Related papers: The China crisis
With the implementation of many ambitious observation projects, including LAMOST, FAST, and Antarctic observatory at Doom A, observational astronomy in China is stepping into a brand new era with emerging data avalanche. In the era of…
On May 27th 2010, the Italian astronomical community learned with concern that the National Institute for Astrophysics (INAF) was going to be suppressed, and that its employees were going to be transferred to the National Research Council…
As astronomy enters an era defined by global telescope networks, petabyte-scale surveys, and powerful computational tools, the longstanding goals of astronomy education, particularly introductory ``ASTRO101'', but equally encompassing both…
(abridged) The activities of the Commission have continued to focus on controlling unwanted light and radio emissions at observatory sites, monitoring of conditions at observatory sites, and education and outreach. Commission members have…
Currently, Artificial Intelligence (AI) has won unprecedented attention and is becoming the increasingly popular focus in China. This change can be judged by the impressive record of academic publications, the amount of state-level…
This essay analyzes emerging AI & quantum technology (incl. quantum-AI hybrids) regulation, export controls, and standards in the US, EU, & China, comparing legislative efforts anno 2025 to balance benefits/risks via their distinct…
This document gives some quantitative facts about the role of women in Italian astronomy. More than 26% of Italian IAU members are women: this is the largest fraction among the world leading countries in astronomy. Most of this high…
This paper discusses the IAU Resolutions B1.3, B1.4, B1.5 and B1.9 (2000) that were adopted during the 24th General Assembly in Manchester, 2000 and provides details and explanations for these Resolutions. It is explained why they present…
The Ice Giants represent a unique and relatively poorly characterized class of planets that have been largely unexplored since the brief Voyager 2 flyby in the late 1980's. Uranus is particularly enigmatic, due to its extreme axial tilt,…
Atmospheric nitrogen dioxide (NO2) over China at national level has been kept reducing since 2011 as seen from both satellite observations, ground-based measurements and bottom-up emission inventory (Liu et al., 2016; Irie et al., 2016;…
The {\Gaia} astrometric mission was approved by the European Space Agency in 2000 and the construction of the spacecraft and payload is on-going for a launch in late 2012. {\Gaia} will continuously scan the entire sky for 5 years, yielding…
Using data from the Web of Science (WoS), we analyze the mutual information among university, industrial, and governmental addresses (U-I-G) at the country level for a number of countries. The dynamic evolution of the Triple Helix can thus…
In this brief communication we provide the rationale for, and the outcome of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) resolution vote at the XXIX-th General Assembly in Honolulu, Hawaii, in 2015, on recommended nominal conversion…
Modern science is dominated by scientific productions from teams. A recent finding shows that teams with both large and small sizes are essential in research, prompting us to analyze the extent to which a country's scientific work is…
Observational astronomy has shown significant growth over the last decade and has made important contributions to cosmology. A major paradigm shift in cosmology was brought about by observations of Type Ia supernovae. The notion that the…
The Aryabhatta Research Institute of Observational Sciences (ARIES), a premier autonomous research institute under the Department of Science and Technology, Government of India has a legacy of about seven decades with contributions made in…
The belief that AI technology is on the cusp of causing a generalized social crisis became a popular one in 2023. While there was no doubt an element of hype and exaggeration to some of these accounts, they do reflect the fact that there…
The Committee on Radio Astronomy Frequencies (CRAF) is an Expert Committee of the European Science Foundation. It aims to provide a cost-effective single voice on frequency protection issues for European radio astronomy observatories and…
We present a review on the renowned solar eclipse in the Chinese book "Shujing" describing the oldest account of this kind. After balancing the arguments on the time, place, and the celestial stage, we offer a new scenario. The path of…
This paper presents a comprehensive scientometric analysis of the long-term impact of the 1979 Iranian Revolution on the nation scientific development. Using Scopus-indexed data from 1960 to 2024, we benchmark Iran publication trajectory…