Measurements of the microwave background in Florence, Rome and Berkeley

Francesco Melchiorri began his scientific career as a condensed matter physicist. In the early 1970s he developed an interest in far infrared astrophysics and especially in measurements of the cosmic microwave background (CMB) radiation. First at Florence and later at Rome, his group made measurements of the spectrum of the CMB, the dipole and smaller scale anisotropies, and of the Sunyaev Zeldovich effect. At every stage of this process there were remarkable parallels between Francesco’s career at Florence and Rome and the Author’s career at Berkeley. This paper in honor of Francesco Melchiorri will describe some of these parallels, focusing on measurements of the CMB.