Bulletin Summer 1988

25th Anniversary Lectures The Second Anniversary Lectur e The University held on 22nd June the second of its series of the 25th Anniversary Lectures — on 'High Temperature Superconductivity: Past, Present, and Future'. The speaker, Professor Paul C.W. Chu, TLL Temple chair professor of science, University of Houston, USA, presented a historical survey of superconductivi in his ninety-minute lecture to an audience comprising about 1,000 academics, students and members of the public. Professor Chu began with the work of Kamerlingh Onnes in 1911 and traced the various material and temperature plateaus leading t o the shattering of the liquid nitrogen barrier in 1987, which initiated the modern era of high temperature superconductivity. He also examined current development in very high temperature superconductivity, to room temperature and beyond, and the talk concluded with a discussion on the many ways by which application of superconductivity in everyday life might change the way we live. The Th i rd Anniversary Lecture The third of the series of lectures to celebrate the University's 25th Anniversary will be presented by the faculty of business administration on 26th August. Professor Abraham Charnes, director of the Center for Cybernetic Studies of the University of Texas at Austin, will speak on ‘Towards Management Science'. Professor Charnes is a prominent pioneer in the field of management science/operations research (MS/ OR). Over the past decades, he has helped lay the foundation in the development of linear and non- linear programming, stochastic programming, multi- objective programming, and game theory. He has also made numerous significant contributions to the novel applications of MS/OR in business management, economics, statistics and engineering. Professor Charnes has served as president of the Institute of Management Science in the United States. He is concurrently the J.P. Harbin UT Regents' chair professor in the University of Texas at Austin and title holder of university system professor across the University of Texas system. He has served as consultant to more than 200 companies and government agencies in areas dealing with modelling, systems analysis, etc.