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Luigi Gussalli (1885–1950), engineer and inventor, was a pioneer of motor cars. He turned to astronautics in the 20’s, corresponding with world leaders in this field, such as Oberth and Goddard and exchanging with them theories on interplanetary flight and its prospects. He developed a special double-reaction engine, wrote extensively on multi-stage rockets and published two books on space travel. The first one, in 1923, described a space flight to the Moon, the second one, written in 1946, is even more astonishing in its theme: “Interplanetary travels by means of solar radiations”. == Biography == Gussalli was born in Bologna (Northern Italy) on Dec. 18, 1885. From his earliest years he evinced a knack for mechanical engineering, building as he was a teenager, mechanical toys, steam-engined model cars and real model aeroplanes capable of flight. Like many astronautic pioneers, he was a keen reader of Science Fiction literature and “in his backyard he experimented with the launching of rockets, single, multiple, loaded with ballast, registering their behaviour in flight, their ascent, more or less straight, and extracting theories from such observations” as his friend Luigi Rossetti reports. Judging engineering diplomas ‘too much theoretical and mathematical’, he studied physics at Pavia and later at the Glons-Lieges Polytechnic in Belgium where he became an industrial engineer. Around the same years he started patenting inventions on many kinds of transport. During an Air Show in Montechiari, he got acquainted with the most famous flyers of the time, such as Blériot and Ghedi, and took to motor racing. In 1915 he served in World War I as a car driver, and then moved on to the Testing Commission as an engineer. After World War I he devoted himself entirely to his inventions. In 1923, his book, "Can We Attempt a Space Journey to the Moon?" stirred quite an interest in the media which start comparing his experiences in rocketry to those of the USA scientist Goddard and the French Esnault-Pelterie. In 1930, at the 19th Convention of the Italian Society for the Progress of Sciences, he read his paper on 'Astronautics and Jet Propulsion' and suggested awarding an International Prize for Astronautical Altitude to foster enthusiasm 'towards Astronautics, so little known in Italy'. His suggestion was vetoed by the Scientific Committee of the Convention. The years between the two World Wars were to see an increasingly hostile relationship between Gussalli and the academic world and state institutions: he would often accuse the many scientific committees of shortsightedness, apathy and lack of intuition. These were also the years in which he was in regular correspondence with Goddard and Oberth. In 1941 he published his second book, 'Jet Propulsion for Astronautics: Reduction of Fuel Consumption Makes Possible Human Navigation in Space' or… Makes Space Exploration a Reality?', suggesting the use of a 'solar engine' as an auxiliary motor. Then he drew plans for a stratospheric airship. Between 1942 and the end of World War II he wrote his last book: 'Interplanetary Travel through Solar Radiations: a Fuel-Free Propulsion System (that needs no fuel) is the Key to Interplanetary Travel'. The book was published in 1946, both in Italian and English, drawing more attention abroad than in Italy. His last writing dates from June 1949. He addressed a letter to the Italian National Center for Research, the historical Accademia dei Lincei and the Italian Society for the Progress of Sciences, underlining analogies between his writings and the experiments being performed in the USA at the time on multiple-stage rockets, spaceships spinning on their axes to create artificial gravity and the development of a solar engine to power spacecraft. This letter, which is regarded as his last will and testament, in scientific terms, ends on a sour note, with him blaming the Italian scientific milieu for its disinterest in his theories. He died on June 23, 1950, at Barbano di Salo' in Northern Italy. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Luigi Gussalli」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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