The proceedings of the Second European Meeting on "New Aspects of MagellanicCloud Research" review the most recent progress in the study of the LMC and SMC. The activities within the ground-based ESO key programme "Coordinated Investigations of Selected Regions in the Magellanic Clouds", as well as new exciting observations from space missions (ROSAT, IUE, ISO, IRAS) result in a more profound insightinto the structure, kinematics, populations (stars, clusters, interstellar medium), and the chemical composition and evolution of the Magellanic Cloud system. The book addresses researchers and graduate students in astrophysics.

In order to bring the scientific events of the meetings of the Astronomische Gesellschaft (AG) to the attention of the worldwide astronomical community, an annual publication, Reviews in Modern Astronomy, was established. It is devoted exclusively to . the invited reviews, the Karl Schwarz schild lectures, and the high light contributions from leading scientists reporting on recent progress and scientific achievements at their respective institutes. This third volume continues the yearbook series of publications of the society. It comprises the complete set of contributions presented during the spring meeting of the AG at Berlin in March 1990, which was dedicated to the topic "Accretion and Winds." In addition four latecomers (two review and two highlight papers) delivered at the fall meeting at Graz, Austria in September 1989 close this volume. Heidelberg, September 1990 G: Klare Contents Some New Elements in Accretion Disk Theory By F. Meyer (With 5 Figures) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1 Mass Transfer and Evolution in Close Binaries By A. R. King (With 4 Figures) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 14 Radiation Hydrodynamics of the Boundary Layer of Accretion Disks in Cataclysmic Variables By W. Kley (With 6 Figures) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 21 Curious Observations of Cataclysmic Variables By F. V. Hessman (With 10 Figures) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 32 Accretion in AM Herculis Stars 44 By A. D. Schwope (With 12 Figures) X-ray Diagnostics of Accretion Disks By G. Hasinger (With 12 Figures) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 60 Accretion Phenomena at Neutron Stars By A. Rebetzky, H. Herold, U. Kraus, H. -P. Nollert, and H. Ruder (With 13 Figures) . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . ."

This second volume of Reviews in Modern Astronomy continues the new series of publications of the Astronomische Gesellschaft (AG). In order to bring the scientific events of the meetings of the society to the attention of the worldwide astronomical community, it was decided to devote a new annual publication, Reviews in Modern Astronomy, exclusively to the invited reviews, the Karl Schwarzschild lectures, and the highlight contributions from leading scientists reporting on recent progress and scientific achievements at their institutes. Volume 2 comprises the contributions presented during the spring meet- ing of the AG at Friedrichshafen in April 1989, which was dedicated to the topic "Astrophysics with Modern Technology - Space-based and Ground-based Systems", as well as those delivered at the fall meeting at Graz, Austria in September 1989. The Karl Schwarzschild lectures constitute a special series by outstanding scientists honoured with the Karl Schwarzschild medal of the Astronomische Gesellschaft. Between 1959 and 1987 the following scientists presented Karl Schwarzschild lectures at meetings of the Astronomische Gesellschaft: Martin Schwarzschild (1959) George Field (1978) Charles Fehrenbach (1963) Ludwig Biermann (1980) Maarten Schmidt (1968) Bohdan Paczynski (1981) Bengt Stromgren (1969) Jean Delhaye (1982) Antony Hewish (1971) Donald Lynden-Bell (1983) Jan H. Oort (1972) Daniel M. Popper (1984) Corne lis de Jager (1974) Subrahmanyan Chandrasekhar (1986) Lyman Spitzer Jr.

The annual meeting of the Astronomische Gesellschaft in Cologne, June 1988, featured extensive reviews of the chemical processes relevant to astrophysics. The twelve contributions to this book, written by experts from the US, UK, France, Belgium, Switzerland and Germany, deal in depth with the chemistry of comets and meteorites, of stars and their shells, of the interstellar medium and galaxies. A comprehensive review of nucleosynthesis and two reports on observations round off an up-to-date presentation of cosmic chemistry.

The International Scientific Spring Meeting of the Astronomische Ge sellschaft (AG) held at Bamberg in April 1991 was devoted to "Vari abilities in Stars and Galaxies." Time-dependent phenomena are observed in a wide range of as tronomical objects. They are caused by different physical mechanisms (for example by pulsation, by accretion, or by dramatic eruptive events in connection with mass outflow) producing observable intensity vari ations through all wavelengths. Many of the papers in this volume are concerned with galactic stars showing such behaviour (for ex ample cataclysmic variables, symbiotic stars, luminous blue variables (LBVs) and novae). Intrinsic variations of the, magnetic field struc ture on observable time scales are, for instance, a peculiarity of cool, solar-like stars and represent a useful tool to study differential rotation and cycles of activity. Recent results on the investigation of gas motions in the inner regions of the Milky Way system, a study of the bipolar galaxy M 82, observations of variable extragalactic radio sources, the variability of emission lines in active galactic nuclei (AGN) as well as continuum variations of quasars and AGN are discussed by several authors. The yearbook series Reviews in Modern Astronomy of the AG to bring the scientific events of the was established in 1988 in order meetings of the society to the attention of the worldwide astronomical community."

The yearbook series Reviews in Modern Astronomy of the Astronomische Gesell three years ago in order to bring the scientific events schaft (AG) was established of the meetings of the society to the attention of the worldwide astronomical community. Reviews in Modern Astronomy is devoted exclusively to the invited reviews, the Karl Schwarzschild lectures, and the highlight contributions from leading scientists reporting on recent progress and scientific achievements at their research institutes. Volume 4 comprises all, eighteen contributions which were presented during the fall meeting of the AG at Preiburg/Breisgau in September 1990. They cover problems in solar research and the solar system as well as the first results of the ROSAT and Hipparcos space missions, stellar and extragalactic studies, and Supernova 1987A in the Large Magellanic Cloud. The Karl Schwarzschild Medal was awarded to Professor Eugene Parker1. His lecture entitled "Convection, Spontaneous Discontinuities, and Stellar Winds and X-Ray Emis*sion" begins this volume.