The Radio Research Board was formed by the Department of Scientific and Industrial Research in 1920. The Radio Research Station (1924 – 31 August 1979) at

Ditton Park Ditton Park, Ditton Manor House or Ditton Park House was the manor house and private feudal demesne of the lord of the Manor of Ditton, Slough, Ditton, and refers today to the rebuilt building and smaller grounds towards the edge of the town of S ...

, Near Slough, Berkshire, England was the UK government research laboratory which pioneered the regular observation of the ionosphere by

ionosonde An ionosonde, or chirpsounder, is a special radar for the examination of the ionosphere. The basic ionosonde technology was invented in 1925 by Gregory Breit and Merle A. Tuve and further developed in the late 1920s by a number of prominent phys ...

s. In continuous operation from 20 September 1932, it applied the ionosonde technology for the early developments which led to the British Chain Home radar system, operational during World War II. In 1965, it was renamed the Radio and Space Research Station, to reflect its increasing role in space research. In 1974, it became the Appleton Laboratory, in honour of

Sir Edward Victor Appleton Sir Edward Victor Appleton (6 September 1892 – 21 April 1965) was an English physicist, Nobel Prize winner (1947) and pioneer in radiophysics. He studied, and was also employed as a lab technician, at Bradford College from 1909 to 1911. He ...

, who had received the 1947 Nobel prize for his work on the ionosphere and who had long been associated with the station's research. In 1979, the laboratory merged with the Rutherford Laboratory to form the

Rutherford Appleton Laboratory The Rutherford Appleton Laboratory (RAL) is one of the national scientific research laboratories in the UK operated by the Science and Technology Facilities Council (STFC). It began as the Rutherford High Energy Laboratory, merged with the Atlas ...

and over the next three years moved from Ditton Park to

Chilton, Oxfordshire Chilton is a village and civil parish in the Vale of White Horse about southwest of Didcot. The parish was part of Berkshire until the 1974 local government boundary changes transferred the Vale of White Horse to Oxfordshire. The 2011 Census ...

References

External links

* http://www.datchethistory.org.uk/space%20research%20ditton/appleton.htm * https://www.gracesguide.co.uk/Radio_Research_Station Radar History of Buckinghamshire Government agencies established in 1924 Research institutes established in 1924 1924 establishments in England Government research Government of the United Kingdom Research institutes in Buckinghamshire {{UK-gov-stub