X-ray astronomy was born in June 1962 with a totally unexpected discovery of a bright X-ray source (presently known as Sco X-1) in a historic rocket flight conducted by Riccardo Giacconi, Herb Gursky, Frank Paolini and late Bruno Rossi. In the last 30 years, astronomy through the newly opened window has made a dramatic expansion.

The universe contains enormously rich varieties which had been left unexplored until recent times. From 40’s through 60’s, new wavelength windows, radio, infrared and X-rays successively opened. As a result, the presence of objects and regions distributed over an extremely wide temperature range from a few Kelvin through hundreds of millions of Kelvin were discovered. A burst of surprising discoveries made in 60’s marked the opening of a whole new era of multi-wavelength astronomy.

The study of Earth rotation encompasses the complex nature of orientation changes, the excitation of these changes and their geophysical implications in a broad variety of areas. Studies have embarked on a new era with the advent of highly accurate space geodetic techniques and the increasing availability of complementary geophysical data sets. This paper provides an overview of Earth rotation variations from hours to centuries with a brief discussion of polar motion and nutation results.

This is a review of the present status of particle physics and the main scientific goals in our work at the “High Energy Frontier” with specific emphasis on connections to Cosmology. Based on an extraordinarily successful Standard Model, our field is exploring the fundamental questions such as the nature of mass and the unification scheme which only a few decades ago seemed to belong mostly to the realm of dreams. Neutrino masses and oscillations, the key to CP-violation and proton decay are actively searched for at accelerators and underground experiments.

This workshop was organized to analyze the present problems of women as astronomers and to focus on possible ways to improve the situation in view of the various contexts in the different countries.

To set up a framework for this analysis the statistical data from the IAU membership (Bergeron 1992) is presented in Table 1. This table only includes countries with 50 or more members and is ordered by the fraction of women participation; values for the overall membership are included.

Let me start with a short historical excursion, taking the Bologna University as an example. The Bologna University was founded in 1088, but only at the beginning of 1700, when a deep transformation in the tradition and female behaviour model occurred, women started to approach the academic life mostly in humanities. There were also examples of scientist women, often without a real academic title working side by side with men (generally fathers or husbands).

During the 19th century the female presence in the italian universities slowly increased, becoming a reality at the beginning of the 20th century. In the time interval from 1884 to 1900, 224 degrees were assigned to women in Italy (less than 10% of the total): 68.9% in Literature and Philosophy,7.8% in Mathematics, 11.7% in Natural Science, 9.3% in Medicine, and 2.3% in Law. Women were mostly involved in fields related to educational activities, however six out of 224 got a chair at the Universities, five of which in scientific fields.

Astronomy is a very popular science in Russia, but officially it is considered rather a man’s speciality because of night observations, laborious measurements, developments of new facilities, etc.

At present there are about 35% women among specialists with higher astronomical education. The indicator of professional level is for women often higher then for men at this stage of career. Unfortunately this level remains the limit for most women-astronomers, because the possibility of farther promotion and higher position depends on family-status, home-life, having children, etc. That is why only 30% women have the first scientific degree, about 5%, the second scientific degree, and only a few individuals, the title of Professor.

As a consequence the most difficult part of this exciting science falls on women-astronomers: monotonous observations and calculations for astrometrical catalogues, processing of spectral information reduction of data, data bank management, and others. This is the most labour - intensive and ungrateful part of astronomical research that can not produce results ready for publication at relatively short times.

This paper is divided into three sections. In the first, we highlight the results of statistical investigations into the status of women in astronomy in the US. In the second section, we discuss some of the likely reasons for the lack of equal representation by women in astronomy and in the final section, we discuss some the suggestions for how to improve things. Much of the information presented here was taken from the proceedings of the Women in Astronomy meeting held in Baltimore in 1992. Recommendations from that meeting, have been formalized in the Baltimore Charter. The Baltimore Charter has been endorsed by a number of universities and institutions in America, including the NSF, NASA, and the AAS.

The percentages of women working in Astronomy including research and technical positions are as follows:

If we look at the percentages of female students:

It is easy to see, that since fewer women have the chance of higher education, it is not a surprise that fewer women can reach to the higher level in astronomy.

Social discrimination and prejudice have been the obstacles for women to get higher education and choose a career in astronomy. For example:

1. — 1. Home influence. A girl from her early childhood is educated to play with dolls and help in the kitchen.

2. — 2. Marriage. In the view of public, a man should not choose a wife with higher education nor in a higher position as compared to him. And thus, well educated women have less chance to get married.

As the oldest speaker at this Joint Discussion, my lifetime in astronomy spans a larger number of decades than the lives of most of us here, and consequently I have seen great changes in the opportunities, working conditions, status, and rewards for their work that are now available to women, in comparison with the situation as it was 50 years ago. Nevertheless, one has to admit that the answers to two of the questions we have been asked to address have to be a qualified yes: there is still a problem, and there is need for improvement.

The advances that we have seen, especially in the last 20 years, have been recognized throughout the worldwide community as being of immense benefit to astronomy. It is also recognized by the general public that the situation for women in astronomy is much different now from what it was in my early years.

It is impossible to pose, explain and solve in a mere 15 minutes a complex puzzle like this that has been with us for centuries. There are so many different facets; it is hard to focus on a problem that has no nucleus and to summarize a situation that has neither beginning nor end, and some of you are therefore bound to disagree with at least some of what I say.

I singled out the three questions, “Is there a problem?”, “Is there need for improvement?” and “What are the possible ways to improve the situation?”, because each seems to beg the next and all three can therefore be tackled together. The official answer to the first question is “No, there is no discrimination, and no Problem”, because the large majority of institutions declare themselves Equal Opportunity Employers, and statistics show that women are usually appointed to positions in at least the same proportion, relative to their malepeers, as they apply. The nagging worry is why they do not feel able to apply in the sort of numbers that reflect their population. This is more than a social problem; anyone who counts the cost of educating his or her daughter to the age of 25 will know that it has an economic side too. And the reality of the Problem? I attended the 1992 Baltimore meeting on “Women in Astronomy”, and for the first of the two days the 175 or so women in the 200-strong audience simply let off steam, flung mud, aired grievances, and demonstrated that a Problem was very much in evidence; everyone had one, in some disguise - except, possibly, those who occupied the seats on the Panel the next day and answered the political questions. But put 175 men together in a free-for-all, and they would probably discuss .... maybe how best to spend the next $M100 on space astronomy.