Bryan Priestman Memorial Lecture Series
The Bryan Priestman Memorial Lecture Series were established in 1946 to commemorate Bryan Priestman, a professor of physics at UNB who died in 1945 while attempting to save a boy from drowning in the Saint John River.
Date | Name of Lecturer | Title of Lecture(s) |
21 January 1952
22 January 22 January |
Harlow Shapley | "The Effect of Science on National Boundaries"
"The Cosmos" "Advanced Problems in Astronomy" |
4 March 1953
5 March 6 March |
James A. Corry | "Civil Liberties in Trying Times"
"Fair Hopes for Democracy" "The Demands of Democracy |
31 March 1954
1 April 2 April |
George Wald | "The Origin of Life"
"Atoms and Organisms" "Biochemical Evolution" |
2 March 1955
3 March 4 March |
George Gamow | "Evolution of the Stars"
"Origin of the Universe" "Biochemical Evolution" |
18 April 1956
19 April 20 April |
J.H. Quastel | "Influence of Biochemistry on Modern Life"
"Chemical Activities of the Soil" "Action of Drugs on Enzyme Systems" |
21 October 1957
22 October 23 October |
Linus Pauling | "Molecules in Relation to Disease"
"The Structure of Proteins" "Science in the Modern World" |
18 February 1959
19 February 20 February |
John Tuzo Wilson | "Results of the International Geophysical Year"
"Mountain Building and Continental Growth" "Radioactive Methods of Determining the Age of the Earth and Rocks" |
24 February 1960
25 February 26 February |
Robert Watson-Watt | "Scientists and Statesmen"
"Physics Is Not Enough" "Radar's Birthday" |
11 March 1963
12 March 13 March |
H.L. Keenleyside | "The World Around Us"
"Race, Colour, and the Commonwealth" "Democracy and Canada" |
9 March 1964
10 March 11 March |
Sydney Fox | "Theories of Biochemical Origins"
"Experimental Geosynthesis and the Origin of Cells" "Modern Extensions of Evolutionary Theory" |
29 March 1965
30 March 31 March |
Philip Morrison | "Like a Plain in Bohemia"
"The Plurality of Worlds" "A Discriminating Search" |
2 November 1966
3 November 4 November |
Har Gobind Khorana | "Nucleic Acid Synthesis"
"Genetic Code I" "Genetic Code II" |
24 March 1969
25 March 26 March |
John Wheeler | "The End of Time"
"The Strange Nature of Einstein's Space" "Our Universe: The Known and the Unknown" |
20 January 1970
21 January 22 January |
Edward Bullard | "The Rocks Beneath the Ocean"
"The Earth's Magnetic Field" "The New Geology: Ridges, Plates and Trenches" |
2 November 1970
3 November 4 November |
Zdenek Kopal | "Fundamental Properties of the Moon and its Internal Structure"
"Surface of the Moon and its Composition" "Age and Evolution of the Moon" |
20 March 1972
21 March 22 March |
Robert C. Gallo | "Tumor viruses, theories of viral oncogenesis and relevance to man"
"Reverse transcriptase: the DNA polymerase of oncogenic RNA viruses" "The Leukemic Cell" |
18 March 1974
19 March 20 March |
Gerhard Herzberg | "The Space Between the Stars"
"Spectra of Molecular Ions" "Experimental Tessets of the Quantium Theory of Molecular Hydrogen" |
29 March 1976
30 March 31 March |
Matthew S. Meselson | "The Replication and Mutation of DNA - mutation and cancer"
"Recombination and Rearrangement of Genes" "The Eukaryotic Gene - Why is it so large?" |
17 October 1977
18 October 19 October |
William S. Fyfe | "Global Resources: The Evolution of the Earth's Crust"
"Fluid motion, Chemical Transport and Ore Deposits" "Geosphere Interaction; Global Mixing" |
1978 - 1979 | None | |
17 March 1980
18 March 19 March |
William Nunn Lipscomb | "How do Enzymes Work?"
"Regulatory Processes at the Molecular Level in Proteins and Enzymes" "Boranes and Carboranes" |
19 October 1981
20 October 20 October |
Rosalyn Yalow | "Radioactivity in the Service of Man"
"Radiation: Are There Safe Levels?" "An Introduction to Radioimmunoassay" |
19 September 1983
20 September 21 September |
Arthur L. Schawlow | "Lasers and their Uses"
"Spectroscopy in a New Light" "Frontiers in Laser Spectroscopy" |
15 October 1986
16 October 16 October |
Ursula Franklin | "Archaeometry, A New Interdisciplinary Field"
"Cooperative Research Among Scientists, Archaeologists and Historians: What Happens in Real Life" "Women's Contributions in Science and Technology" |
6 October 1988
7 October |
John Polanyi | "Groping Towards Discovery"
"New Directions in Reaction Dynamics" |
7 February 1990
8 February 9 February |
F. Kenneth Hare | "Nature Under Attack: Learning How To Survive"
"The Preservation of Nature: The Role of the Changing Climate" "Energy Options: Public Safety and Environmental Changes" |
17 October 1990
18 October 19 October |
Ronald L. Graham | "Computers and Mathematics: Coping with Finiteness"
"The Shortest Network Problem" "Quasi-random Graphs" |
16 October 1991
17 October 18 October |
John Maynard Smith | "The Evolution of Sex"
"The Major Transitions in Evolutions" "The Evolution of Bacteria: Does Sex Matter?" |
8 October 1992
9 October |
Roger Penrose | "Computability and the Mind"
"Magic Dodecahedra and the Mystery of Quantum Entanglement" |
14 April 1994
15 April |
Rudolph Marcus | "Life in Science: Interaction of Theory and Experiment"
"Electron Transfer Reactions in Chemistry and Biology" |
14 November 1994
15 November |
Eugene Shoemaker | "Large-body Impacts Are a Cause for Mass Extinctions"
"The Crash of Periodic Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9 on Jupiter" |
30 October 1995
31 October |
John H. Conway | "Calendar Calisthenics"
"The Symmetries of Things" |
17 October 1997
18 October |
Michael Smith | "Chemistry and Genetics"
"The First Stages of DNA Sequencing in the Human Genome Project" |
20 May 1999
21 May |
Harrison Hagan Schmitt | "Back to the Moon and Beyond"
Untitled technical lecture |
13 September 2006
14 September 15 September |
Harold Kroto | "Science, Society and Sustainability"
"Enlightenment Under Threat - Can it Be Saved by the Internet?" "Architecture in NanoSpace" |
18 September 2012 | Christopher J. Wild | "It's a Great Story, but is it True?" |
Source(s):
- UA Case 208.
- UNB Scrapbook (UA RG 100), 1 January - 31 March 1969.
- UNB Scrapbook (UA RG 100), 1 March - 30 April 1974.
© UNB Archives & Special Collections, 2014