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that special attention be paid to the great intellectual challenges connected with man's conquest of air and space over the last few decades. He referred first to satellite imaging of earth, as mentioned in the paper, and went on to discuss the importance of a telescope borne into space by the shuttle. These developments, and others like them, will make it possible to present to the visitors to the Museum a grand picture of the evolution of the Universe and the solar system that is now emerging. Dr. Gell-Mann expressed his hope that Dr. Harwit's arrival as Director of the Museum would mark the beginning of that Museum's presentations on giant scientific syntheses, such as these, to the visiting public.

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The National Air and Space Museum Amendments Act of 1966 directs the National Air and Space Museum to ".... collect, preserve, and display aeronautical and space flight equipment of historical interest and significance; ..." In keeping with its general mandate to increase and diffuse knowledge, the Smithsonian interprets this as conveying a broad responsibility not simply to assemble and exhibit historical air and space artifacts but to conduct related research and to synthesize and interpret the significance of the mass of new scientific discoveries and successive waves of technological advance that are associated with human-directed flight.

With the recent appointment of Dr. Martin Harwit as the Director of NASM, the Museum has entered upon a significant new phase of activity. An astrophysicist who has long been involved in NASA programs and related international research activities, Dr. Harwit brings to the Museum an opportunity for the substantial programs of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory to find their first public outlet. He has a long-standing commitment to the public communication of scientific understanding, as well as a deep concern for developing new and more effective ways to link research findings to education and outreach.

Prominent among the new directions that NASM's programs should now begin to take is a heightened emphasis on international complementarities and cooperation that have contributed to the enormous success and rapidity with which our frontiers of knowledge have advanced. This is reflected in the multinational character of much of the progress that has occurred in aerospace. Frequently the innovations have been highly competitive and subordinated to military requirements, but on the other hand the extraordinary advances in astronomy and astrophysics have consistently been the product of a very high order of international collaboration. Current probes of interplanetary space, demanding more and more advanced technology