Latin American archaeology, Asian cultural history, Arctic 

 studies, and Paleoindian/Paleoecology studies, as well as 

 the museum's American Indian Program and Repatriation 

 Office, the editorial staff of the Handbook of North American 

 Indians, and the collections of the National Anthropologi- 

 cal Archives and the Human Film Studies Archives. 



eluding the Sun, orbit and which is hidden from optical 

 view by dust between the stars, has been determined by 

 SAO radio astronomers and their colleagues to within 

 0.03 arcsecond, a measurement uncertainty equivalent 

 to less than the width of a penny as seen from a distance 

 of 65 kilometers. 



1997 



■ Discussion Program The Senate of Scientists of the 

 National Museum of Natural History presented an in- 

 formal discussion series to introduce the public to the 

 work of museum scientists and the research value of the 

 Smithsonian's incomparable collections. These Spotlights 

 on Research, held in museum exhibition galleries, 

 focused on such subjects as diversity among fishes; the 

 domestication of livestock and human history; the dif- 

 ference between tocks, minerals, and gems; the early 

 solar system; and the importance of seaweed in our lives. 



1997 



* Permanent Exhibition A collection of ceramics by 

 contemporary Korean masters, donated by the National 

 Museum of Korea, was added to the exhibits in the Na- 

 tional Museum of Natural History's Hall of Asian Peoples. 



January—December 



■ Anniversary In 1997, the National Museum of 

 African Art celebrated its 10th year on the National 

 Mall with a year's worth of special events. The celebra- 

 tion included the installation in the museum's pavilion 

 of kinetic sculptures by the contemporary Nigerian art- 

 ist Sokan Douglas Camp; special exhibitions and public 

 programs; and a Quadrangle-wide birthday party. 



January 



■ Research Based on satellite observations of x-ray bi- 

 nary stars, SAO scientists and their colleagues were able 

 to provide evidence supporting the existence of a pre- 

 viously theoretical phenomenon known as an "event 

 horizon," the one-way membrane surrounding a black 

 hole, and the boundary at which matter and energy, in- 

 cluding light, begin to fall into this gravitational trap. 



January 



■ Research The position on the sky of the center of the 

 Milky Way galaxy, a point around which all stars, in- 



January 



■ Publication The graphic results of a 20-year survey of 

 molecular clouds in the Milky Way conducted by two 

 identical 1.2-meter radio telescopes, one on the roof of 

 the observatory complex in Cambridge, MA, and the other 

 on a mountaintop in Chile, was published by SAO as a 

 large-scale color poster and made available to students, 

 researchers, and amateur astronomers worldwide. 



January 



■ Grant Mrs. Jefferson Patterson contributed funds to 

 the Smithsonian Institution Libraries to support for 

 three years the position of curator of Natural History 

 Rare Books in the Special Collections Deparrment. 

 Leslie K. Overstreet, who was appointed to the posi- 

 tion, is involved with the development of the projected 

 Natural History Rare Book Library now under construc- 

 tion in the East Court of the National Museum of 

 Natural History. 



January 



■ Corporate Membership The Smithsonian Institution 

 Libraries brought in Leonard Jaques of the Jaques Ad- 

 miralty Law Firm in Detroit as a Smithsonian Corporate 

 member at the $25,000 level. Jaques Admiralty is the 

 first member to be brought into the SCMP by a unit of 

 the Institution. 



January 



■ Agreements Several agreements were negotiated with 

 the Presidential Inaugural Committee for Inaugural 

 activities at Smithsonian sites and for other services 

 provided to the Inaugural Commirtee during the cele- 

 bration of the second inauguration of President Clinton. 



January 



■ Special Event Ten Smithsonian scholars reached more 

 than 7,000 people in nearly 100 presentations as part of 

 The Smithsonian Associates' Smithsonian Voices of Dis- 



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