During the period of Curtis L. Hemenway's
directorship, the main work of the Dudley Observatory shifted from
observational astronomy to space science. Research centered around
the study of cosmic dust in the upper atmosphere and in space. The
analysis of micrometeorites to determine their origin formed the
bulk of the research performed over the next decades.
Micrometeorites
are tiny particles less than one-ten-thousandth of a meter in
diameter that bombard the earth from space. Efforts included
collecting micrometeorites with apparatus flown on high altitude
aircraft, balloons, and spacecraft, and analyzing the collected
materials using such tools as electron microscopes.
Image of crater from S-10 experiment
(50µ)
Dudley's first major contract was awarded in 1959 by the Air
Force Cambridge Research Center. In the early part of 1961, a NASA
grant supported balloon-borne sampling devices in the Sesame
project. Sounding rockets were used for the same purpose in the
Pandora program. In the 1970's, Dudley developed experiments and
sampling devices that were included in the Apollo, Gemini, Skylab
guest experiment programs. Balloons continued to be used in the
Magellan project in which circumpolar flights were made from a
base in Australia. Contracts
and grants to fund research in this general area came from
NASA, the National Science Foundation, and the AFCRC.
Complementary research areas included the sublimation of ice
particles, meteor spectroscopy, particle formation, and ultra high
resolution spectroscopy.
The
Dudley Observatory
