Developing Basic Space Science World-Wide A Decade of UN/ESA Workshops

When the first United Nations/European Space Agency Workshop for Basic Space Science was planned to be held in Bangalore, India (1991) on the invitation of ISRO, few of those involved could expect that a unique forum was going to be created for scientific dialogue between scientists from developing and industrialized nations. As the format of the first workshop was on purpose left free with time for presentations, working sessions, and plenary discussions, the workshop was left to find its own dynamics. After a decade of UN/ESA Workshops, this book brings together the historical activities, the plans which have been developed over the past decade in the different nations, and the results which have materialized during this time in different developing nations. It aims to achieve for development agencies to be assisted in ways to find more effective tools for the application of development aid. The last section of the book contains a guide for teachers to introduce astrophysics into university physics courses. This will be of use to teachers in many nations. Everything described in this book is the result of a truly collective effort from all involved in all UN/ESA workshops. The mutual support from the participants has helped significantly to implement some of the accomplishments described in the book. Rather than organizing this book in a subject driven way, it is essentially organized according to the common economic regions of the world, as defined by the United Nations (Africa, Asia and the Pacific, Europe, Latin America and the Caribbean, Western Asia). This allows better recognition of the importance of a regional (and at times) global approach to basic space science for the developing nation's world wide. It highlights very specific scientific investigations which have been completed successfully in the various developing nations. The book supplements the published ten volumes of workshop proceedings containing scientific papers presented in the workshops from 1991 to 2002. Information on the workshops is also available at http://www.seas.columbia.edu/~ah297/un-esa/index.html http://www.oosa.unvienna.org/SAP/bss/index.html http://www.oosa.unvienna.org/SAP/centres/centres.html