From the Editor

Many of us are faced with a problem in keeping up with international optics. The growth of science means that there is so much more to learn. The journals get thicker; the papers harder to understand. We don't get to see foreign journals as often as we would like to, and when we do there is a language barrier. Each new journal (even Applied Optics!) just seems to add to our chores. This problem is common to all science. After all, 90 percent of all the scientists who ever existed are alive today. The proliferation of meetings, symposia, and even more papers may delight the publishing and hotel industries, but they are the despair of research people trying to keep abreast of a field. A new body of literature is growing up on the problem of dis­seminating existing literature. Until some universal computer is developed to solve our problem, I would like to offer several sug­gestions for those who would understand international optics: (1) use the opportunity to read translations of articles, such as in Optics and Spectroscopy; (2) keep in personal touch with scientists and laboratories abroad and with their work through inter­national meetings; and (3) find a survey of this work in condensed and handy form such as we hope we have provided here.

Optics is a relatively old science, and one rich with contributions from scientists all over the world. There are great differences, however, in the traditions and patterns of research in different countries. Certain countries have a history of outstanding con­tributions to optics. In others, optics research tends to be isolated and relatively meager, for their physics has flowered in other fields. There are reasons for these differences. In some countries every budding physicist must spend a lot of time— up to 2 years—understanding optics. Others—such as the United States—require only a short course. Sometimes a national pattern of research in optics has been set by a few brilliant and dynamic people at a single institute or university. The presence of an optical industry will dramatically affect the pattern of physics research, not only through the basic research that it supports, but through attracting students into the field and encouraging the training of technicians and scientists in applied optics.

Whatever the type of research being carried out, it is always rewarding to visit a foreign scientist and laboratory. Not only will you improve your knowledge of the field, but you will get a glimpse of the country which is more interesting and penetrating than that afforded by the standard rubberneck tour. The opportunity to go to international meetings (such as the ICO meeting in Munich this August) should be grasped by anyone who can afford the time and trip. Here you can meet and talk with many of the people mentioned and writing herein—the leaders of international optics.

D. Z. ROBINSON

We have already spoken in this column of the unsung heroes who, by reporting, reviewing, and refereeing, are indispensable to the successful operation of the journal. Perhaps the most heroic of all are the Feature Editors—those responsible for the featured topic of each issue—for on them falls the primary burden of luring to our journal the topical material that is ripe for pub­lication. The Editor was advised early in the game not tc utilize

this space to praise the Feature Editors: if you do it for one you will have to do it for them all. But the best advice is that which is ignored, so here goes. I t seems to us that we owe a particular debt of gratitude to the first three Feature Editors, more than to all the others that come later, because these three were working in the dark. They wrote to colleagues and co-workers describing a journal that did not yet exist, which no one had seen, but in which they should nevertheless publish. Furthermore, it was essential that the journal get off to a good start, for the entire tone of the journal can be set by the enthusiasm and momentum of the first few issues. The Feature Editors yet to perform will still have to labor to maintain this momentum, but they should no longer have to persuade reluctant authors that this is indeed an honest, up­right, and respectable journal.

Bruce Billings, our Pumping Editor, had the most difficult job, being the earliest in time. Furthermore, the sudden and explosive development of this field of masers, irasers, lasers, and quasers, although concerning optical radiation, was initially dominated by the solid-state physicists and electronic engineers, most of whom felt no kinship with optics or the Optical Society. Look at the articles of the first issue; how few of their references are to optical journals. Our issue on this feature was most timely: we now have many more papers on optical pumping waiting to be published. Perhaps we can yet become the focal point, the publishing home for this subject.

Lloyd Mundie, our Space Optics Editor, drew on his broad knowledge of the present status of space research to assemble a splendid issue on Space. These papers run the gamut from the vacuum ultraviolet to the infrared and from ground-based to air­borne, balloon-borne, and even satellite-borne optical studies. Shortly after the first Sputnik your Editor was on a program committee for a meeting reporting on infrared studies. We enthusiastically chose as our theme "Infrared in the Space Age," and then at the meeting found to our disappointment tha t many of the papers were little more than proposals: we simply were not in the Space Age. But now space studies are a reality, and bigger and better and more exciting optical studies of space and from space platforms should help fill many future issues of Applied Optics.

David Robinson, our International Optics Editor, performed the third miracle in a row. He was not appealing to workers to return to optics from journals of other disciplines, but rather bridging the national and language boundaries that separate and divide us. Many foreign workers are encouraged to publish in their own national journals, and are reluctant to publish in the standard journal of another national society. Simply having the word American in the title seems to be a deterrent. Many foreign workers who read and speak English fluently become suddenly shy about trying to write it. We are indeed sponsored and published by a national society, but we are not its official organ, and our multilingual nature should encourage foreign participation. Certainly this issue should demonstrate that optics people the world over can be persuaded to contribute to a common journal.

We owe much to these first three Feature Editors, whose efforts really launched the journal so successfully.

The featured topics for the first three issues: Optical Pump­ing, Space Optics, and International Optics have pretty much dominated the entire issue. The Editor looks forward to the day when these features can be held to a smaller proportion of the journal, so that there is more room for the contributed papers on other topics. We welcome your suggestions of topics to highlight in future issues. When we become a monthly next year we have immediate openings for six new topics. We need topics that are interesting and timely, and so interesting and so timely that the Editor is buried under the avalanche of papers!

J. N. HOWARD

206 APPLIED OPTICS / Vol. 1, No. 3 / May 1962