someway off. However, in due course their adoption, for example, to predict the fluid flow and manoeuvring behaviour of a deeply submerged travelling submarine or, the self propelled efficiency of a ship design in calm water will be a regular part of the role of a naval architect. Te complexity of these types of problems increases very significantly when the vessel is in the vicinity of an irregular free surface. It therefore follows that the prediction of all ship motion and wave loading responses associated with a flexible ship structure travelling in an irregular seaway is limited to grand challenge exercises using the largest computers. Model experimental data and mathematical model predictions


both provide approximate solutions to fluid-structure interaction problems. The approximation in experiments arises because of accuracy of measurement, signal processing analysis, the difficulty in satisfying the disparate corresponding requirements of wave and viscous effects at model and full scale, etc whereas the mathematical model depends on initial theoretical assumptions and the developed numerical scheme of study which influence solution. Both approaches are of equal importance in the accumulation of knowledge through observation of physical interaction mechanisms, data, etc which the mathematical model should replicate together with defining the behaviour characteristics of the solution within the experimental range and its trends beyond, without contradicting the initial assumptions.


Concluding remarks Since its formation in 1860, the Institution has been at the forefront of developments in naval architecture. It has provided a learned society for the dissemination of information through its roles in education, discussion forums and professional publications. Changes continue to occur in the profession and the importance of these roles increases as ship types evolve to support world trade. With approximately 95% of commodities and manufactured goods transported by sea, shipping underpins worldwide economic growth and the shipping industry has been very successful in carrying goods from manufacturing centres to markets at low cost and thus contribute to the economics of the respective countries through employment by manufacturer to booms in sales at markets. The synthesis of the applied engineering problems resulting from real ship design and the advances in mathematical theory, modelling and understanding have been fundamental to the ability to design larger, more structurally complex and ever more efficient ships of a multiplicity of form and function. For such progress to continue requires the Royal Institution to raise standards in the profession and naval architecture education to focus on the fundamentals of science, engineering and operational management so that there is a full appreciation of the growing spheres of influence in which the naval architect interacts.


Professor W.G. Price was President of the Royal Institution of Naval Architects from 2004 to 2006.


Dr D.A. Hudson, Professor P. Temarel and Dr S.R. Turnock are members of the School of Engineering Sciences at the University of Southampton


The First Transactions Paper


Over 5000 technical and scientific papers have been published in the Institution’s Transactions, recording the development of ship and offshore design and construction. The first paper published by the Institution of Naval Architects in its Transaction of 1860 was “On The Present State of The Mathematical Theory of Naval Architecture” by The Rev. Joseph Woolley, a founding member of the Institution. The paper was read at the first meeting of the opening Session of the Institution, on Thursday, 1 March, 1860. In 1860, and for some years afterwards, it was not the


practice to preface a paper with a summary, but the paper opened with the following paragraphs:


“On The Present State of the Mathematical Theory of Naval Architecture”


“The subject of the present Paper is one of very considerable magnitude, and I can here pretend to do nothing more than give a very imperfect sketch of it ; indeed, I shall confine myself entirely to that branch of it which treats of the construction and behaviour of ships. I can only wish, for the sake of the science of naval architecture, that the subject were more extensive than it is. It must, unfortunately, be conceded that the mathematical theory of that science is in a very imperfect state, and that some of the most important and interesting problems have hitherto eluded the grasp of the geometer and physicist. One of the chief benefits to be looked for from the Institution of Naval Architects, which we are inaugurating to-day, is a more systematic inquiry into the laws of nature on which the motions of a vessel at sea depend than has hitherto been attempted, an inquiry that shall furnish to the mathematician satisfactory data on which he may found his calculations. The great and hitherto insurmountable difficulty has been the discovery of these laws. I think it right, however, to assert at the outset, that


the practice of naval architecture owes more to mathematical investigation than might be inferred from the very limited number of problems directly affecting the form of ships which scientific inquiry has furnished. Even erroneous theories _ theories, I mean, founded on laws known to be more or less unsound have done, and continue to do, good service; and general reasoning on mechanical principles as applied to ships, although incapable of being put into the accurate language of analysis, has been, and may still be, the means of preserving the scientific builder from errors of a grave kind, and of guiding him to the construction of vessels with a fair share of the good qualities he wishes to impart to her……..”


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