The Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters (Danish: Det Kongelige Danske Videnskabernes Selskab or Videnskabernes Selskab) is a Danish academy of science. The Royal Danish Academy was established on November 13, 1742, and was created with the purpose of strengthening the position of Science in Denmark as well as promoting interdisciplinary understanding.
The Royal Danish Academy works as a body of cooperation and a meeting place for prominent scientists from all areas of basic scientific research. Its core activities consist of organizing the biweekly meetings for the academy's members, publishing scientific works, advising, and communicating, organizing and conducting events and lectures of a scientific character (e.g. public lectures and symposiums) as well as participating in international cooperation with other scientific academies and with scientific organizations like for example ISC and EASAC.
Since 1745, the Royal Danish Academy has had its own publishing company that is still, to this day, publishing scientific books, currently via four different series, all under the main title of Scientia Danica. A year after the publication of a scientific work, the publication is made available on the Publication Platform of the Royal Academy.
The Royal Danish Academy also administers several foundations and grants that provide financial support for different scientific work, e.g. research stays outside of Denmark.
In 2011, the Royal Danish Academy established the Young Academy (Danish: Det Unge Akademi or “DUA”) which acts as a scientific forum for excellent young researchers.
The Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters was established on November 13, 1742, with the wish of creating a “learned society”. Behind the establishment was Johan Ludvig Holstein (Count and titular Privy Councillor), Hans Gram (Counsellor, Royal Historiographer and Professor), Erik Pontoppidan (Professor of Theology) and Henrik Hielmstierne (Secretary of the Danish Chancellery), and the approbation for the establishment was given by King Christian the 6th of Denmark.
Between 1761 and 1843, The Royal Danish Academy undertook a geographical and trigonometrical measuring of Denmark and Schleswig-Holstein that resulted in no less than 24 published maps. Another project of that time was a Danish dictionary which was published in 8 volumes during the time of 1793–1905.
Throughout the years, part of the Royal Danish Academy's work has also consisted in making out prize essays and awarding medals (silver and gold) to scientists based on their solutions. To this very day, the Royal Danish Academy still carries out the awarding of different medals, however not based on prize essays.
From 1855 to 1899, the meetings of the Royal Danish Academy were held at Prinsens Palais (today the National Museum of Denmark, “Nationalmuseet”). Before then, the Royal Academy meetings took place at different venues, e.g. the private homes of some of the members. In 1899, the Royal Danish Academy moved into the new house of the Carlsberg Foundation, located on H.C. Andersens Boulevard in Copenhagen. Both the academy and the Carlsberg Foundation are still located here today. The building was designed by architect Vilhelm Petersen.
In 1876, brewer J.C. Jacobsen established the Carlsberg Foundation with the purpose of promoting science. Today, the Carlsberg Foundation's board of directors consists of five members of the academy, elected by the members themselves.
Marie Skłodowska-Curie was the first female ever to be elected as a member of the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters. In 1968, the first Danish female, Eli Fischer-Jørgensen, was elected as a member too.
Since its establishment in 1742, the Royal Danish Academy has kept a historical archive, and because of that, the academy today has a vast collection of scientific records and documents wherein one may find both portraits of members, handwritten letters and even never before published prize essays as well as a large number of models, diagrams, drawings and other scientific works. In 2019, the entire archives of the Royal Danish Academy was moved to the Danish National Archives (Danish: “Rigsarkivet”) and may be looked up via the public access platform Daisy.
Members
The Royal Danish Academy has about 250 national members and about 250 international members. The members are prominent scientists within both the humanities and social sciences as well as the natural sciences. Each year, a number of new members are elected, and these members will then either belong to the Class of the Humanities and Social Sciences or the Class of Natural Sciences. In even years, 9 new members of the Class of Natural Sciences are elected. In odd years, 6 new members of the Class of Humanities and Social Sciences are elected.
A presidium is elected from among the members and by the members themselves. The presidium is responsible for directing the Royal Danish Academy. It consists of a President (at present Professor Marie Louise Nosch), a Secretary General (at present Professor Thomas Sinkjær), an Editor (at present Professor Marianne Pade) and two Vice Presidents – each being the chairperson of one of the two classes respectively – as well as two class representatives, also one for each class.
Throughout the years, many prominent scientists have been a part of the Royal Danish Academy's presidium, counting no other than Professor Hans Christian Ørsted who acted as the Secretary General of the academy, and Professor Niels Bohr who acted as president from 1939 to 1962.
The presidium of the Royal Danish Academy carries out its work with assistance from the Royal Academy’s secretariat. The secretariat carries out the administrative functions underlying the Royal Danish Academy's purposes.
Aage Niels Bohr was a Danish nuclear physicist who shared the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1975 with Ben Roy Mottelson and James Rainwater "for the discovery of the connection between collective motion and particle motion in atomic nuclei and the development of the theory of the structure of the atomic nucleus based on this connection". Starting from Rainwater's concept of an irregular-shaped liquid drop model of the nucleus, Bohr and Mottelson developed a detailed theory that was in close agreement with experiments.
The University of Copenhagen is a prestigious public research university in Copenhagen, Denmark. Founded in 1479, the University of Copenhagen is the second-oldest university in Scandinavia after Uppsala University.
Johannes Japetus Smith Steenstrup FRS(For) HFRSE was a Danish zoologist, biologist, and professor.
Johan Ernst Gunnerus was a Norwegian bishop and botanist. Gunnerus was born at Christiania. He was bishop of the Diocese of Nidaros from 1758 until his death and also a professor of theology at the University of Copenhagen.
The Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters is a learned society based in Oslo, Norway. Its purpose is to support the advancement of science and scholarship in Norway.
Anders Sandøe Ørsted, also written as Anders Sandoe Oersted or Anders Sandö Örsted was a Danish botanist, mycologist, zoologist and marine biologist. He was the nephew of physicist Hans Christian Ørsted and of politician Anders Sandøe Ørsted.
Hans Christian Ørsted was a Danish physicist and chemist who discovered that electric currents create magnetic fields, which was the first connection found between electricity and magnetism. Oersted's law and the oersted unit (Oe) are named after him.
Carlsberg Foundation is a not-for-profit organization that was founded by J. C. Jacobsen in 1876, by allocating some of his shares in the Carlsberg Brewery to fund and operate the Carlsberg Laboratory and the Museum of National History at Frederiksborg Palace. The foundation has since expanded to fund scientific research, and via the Tuborg Foundation to fund social works. As of 2011 it owned 30.3% of the shares in Carlsberg Group and controlled 74.2% of the voting power.
Knud Jessen was a Danish botanist and quaternary geologist.
The Royal Norwegian Society of Sciences and Letters is a Norwegian learned society based in Trondheim. It was founded in 1760 and is Norway's oldest scientific and scholarly institution. The society's Protector is King Harald V of Norway. Its membership consists of no more than 435 members elected for life among the country's most prominent scholars and scientists.
Børge Christian Jessen was a Danish mathematician best known for his work in analysis, specifically on the Riemann zeta function, and in geometry, specifically on Hilbert's third problem.
David Favrholdt was a Danish philosopher, educated with M.A.s in psychology and philosophy and later Dr. Phil. from Copenhagen University. He is one of few Danes to be included in the International Who's Who.
Events from the year 1742 in Denmark.
Jens Kehlet Nørskov is the Villum Kann Rasmussen professor at the Technical University of Denmark. He is a Danish physicist most notable for his work on theoretical description of surfaces, catalysis, materials, nanostructures, and biomolecules.
Hans Gram was a Danish academic, philologist and historian.
Anja Cetti Andersen is an astronomer and astrophysicist from Hørsholm, Denmark.
Helge Stjernholm Kragh is a Danish historian of science who focuses on the development of 19th century physics, chemistry, and astronomy. His published work includes biographies of Paul Dirac, Julius Thomsen and Ludvig Lorenz, and The Oxford Handbook of the History of Modern Cosmology (2019) which he co-edited with Malcolm Longair.
A Meeting in the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters is a monumental 1897 oil-on-canvas group portrait painting by Peder Severin Krøyer, depicting the membership of Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters during one of its meetings in the Prince's Mansion in Copenhagen. The painting was commissioned by the Carlsberg Foundation in conjunction with the construction of its new building on H. C. Andersens Boulevard. Measuring 519.4 cm (204.5 in) wide and 266.7 cm (105.0 in) tall, it is Krøyer's largest painting.
Peter Kristian Prytz was a Danish physicist. He was a professor at the Technical University of Denmark from 1894 to 1921.
Thomas Sinkjær R is a Danish scientist and professor of neuroscience and technology at the Department of Health Science and Technology of Aalborg University, Denmark. He is the Secretary General of the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters and an elected fellow of the Danish Academy of Technical Sciences.
References
A Jubilee Celebratory Publication – The Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters 1742–2017, published 2017 by the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters.
Publication Platform of the Royal Danish Academy of Sciences and Letters (public access).
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