IGY IN RETROSPECT—ROBERTS 267 
ray studies were important for their implications regarding solar and 
geophysical effects, especially in relation to magnetic fields of the sun, 
the earth, and space, and to cosmic-ray interactions with the atmos- 
phere. Latitude and longitude work was directed to improve time 
determinations and star catalogs and to determine the irregularities 
of the earth’s rotation. Glaciological and oceanographic work, orig- 
inally considered not to be of synoptic nature, and therefore of minor 
IGY significance, eventually grew into major projects because of their 
importance in the heat balance and chemical problems of meteorology. 
Oceanography in particular loomed large because of the intimate 
relations of the oceans to many problems of weather and terrestrial 
dynamics and because of the vast natural resources of the oceans. 
Emphasis throughout was placed on worldwide views of all these geo- 
physical phenomena, and particularly on intensive investigations in 
little-known Antarctica. 
THE OPERATION OF IGY ANNEX VII 
; NATIONAL INTERNATIONAL Wor-p Data RESEARCH AND Pustica- 
AL PERIOD 
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Ficure 1 
Inevitably many other detailed aspects of these disciplines, as 
well as entirely new and unanticipated problems, demanded attention 
before the IGY was even well started. While the original concept, 
derived from the polar-year experiences, envisioned a program con- 
centrating on synoptic problems, secondary objectives presented them- 
selves and were admitted to provide for types of work that would be 
facilitated by the basic IGY activities, or that could constitute epochal 
measurements for secular change studies. 
ORGANIZATION OF THE IGY 
One of the first aims of CSAGI was to enlist the cooperation of as 
many countries as possible—ideally all scientifically competent na- 
tions. At one of the formal meetings of CSAGI at Rome in 1954, 
