QUESTION:
Who or what was the Kuiper Airborne Observatory named after?

ANSWER from Ted Chandon on May 20:
The Kuiper Airborne Observatory is named for Gerard P. Kuiper, a
Dutch-born astronomer who became well known for numerous discoveries mainly
in the area of planetary astronomy.  He discovered several satellites of
planets, and pioneered the use of infrared (heat) detectors in astronomy.
It was while working on infrared planetary astronomy that he became
frustrated with the problem of obscuration by water vapor in the Earth's
atmosphere.  This is a particularly nasty problem if the astronomer is
trying to detect the small amount of water vapor on Mars, for example, while
peering through the much larger amounts of water vapor in the Earth's
atmosphere.  He surveyed high altitude, dry observatory sites in an effort
to reduce the amount of water vapor obscuration, and finally made use of a
NASA airplane (a Convair 990 which no longer exists) for some critical
observations.  His pioneering use of an airplane for astronomy is the reason
the Kuiper Airborne Observatory has the name it does.