ABSTRACT
Starting in the early 1950s, Merle Tuve's second major line of research was radio astronomy; in particular, observing radio emissions from interstellar hydrogen clouds. Tuve and colleagues devoted much of their time to developing photoelectric image detectors and multichannel recorders for optical telescopes as well. Tuve also contributed toward the establishment and development of the National Radio Astronomy Observatory, and his group was a frequent user of its 300-foot transit telescope in Green Bank, West Virginia. Tuve put him in charge of the radio fuse, while others got variants such as photoelectric and acoustic fuses. Later Richard Roberts went on to guided missiles and ramjets. When Roberts left Norman Heydenburg, he was replaced by George M Temmer, and the two set about exploring a new form of nuclear interaction known as Coulomb excitation. Eventually Heydenburg ended up professor and department head at FSU, while Temmer became head of a new tandem laboratory at Rutgers University.
