Person

Slee, Owen Bruce (Bruce) (1924 - 2016)

Born
10 August 1924
Adelaide, South Australia, Australia
Died
18 August 2016
Sydney, New South Wales, Australia
Occupation
Radio astronomer and Science historian

Summary

Bruce Slee was an international pioneer of radio astronomy who, over 60 years, made wide-ranging contributions that extend from the Solar System to our Milky Way galaxy to quasars. He joined the CSIRO Division of Radiophysics in 1946, retiring in 1989 having worked at a variety of facilities including field stations at Dover Heights and Fleurs in Sydney and the Parkes radio telescope. He was a member of the team with John Bolton and Gordon Stanley that discovered the first discrete, point-like radio sources at Dover Heights. The discovery led to a new branch of astronomy, extragalactic radio astronomy. With colleagues Bernard Mills and Eric Hill, Slee detected more than 2,000 radio sources and published the celebrated MSH Catalog over the period 1958 -1961. During the 1960s Slee conducted pioneering work searching for radio emissions from stars other than the Sun. Slee published nearly 200 research papers and since 1994 has written widely on the history of radio astronomy. The minor planet 9391 Slee was named in his honour by the International Astronomical Union.

Skip to

Details

Chronology

1946 - 1989
Career position - Research Scientist (later Principal Research Scientist), CSIRO Division of Radiophysics
1959
Education - Bachelor of Science (BSc), University of New South Wales
1971
Award - Doctor of Science (DSc), University of New South Wales
1988 - 1989
Career position - Principal Research Scientist, Australia National Telescope Facility
1989
Life event - Retired
1989 - 2016
Honorary Fellow, Australia Telescope National Facility
2017
Award - Member of the Order of Australia (AM) for significant service to science, particularly in the field of radio astronomy, as a researcher, author and mentor of young scientists (posthumous)

Published resources

Book Sections

  • Orchiston, W.; and Slee, B., 'Early Australian observation of historic supernova remnants at radio wavelengths' in Proceedings of the 5th International Conference on Oriental Astronomy, Chen, Y.-K., Orchiston, W., Soonthornthum, B. and Strom, R., eds (Chiang Mai. Thailand: University of Chiang Mai Press, 2005), pp. 43-56. Details
  • Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'The Radiophysics Field Stations and the Early Development of Radio Astronomy' in The New Astronomy: Opening the Electromagnetic Window and Expanding our View of Planet Earth, Wayne Orchiston, ed., ed. (Dordrecht: Springer, 2005), pp. 119-168. Details
  • Stewart, Ronald, Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'The Sun Has Set on a Brilliant Mind: John Paul Wild (1923-2008), Solar Radio Astronomer Extraordinaire' in Highlighting the History of Astronomy in the Asia-Pacific Region: Proceedings of the ICOA-6, Orchiston, Wayne, Nakamura, Tsuko and Strom, Richard G., eds (New York: Springer, 2011), pp. 527-42. Details
  • Stewart, Ronald, Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'The Contribution of the Division of Radiophysics Dapto Field Station to Solar Radio Astronomy, 1952-1964' in Highlighting the History of Astronomy in the Asia-Pacific Region: Proceedings of the ICOA-6, Orchiston, Wayne, Nakamura, Tsuko and Strom, Richard G., eds (New York: Springer, 2011), pp. 481-526. Details
  • Stewart, Ronald, Wendt, Harry, Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'A Retrospective View of Australian Solar Radio Astronomy 1945-1960' in Highlighting the History of Astronomy in the Asia-Pacific Region: Proceedings of the ICOA-6, Orchiston, Wayne, Nakamura, Tsuko and Strom, Richard G., eds (New York: Springer, 2011), pp. 589-629. Details
  • Wendt, H.; Orchiston, W.; and Slee, B., 'The contribution of the Division of Radiophysics Potts Hill field station to international radio astronomy' in Highlighting the history of astronomy in the Asia-Pacific Region: proceedings of the ICOA-6 conference. Astrophysics and space science proceedings, Orchiston, W., Nakamura, Tsuko and Strom, Richard G., eds (New York: Springer, 2011), pp. 379-431. Details
  • Wendt, Harry, Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'An overview of W.N. Christiansen's contribution to Australian radio astronomy, 1948-1960' in Highlighting the history of astronomy in the Asia-Pacific Region: proceedings of the ICOA-6 conference. Astrophysics and space science proceedings, Orchiston, Wayne, Nakamura, Tsuko and Strom, Richard G., eds (New York: Springer, 2011), pp. 547-87. Details
  • Wendt, Harry, Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'The Contribution of the Division of Radiophysics Murraybank Field Station to international radio astronomy' in Highlighting the history of astronomy in the Asia-Pacific Region: proceedings of the ICOA-6 conference. Astrophysics and space science proceedings, Orchiston, Wayne, Nakamura, Tsuko and Strom, Richard G, eds (New York: Springer, 2011), pp. 433-79. Details

Journal Articles

  • George, Martin, Orchiston, Wayne, Slee, Bruce and Wielebinski, Richard, 'The history of early low frequency radio astronomy in Australia, 2: Tasmania', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 18 (1) (2015), 14-22. Details
  • George, Martin, Orchiston, Wayne, Slee, Bruce and Wielebinski, Richard, 'The history of early low frequency radio astronomy in Australia, 3: Ellis, Reber and the Cambridge Field Station near Hobart', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 18 (2) (2015), 177-89. Details
  • George, Martin, Orchiston, Wayne, Slee, Bruce and Wielebinski, Richard, 'The early history of low frequency radio astronomy in Australia, 6: Michael Bessell and the University of Tasmania's Richmond field station near Hobart', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 19 (2) (2016), 185-94. Details
  • George, Martin, Orchiston, Wayne, Wielebinski, Richard and Slee, Bruce, 'The history of early low frequency radio astronomy in Australia, 5: Reber and the Kempton Field Station in Tasmania', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 18 (3) (2015), 312-24. Details
  • Kellermann, K.I.; Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'Gordon James Stanley and the Early Development of Radio Astronomy in Australia and the United States', Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia, 22 (1) (2005), 1-11. Details
  • Orchiston, W.; and Slee, B., 'The Australasian discovery of solar radio emission', AAO Newsletter, 101 (2002), 25-7. Details
  • Orchiston, Wayne, 'From the Solar Corona to Clusters of Galaxies: the Radio Astronomy of Bruce Slee', Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia, 21 (2004), 23-71. Details
  • Orchiston, Wayne, 'Sixty Years in Radio Astronomy: a Tribute to Bruce Slee', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 8 (1) (2005), 3-10. Details
  • Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, B., 'Ingenuity and Initiative in Australian Radio Astronomy: the Dover Heights Hole-in-the-Ground Antenna', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 5 (2002), 21-34. Details
  • Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, B., 'The Flowering of Fleurs: an Interesting Interlude in Australian Radio Astronomy', ATNF News, 47 (2002), 12-15. Details
  • Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'Shame about Shain! Early Australian radio astronomy at Hornsby Valley', ATNF News, 55 (2005), 14-6. Details
  • Orchiston, Wayne, George, Martin, Slee, Bruce and Wielebinski, Richard, 'The history of early low frequency radio astronomy in Australia, 1: the CSIRO Division of Radiophysics', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 18 (1) (2015), 3-13. Details
  • Orchiston, Wayne, Slee, Bruce and Burman, Ron, 'The Genesis of Solar Radio Astronomy in Australia', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 9 (1) (2006), 35-56. Details
  • Orchiston, Wayne, Slee, Bruce, George, Martin and Wielebinski, Richard, 'The history of early low frequency radio astronomy in Australia, 4: Kerr, Shain, Higgins and the Hornsby Valley Field Station near Sydney', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 18 (3) (2015), 285-311. Details
  • Orchiston, Wayne; and Robertson, Peter, 'The origins and development of extragalactic radio astronomy: the role of the CSIRO's Division of Radiophysics Dover Heights Field Station in Sydney', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 20 (3) (2017), 289-312. Details
  • Orchiston, Wayne; Sim, Helen; and Robertson, Peter, 'Dr Owen Bruce Slee 10 August 1924 - 18 August 2016', Australian Physics, 53 (6) (2016), 214, https://aip.org.au/wp-content/uploads/Australian%20Physics/Aust%20Phys%2053-6.pdf. Details
  • Robertson, P.; Orchiston, W.; and Slee, B., 'John Bolton and the discovery of discrete radio sources', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 17 (2014), 283-306. Details
  • Robertson, Peter, Cozens, Glen, Orchiston, Wayne, Wendt, Harry and Slee, Bruce, 'Early Australian Optical and Radio Observations of Centaurus A', Publications of the Astronomical Society of Australia, 27 (4) (2010), 402-30. Details
  • Slee, Bruce, 'Some Memories of the Dover Heights Field Station, 1946-1954', Australian Journal of Physics, 47 (5) (1994), 517-534. Details
  • Slee, Bruce, 'Early Australian Measurements of Angular Structure in Discrete Radio Sources', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 8 (2) (2005), 97-106. Details
  • Stewart, Ronald, Wendt, Harry, Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'Highlighting our History: the World's First Solar Radiospectrograph - Penrith 1948-1949', ATNF news, 68 (2010), 8-11. Details
  • Stewart, Ronald, Wendt, Harry, Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'The Radiophysics Field Station at Penrith, New South Wales, and the World's first Solar Radiospectrograph', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 13 (1) (2010), 2-15. Details
  • Wendt, Harry, Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'The Australian Solar Eclipse Expeditions of 1947 and 1949', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 11 (1) (2008), 71-8. Details
  • Wendt, Harry, Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'W. N. Christiansen and the Development of the Solar Grating Array', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 11 (3) (2008), 173-84. Details
  • Wendt, Harry, Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'W. N. Christiansen and the Initial Australian Investigation of the 21cm Hydrogen Line', Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage, 11 (3) (2008), 185-93. Details
  • Wendt, Harry, Orchiston, Wayne and Slee, Bruce, 'Highlighting our History: Potts Hill Field Station, 1948- 1962', ATNF News, 66 (2009), 10-13. Details

Resource Sections

Helen Cohn

Last modified: 14 August 2018

EOAS ID: biogs/P005742b.htm

Except where otherwise noted, content on this site is
Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike 4.0 International License.
What do we mean by this?

Published by Swinburne University of Technology.
This Edition: 2024 November (Ballambar - Gariwerd calendar - early summer - season of butterflies)
Reference: http://www.bom.gov.au/iwk/calendars/gariwerd.shtml#ballambar
For earlier editions see the Internet Archive at: https://web.archive.org/web/*/www.eoas.info

The Encyclopedia of Australian Science and Innovation uses the Online Heritage Resource Manager (OHRM), a relational data curation and web publication system developed by the eScholarship Research Centre and its predecessors at the University of Melbourne 1999-2020. The OHRM has been maintained by Gavan McCarthy since 2020.

Cite this page: https://www.eoas.info/biogs/P005742b.htm

"... the rengitj, as a visible mark or imprint on the land, is characterised as a place of origin, the repository of all names, as well as a kind of mapped visual expression of the connection between people and places which is to be carried out in the temporal sequence of the journey." Fanca Tamisari (1998) 'Body, Vision and Movement: In the footprints of the ancestors'. Oceania 68(4) p260