In 1986 progress in helio- and asteroseismology motivated IAU Symposium No 123, almost precisely 40 years before the present workshop. As noted in the preface to the proceedings of that Symposium, “[the] last 10 years [had] witnessed a very rapid evolution of the study of the solar interior, [while] the stellar studies [appeared] poised to take off”. Dedicated facilities for observing solar oscillations were being established, including some later to be launched on the SoHO satellite, and efforts were on the way to detect solar-like oscillations in other stars, predicted to be present from the understanding of the excitation of the solar modes. In addition to solar and solar-like oscillations, the symposium also covered other types of pulsating stars, with white dwarfs already playing a prominent role.
The symposium gathered around 110 scientists. These included Bob Noyes, Eric Fossat, George Isaak and Franz Deubner who made the early detection of solar oscillations, and Douglas Gough, the father of helioseismology, together with others who had led the establishment of the field and the general study of pulsating stars such as Art Cox, an expert on classical Cepheids, and Don Kurtz, presenting early results on rapidly oscillating Ap stars. Many of the participants have since played leading roles in the further development of the seismology of the Sun and other stars. However, despite the optimism expressed 40 years ago, none could probably have foreseen back then the extent to which seismology has come to dominate stellar astrophysics.
