Re: ECON: Private research dollars

Eugene Leitl (eugene@liposome.genebee.msu.su)
Fri, 6 Feb 1998 14:55:39 +0300 (MSK)


On Fri, 30 Jan 1998, Jim McCoy wrote:

> Radar, as the name implies, was developed for rangefinding and
> targetting in this program but the first principles upon which it is
> based were not. Radio experiments in the 20s and 30s discovered that
> radio waves bounced off of storm fronts. It was weather research and
> a cool new toy called radio, not a need to track aricraft, which
> brought us radar.

The principle was known, yes, but radar development was a costly toy,
pushed by military necesseties. In the Albion air battle, superior British
radar vs. the Teutonic neoludd Heldenmythos ('Ich will keinen Kinntop im
Flugzeug') made a significant impact on the war theatre.

Btw, modern radar (synthetic aperture, phased array) has experienced/is
experiencing a second revolution due to advances in (digital and analog)
electronics, xref terrain mapping/surface probing from LEO. Also, check
out lidar.

> jim
>

ciao,
'gene