And Hypersonic Flight

"After we have made Italy, we must make the Italians." It was in this spirit that the19th century scientists of the Italian Riemann school played a decisive role in theformation of the Italian nation state.Hydrodynamicsand theCourtesy of Adolf BusemannScientific Foundationsof theModern Italian Nationby Giuseppe FilipponiThe role of Leonardo da Vinci as father of the ItalianRenaissance and the political activity of Leibniz duringthe late 17th century clearly demonstrate thatscientific advancements are historically born of the politicalactivity required to build republican states committed toscientific, technological, and cultural advancements.This is exactly the case of the great hydrodynamic schoolthat was developed in Italy during the mid-19th centurywith the decisive contribution of Bernhard Riemann. Riemanncame from Gottingen University to Italy to spendParticipants at the 1935 European aerodynamics conferenceat Volta, Italy, a milestone in the development of supersonicflight. Ludwig Prandtl is fifth from left, first row.his last years in Pisa and Maggiore Lake. Enrico Betti, EugenioBeltrami, Felice Groiti, Francesco Brioschi, Luigi Cremona,Masotti, and Carlo Matteucci were the principalrepresentatives of this hydrodynamic school, and they hada decisive role in the political and military struggles thatdirectly led to the formation of the modern Italian state in1860.In fact, during the period 1840-1860, as a result of thework of some of these scientists, the Annual Congress ofItalian Scientists, which brought together scientists fromthroughout the Italian peninsula, became one of the centersof the patriotic conspiracy. The Congress was consideredso dangerous that two orders were issued in 1850—one by the Austrian governor of Lombardo-Veneto andthe other by the Vatican Curia—banning the future par-50 January-February 1986 FUSION