Center for Short-Lived Phenomena

Last updated

The Center for Short-Lived Phenomena (CSLP) was an office at the Smithsonian Institution from 1968 to 1975 [1] designed to assist Smithsonian scientists in studying unusual short-lived natural phenomena such as meteorite impacts, volcanic events, earthquakes, and unusual ecological events such as plagues, extinctions, fish rains, and the effects of oil spill events. [2]

CSLP published a series of scientific reports on unusual phenomena, as well as a 1972 paperback collection of unusual phenomena entitled Strange, Sudden, and Unexpected: True stories from the files of the Smithsonian Institution's Center for Short-lived Phenomena ( ISBN   0-590-09380-0), which covered topics including:

CSLP restructured in 1975, with some activities moved to other portions of the Smithsonian to become the Scientific Event Alert Network, and eventually the Global Volcanism Program. [4] Some of its activities and data were subsequently maintained and operated as an independent non-profit entity under the Center for Short-Lived Phenomena name. CSLP was hired by Cahners Publishing Co. (since acquired by Reed-Elsevier) in 1977 to provide the pilot editorial content for the Oil Spill Intelligence Report newsletter. That publication was the first for Cahners' Newsletter Center business unit, later spun off as Cutter Information Corp (now Cutter Consortium). CSLP continued under contract to Cahners and then Cutter for such content for several years.

The CSLP features as a plot point in Renata Adler's influential novel Speedboat.

Related Research Articles

Nevado del Ruiz Volcanic mountain in Colombia

The Nevado del Ruiz, also known as La Mesa de Herveo is a volcano on the border of the departments of Caldas and Tolima in Colombia, about 129 kilometers (80 mi) west of the capital city Bogotá. It is a stratovolcano composed of many layers of lava alternating with hardened volcanic ash and other pyroclastic rocks. Volcanic activity at Nevado del Ruiz began about two million years ago, since the Early Pleistocene or Late Pliocene, with three major eruptive periods. The current volcanic cone formed during the present eruptive period, which began 150,000 years ago.

Mount Redoubt Volcanic cone in the United States

Redoubt Volcano, or Mount Redoubt, is an active stratovolcano in the largely volcanic Aleutian Range of the U.S. state of Alaska. Located at the head of the Chigmit Mountains subrange in Lake Clark National Park and Preserve, the mountain is just west of Cook Inlet, in the Kenai Peninsula Borough about 110 miles (180 km) southwest of Anchorage. At 10,197 feet (3,108 m), in just over 5 miles (8 km) Mount Redoubt attains 9,150 feet (2,700 m) of prominence over its surrounding terrain. It is the highest summit in the Aleutian Range. In 1976, Redoubt Volcano was designated as a National Natural Landmark by the National Park Service.

Bud Dajo

Bud Dajo, is the second highest point (+600m) in the province of Sulu, Philippines. it is one of the cinder cones that make up the island of Jolo and part of the Jolo Volcanic Group in the Republic of the Philippines. The extinct volcano is located 8 kilometres (5.0 mi) southeast from the town of Jolo in Sulu province. The mountain and adjacent lands were declared as Mount Dajo National Park in 1938.

Mount Rinjani

Mount Rinjani is an active volcano in Indonesia on the island of Lombok. Administratively the mountain is in the Regency of North Lombok, West Nusa Tenggara. It rises to 3,726 metres (12,224 ft), making it the second highest volcano in Indonesia.

Mount Talang

Mount Talang is an active stratovolcano in West Sumatra, Indonesia. Talang has two crater lakes on its flanks, the largest of which is 1 x 2 km wide and is called Lake Talang.

Babuyan Claro Volcano

Babuyan Claro Volcano, also known as Mount Pangasun, is a potentially active volcano located on Babuyan Island, the northernmost of the Babuyan group of islands in Luzon Strait, north of the main island of Luzon in the Philippines. It is classified as one of the active volcanoes of the country with the last confirmed eruption in 1860.

Camiguin de Babuyanes

Camiguin de Babuyanes is an active stratovolcano on Camiguin Island, part of the Babuyan Islands group that is located in Luzon Strait, north of the island of Luzon, in the Philippines. The volcano and the island is within the jurisdiction of the municipality of Calayan, in the province of Cagayan.

Smith Volcano

Smith Volcano, also known as Mount Babuyan, is a cinder cone on Babuyan Island, the northernmost of the Babuyan group of islands on Luzon Strait, north of the main island of Luzon in the Philippines. The mountain is one of the active volcanoes in the Philippines, which last erupted in 1924.

Peuët Sagoë

Peuet Sague is a volcanic complex in the northwest of Sumatra, Indonesia. The name peuet sagoe in Acehnese means four square. The location of the volcanic complex is isolated that needs several journeys on foot from the nearest village to reach the mountain. There are four summits in the complex that all of them are located in the Sigli Regency, Aceh Province. One of the lava dome is called Mount Tutung and it has 70 metres (230 feet) diameter and 80 meters (262.5 feet) deep of an active crater.

Mount Papandayan

Mount Papandayan is a complex stratovolcano, located in Garut Regency, to the southeast of the city of Bandung in West Java, Indonesia. It is about 15 km to the southwest of the town of Garut. At the summit, there are four large craters which contain active fumarole fields. An eruption in 1772 caused the northeast flank to collapse producing a catastrophic debris avalanche that destroyed 40 villages and killed nearly 3,000 people. The eruption truncated the volcano into a broad shape with two peaks and a flat area 1.1 km wide with Alun-Alun crater in the middle, making the mountain appear as a twin volcano; one of the peaks is called Papandayan and the other Mount Puntang.

Volcanism of Canada

The volcanism of Canada is represented by many types of landform including lava flows, volcanic plateaus, lava domes, cinder cones, stratovolcanoes, shield volcanoes, submarine volcanoes, calderas, diatremes, and maars, along with examples of more less common volcanic forms such as tuyas and subglacial mounds. It has a very complex volcanic history spanning from the Precambrian eon at least 3.11 billion years ago when this part of the North American continent began to form.

Bob Citron American businessman

Robert A. Citron, often called Bob Citron was an American entrepreneur and aerospace engineer who was born in Brooklyn, New York, and educated at the University of the Philippines and aeronautical engineering from Northrop University (1953–1959). Citron helped establish and manage the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory’s Operation Moonwatch and Precision Optical Satellite Tracking Programs (STP) after the launch of Sputnik I in 1957. He founded or co-founded five companies dealing with documentary film production, publishing, space research and space logistics support, reusable satellite launch systems, and Lunar transportation and logistics. Citron also started three nonprofit foundations dealing with scientific field research. He died on January 31, 2012, at his home in Bellevue, Washington, at the age of 79, due to complications from prostate cancer.

Volcanism of New Zealand

The volcanism of New Zealand has been responsible for many of the country's geographical features, especially in the North Island and the country's outlying islands.

Global Volcanism Program American research program

The Smithsonian Institution's Global Volcanism Program (GVP) documents Earth's volcanoes and their eruptive history over the past 10,000 years. The GVP reports on current eruptions from around the world as well as maintaining a database repository on active volcanoes and their eruptions. In this way, a global context for the planet's active volcanism is presented. Smithsonian reporting on current volcanic activity dates back to 1968, with the Center for Short-Lived Phenomena (CSLP). The GVP is housed in the Department of Mineral Sciences, part of the National Museum of Natural History, on the National Mall in Washington, D.C.

Mount Santo Tomas

Mount Santo Tomas is a potentially active stratovolcano in the Philippines located in the municipality of Tuba in the province of Benguet.

The Jolo Group of Volcanoes, more commonly referred to as the Jolo Group, are an active group of volcanoes in the island of Jolo in Southern Philippines. The Global Volcanism Program lists Jolo as one of the active volcanoes in the Philippines while the Philippine Institute of Volcanology and Seismology (PHIVOLCS) collectively list the group as Bud Dajo, one of the cinder cones on the island.

Volcanoes of the World was a book that was published in three editions in 1981, 1994, and 2010 as a collaboration between volcanologists around the world, and the Smithsonian Institution's Global Volcanism Program (GVP).

References

  1. ↑ Small, Lawrence M. (February 2002). "Keepers of the Flames". Smithsonian.
  2. ↑ "Record Unit 607: Center for Short-lived Phenomena (Cambridge, Massachusetts), Records, 1968-1974". Finding Aids to Official Records of the Smithsonian Institution. Smithsonian Institution Archives.
  3. ↑ "Metis Shoal". Global Volcanism Program . Smithsonian Institution.
  4. ↑ "About Volcanic Activity Reports". Global Volcanism Program . Smithsonian Institution.


This page is based on this Wikipedia article
Text is available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 license; additional terms may apply.
Images, videos and audio are available under their respective licenses.