTE calculations of hydrogen line profiles for SN1987A.- Non-equilibrium thermal X-ray emission in the early phase of supernova remnant.- Additional papers: Effects of the soft X-ray burst from SN1987A on its circumstellar medium.- Neutrinos: detection and interpretation.- 4. The Cosmic Dust Connection in Interplanetary Space: Comets, Interstellar Dust and Families of Minor PLanets.- From interstellar dust to comet dust and interplanetary particles.- What are families of minor planets?.- IRAS dust bands and the origin of the zodiacal cloud.- Spatially varying optical properties of the zodiacal dust.- What we know about families of asteroids.- Comets, meteorites and interplanetary dust.- Dynamics and spatial shape of short-period meteoroid streams.- Cometary dust and zodiacal light connection.- Dust from the comets.- The origin and physical characteristics of meteoroids.- 5. Atomic and Molecular Data for Astrochemistry.- Atomic and molecular data for diffuse cloud chemistry.- Ultraviolet, visible, and infrared spectroscopy of interstellar molecules.- Microwave spectroscopy of astrophysical molecules.- Some salient features of evolving models of interstellar clouds.- Molecules in circumstellar envelopes.- Atomic and molecular data for stellar physics.- Chemistry in dense interstellar clouds/Data requirements.- Chemistry in shocks.- Chemical effects of interstellar grains.- The volatile composition of comets.- Atmospheres of planets and their satellites.- Disk and Jets on Various Scales in the Universe.- The far-infrared (IRAS) excess in Roberts 22 and related objects.- Recent observations of the beams in SS433.- Large scale jets in Class I and Class II radio sources and quasars.- Synchrotron thermal instabilities and radio filaments in the lobes of Cygnus A.- Gravitation and jet induced velocities in the narrow line region of active galaxies.- Two-flow model for extragalactic radio jets.- 7. The Hubble Space Telescope - Status and Perspectives.- The science program of the Hubble Space Telescope.- Hubble Space Telescope second generation instrument selection.- Wide field/planetary camera-II for the Hubble Space Telescope.- The Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS).- The next generation: an 8-16 m space telescope.- Space astronomy - The next thirty years.- Joint Commssion Meetings.- 1. For Milliarcsecond or Better Accuracy.- 1. Introduction.- 2. Observational accuracies.- 3. Theoretical Developments.- 4. Computational considerations.- 5. Working Group Reports.- 2. Solar and Stellar Coronae.- 1. G. Newkirk's contribution to coronal studies.- 2. Structure of the Solar Corona.- 3. Coronal heating: theoretical ideas.- 4. An update on X-ray emission from stars.- 5. Solar and stellar winds.- 6. Coronal instabilities.- 7. Accretion disk coronae.- 8. Solar and stellar flares.- 3. High Angular Resolution Imaging from the Ground.- Principles of imaging using arrays.- Is the imaging problem identical in all wave bands?.- Review of linked array instruments.- Very long baseline interferometry.- Millimeter wave interferometry.- Meter wave interferometry.- Long baseline optical interferometry.- Speckle interferometry.- Infrared long baseline interferometry.- Active control and adaptive optics for optical interferometers.- Galactic and extragalactic applications.- The application of optical arrays to solar system and stellar problems.- Optical interferometry: summary and perspectives.- 4. Molecules in External Galaxies.- The molecular spiral structure in M51 derived from CO(J = 2 - 1) line observations.- Molecular cloud spiral arms and results from tidal interaction modeling.- CO in NGC4438 and tidal stripping in the Virgo cluster.- CO observations of the central region of NGC4258.- The correlation of CO and IR emission from galaxies: what does it tell us?.- Can galactic GMCs be identified from l-v diagrams?.- Warm gas and spatial variations of molecular excitation in the nuclear region of IC342.- Recent CO(2-1) observations of galaxies with the CSO.- Molecules in galaxies: results from Bell Laboratories.- CO in M82 and other middly active galaxies.- Molecular clouds in dwarf irregular galaxies.- Molecular clouds in the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds.- CO in early type galaxies.- The ratio of H2 to HI gas in infrared luminous galaxies.- Molecular gas in galactic nuclei.- 5. Spectroscopy of Individual Stars in Globlular and the Early Chemical Evolution of Our Galaxy.- Summary.- 6. Stellar Photomety with Modern Array Detectors.- and basic references for stellar photometry with CCD.- CCD imagers for astronomy: past problems and future hopes.- The CCD mosaic project by ESO and INSU/Toulouse Observatory.- Ground-based photometric calibration of the Space Telescope CCD camera.- Some factors affecting the accuracy of stellar photometry with CCDs.- CCD data taking modes and flatfielding problems.- High precision crowded field photometry.- Analytical approximation of long-exposure point spread functions and their use.- Photometric data archives.- 7. Star Clusters in the Magellanic Clouds.- Additional Joint Commission Meeting.- Systematic Observations of the Sun.- Summary.- 1. Observations.- 2. Modeling implications.- 3. Future work.- Additional Contributors.- The microwave background radiation: recent advances and new problems.- Submillimeter spectrum of the cosmic background radiation.- The status of Big Bang nucleosynthesis in July 1988.- Author Index.

Highlights of Astronomy Derek McNally

Highlights of Astronomy by Derek McNally

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Highlights of Astronomy Summary

Highlights of Astronomy: As presented at the XXth General Assembly of the IAU, 1988 by Derek McNally

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