One of the earliest and most productive space scientists, Herbert Friedman has a distinguished record of scientific achievement and public service covering a period of more than five decades. A pioneer of rocket astronomy, he opened the study of the x-ray universe and led the way in research on solar- terrestrial relationships.
His fundamental research conducted with sensitive instruments on high altitude rockets in the 1940s and 50s and on earth orbiting satellites in the 1960s and 70s, has led to a comprehensive understanding of how solar x-rays vary on every time scale and moderate the electrified regions of the ionosphere. With an adventurous experiment carried out with rockets launched from shipboard, he proved that solar flares pro- duce bursts of high energy x-rays that create blackout of short radio waves.
His efforts to map the sky for celestial x-ray sources have led to the discovery of many x-ray stars, x-ray galaxies, and the x-ray pulsar in the Crab Nebula. By observing the lunar occultation of the Crab in 1964 he obtained the first positive identification of a discrete x-ray source with a known celestial object. In 1968 he obtained the first evidence of x-ray pulsations from the spinning neutron star at the center of the nebula. He was principal investigator for the NRL experiment on the first NASA High Energy Observatory, that produced an all-sky catalogue of about a thousand x-ray sources and showed their classification into a variety of astronomical objects.
In view of these achievements, the Cosmos Club takes a great pleasure in bestowing the 1996 Cosmos Club Award on Herbert Friedman, a distinguished scientist and Club member.
