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Controlling the atom. The beginnings of nuclear regulation 1946--1962
This book traces the early history of nuclear power regulation in the US. It focuses on the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC), the federal agency that until 1975 was primarily responsible for planning and carrying out programs to protect public health and safety from the hazards of the civilian use of nuclear energy. It also describes the role of other groups that figured significantly in the development of regulatory policies, including the congressional Joint Committee on Atomic Energy, federal agencies other than the AEC, state governments, the nuclear industry, and scientific organizations. And it considers changes in public perceptions of and attitudes toward atomic energy and the dangers of radiation exposure. The context in which regulatory programs evolved is a rich and complex mixture of political, legislative, legal, technological, scientific, and administrative history. The basic purpose of this book is to provide the Nuclear Regulatory Commission (NRC), which inherited responsibility for nuclear safety after Congress disbanded the AEC, and the general public with information on the historical antecedents and background of regulatory issues
Social Scientists in an Adversarial Environment: The Nuclear Regulatory Commission and Organizational Factors Research
Realizing Societal Benefit from Academic Research: Analysis of the National Science Foundation’s Broader Impacts Criterion
Data in Antarctic science and politics
The internationalization of Antarctica as a continent for science with the Antarctic Treaty (1961) was heralded as bringing about international cooperation and the free exchange of data. However, both national rivalry and proprietorship of data, in varying degrees, remained integral to Antarctic science and politics throughout the 20th century. This paper considers two large field-surveys in Antarctica: first, an aerial photographic survey carried out by the Ronne Antarctic Research Expedition of 1946—8; and second, the Scott Polar Research Institute's radio-echo sounding survey of 1967—79. Both surveys involved geoscientific data but the context in which the investigations and the exchanges of their results took place changed. We argue that the issue of control of data remained paramount across both cases despite shifting international political contexts. The control of data on Antarctic territory, once framed in terms of geopolitics and negotiated between governments, became a matter of science policy and credit to be negotiated among scientific institutions. Whereas the Ronne data were of potential strategic value for reinforcing national territorial claims, the radio-echo sounding data contained information of potential economic and environmental value