The second international conference of the NucTechPol project has taken place from January 31 – February 1, 2019, at the University of Berne, Switzerland.

For a printable version of the programme, see the conference poster (pdf).

Programme

Venue: Room 205, Hallerstrasse 6, 3012 Bern.

Thursday, January 31

09:45–10:15 Introduction | Julia Richers & Fabian Lüscher

Panel I: 10:15–12:00

Soviet Radiation Biology: Navigating Boundaries of Closed Worlds | Susanne Bauer, Oslo

“Atomic Reserve” in the Southern Urals | Laura Sembritzki, Heidelberg

Chair: Silvia Berger, Bern

Panel II: 13:30–15:15

Accelerated Relationships: The USSR and the Rise of Megascience in Cold War High-Energy Physics, 1956–1991 | Roman Khandozhko, Tübingen

Explosive Math: Soviet Mathematicians, the Bomb, and the International Community during the Cold War | Slava Gerovitch, Cambridge, MA

Chair: Carmen Scheide, Bern

Panel III:

15:45–17:30 Apollo-Soyuz Test Project: Mutual Perceptions, Interdependencies, Cooperative Efforts, and Transfers between the Space Programs of the U.S. and the Soviet Union in the 1970s | Darina Volf, Munich

Soviet Science at the Edge of Nuclear Apocalypse Performing “Star Wars” on the International Stage | Asif Siddiqi, New York

Chair: Julia Richers, Bern

Friday, February 1

Panel IV: 09:45–12:15

To Be Taken with a Grain of Salt. Nuclear-Powered Water Desalination in East, West and South (1961 to Present) | Stefan Guth, Tübingen

Trust, Passion and Compromise: ITER and the History of Nuclear Fusion Diplomacy | Anna Åberg, Göteborg

Disillusion about Fusion. Failure as an Asset to Soviet Nuclear Internationalism, 1956–1968 | Fabian Lüscher, Bern

Chair: Tanja Penter, Heidelberg

Panel V: 13:30–16:00

Putting Scientific Diplomacy into Words: Translation, Mediation and Public Communication in Cold War Big Science | Ksenia Tatarchenko, Geneva

Brains, Bombs, and Other Smart Nuclear Reactors | Benjamin Peters, Tulsa

A Global Industry. Transnational Entanglements of Soviet Computer Manufacturing | Felix Herrmann, Bremen

Chair: Klaus Gestwa, Tübingen

16:30–17:00 Final Discussion

Chair: Julia Richers & Fabian Lüscher