The High Frontier

Dr. Gerard K. O'Neill, Professor of Physics at Princeton University, works in the area of high-energy experimental particle physics. Since 1967 he has investigated the possibilities of space utilization to satisfy the world's needs for energy and raw materials. That interest was directed toward the possibility of employing, within the limits of present-day technology, materials and energy freely available in space to construct large manufacturing facilities and human communities in a very high orbit above the Earth. These communities would be the first step in the eventual human colonization of space.
Part of the World Affairs Series: Humankind in the 1980's