Xuesen Qian
The life, and contributions of Xuesen Qian Work by Shizhe Chen on 12/3/2015
Personal Life
Qian Xuesen was born in Hangzhou, the capital of Zhejiang province. He left Hangzhou at the age of three, when his father obtained a post in the Ministry of Education in Beijing. Qian graduated from jiaotongUniversity in Shanghai in 1934 and received a degree in mechanical engineering, with an emphasis on railroad administration; he then spent an internship at Nanchang Air Force Base. In August 1935 Qian left China on a Boxer Rebellion Indemnity Scholarship to study mechanical engineering at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and earned a Master of Science degree from MIT a year later.
Career in the United States
In 1943, Qian and two others in the Caltech rocketry group drafted the first document to use the name Jet Propulsion Laboratory; it was a proposal to the Army for developing missiles in response to Germany‘s V-2 rocket. This led to the Private A, which flew in 1944, and later the Corporal, the WAC Corporal, and other designs.
Scientific Contributions
U.S. long-range rocket research program
The focus of the MIT program on practical applications was ill-suited to Qian, and in 1936 he left for the California Institute of Technology (Caltech) to study under research engineer Theodore von Kármán. In an age before computers, Qian’s ability to quickly perform complex calculations flawlessly was an invaluable asset to von Kármán and a nascent group of rocket scientists at Caltech, where Qian became a recognized expert in the study of aerodynamics and jet propulsion. He received his doctorate in aeronautics from Caltech in 1939. In 1943, during World War II, Qian helped prepare an analysis of the German rocket program for the U.S. Army, and at the war’s end he traveled to Germany as a U.S. Army colonel to debrief captured German rocket scientists, including Wernher von Braun. He helped create and organize the U.S. long-range rocket research program and directed research on the country’s first successful solid-fueled missile, the Private A.
Aerospace Science and Technology
Qian’s leadership role in the founding of the U.S. rocket program led to his appointment in 1956 as the director, and later deputy director, of the Fifth Academy of the Chinese Ministry of Defense (later reorganized as the Chinese Academy of Space Technology [CAST] with Qian as director in 1968). Qian was not directly responsible for the development of any specific missile, rocket engine, or satellite. He earned the imprimatur “the father of Chinese aerospace” because he personally trained the first generation of revolutionary China’s aerospace engineers. Qian’s loyalty to the Chinese Communist Party and his commitment to the revitalization of his homeland cemented his legacy as a scientific leader. His unquestioned political integrity and patriotic zeal were indispensable in helping the aerospace program acquire critical institutional and financial support throughout the turbulent political struggles of the Maoist era.
Other
Papers
Tsien HS Two-dimensional subsonic flow of compressible fluids Aeronaut. Sci. 1939
Von Karman T, Tsien HS. The buckling of thin cylindrical shells under axial compression. J Aeronaut Sci 1941
Tsien, HS 1943 Symmetrical Joukowsky Airfoils in shear flow. Q. Appl. Math.
Tsien, HS, "On the Design of the Contraction Cone for a Wind Tunnel," J. Aeronaut. Sci., 10, 68-70, 1943
Von Karman, T. and Tsien, HS, "Lifting- line Theory for a Wing in Nonuniform Flow," Quarterly of Applied Mathematics, Vol. 3, 1945
Tsien, HS: Similarity laws of hypersonic flows. J. Math. Phys. 25, 247-251, (1946).
Tsien, HS 1952 The transfer functions of rocket nozzles. J. Am. Rocket Soc
Tsien, HS, "Rockets and Other Thermal Jets Using Nuclear Energy", The Science and Engineering of Nuclear Power, Addison-Wesley Vol.11, 1949
Tsien, HS, “Take-Off from Satellite Orbit,” Journal of the American. Rocket Society, Vol. 23, No. 4, 1953
Tsien, HS 1956 The Poincaré-Lighthill-Kuo Method, Advances in Appl. Mech.
Tsien, HS, 1958, "The equations of gas dynamics."
Awards
In 1956, Qian put forward "Proposal on the Development of China's Aviation Industry for National Defense" and assisted Zhou Enlai, the then premiere, and Marshal Nie Rongzheng to prepare the establishment of China's first missile and rocket R&D structure, the Fifth Research Institute of State Ministry of Defense. In October 1956, Qian assumed office of director-general with the fifth research institute. Henceforth, Qian has long been in charge of the chief technological officer with the R&D of China's missile, rocket and spacecraft, and has contributed greatly to the establishment and development of China's missile, rocket and spacecraft undertakings. Qian is a forerunner pioneering the development of China's aerospace science and technology. He has been honored as "Father of China's Missile".
See also
Further reading
Einstein, His Life and Universe by Walter Issacson, 2007
The World as I See It by Albert Einstein, 1949
External links
http://kaleidoscope.cultural-china.com/en/185Kaleidoscope6382.html