X-Nico

unusual facts about astronomers



127 Johanna

127 Johanna is a large, dark main-belt asteroid that was discovered by French astronomers Paul Henry and Prosper Henry on November 5, 1872, and is believed to be named after Joan of Arc.

14339 Knorre

It is named after the Knorre family of astronomers, including Viktor Knorre.

147397 Bobhazel

Bob Sealy founded the Seaside Amateur Astronomers Club and taught astronomy at Clatsop Community College in Astoria, Oregon.

63 Ophiuchi

In 1983, astronomers from the Sternberg Astronomical Institute in Moscow, Russia identified a faint, shell-shaped nebula surrounding the star that was being excited by the star's energy.

AB Doradus moving group

In 2012, a group of astronomers announced the discovery of CFBDSIR 2149-0403, a purported "free-floating planet" between 4 and 7 times the mass of Jupiter that appeared to be part of the moving group.

Andrew Fraknoi

Since 1999, Fraknoi has organized and moderated the Silicon Valley Astronomy Lecture Series, where noted astronomers from around California and the nation give nontechnical public talks on new developments in our exploration of the universe in the large Smithwick Theater at Foothill College.

Atlas Coelestis

Finally, the changes in the positions of stars (the original observations were made in the 1690s), led to an update made in the 1770s by the French engineer Jean Nicolas Fortin, supervised by the astronomers Le Monnier and Messier, from the Royal Academy of Sciences in Paris.

Chinese constellations

Ancient Chinese astronomers designated names to the visible stars systematically, roughly more than one thousand years before Johann Bayer did it in a similar way.

Clabon Allen

Allen observed the 1 October 1940 solar eclipse in South Africa and obtained important results on the solar corona, including measurements of its electron density which were to prove invaluable to radio astronomers.

Earth's orbit

Mathematicians and astronomers (such as Laplace, Lagrange, Gauss, Poincaré, Kolmogorov, Vladimir Arnold, and Jürgen Moser) have searched for evidence for the stability of the planetary motions, and this quest led to many mathematical developments, and several successive 'proofs' of stability for the solar system.

Eudemus of Rhodes

Philosophers and astronomers treated by Eudemus include Thales, Anaximander, Anaximenes, Oenopides, Eudoxus, and others.

Frontiers of Astrobiology

Frontiers of Astrobiology is a non-fiction book edited by astronomers Chris Impey, Jonathan Lunine, and José Funes that summarizes the state of our understanding of life on Earth, the search for exoplanets, and the prospects for life elsewhere.

Henize 206

This low-metallicity state approximates the predicted chemical composition of the early Universe, allowing astronomers to compare what stellar life was like billions of years ago, when heavy metals were scarce.

ILLIAC I

1957 – Mathematician Donald B. Gillies, physicist James E. Snyder, and astronomers George C. McVittie, S. P. Wyatt, Ivan R. King and George W. Swenson of the University of Illinois used the ILLIAC I computer to calculate the orbit of the Sputnik I satellite within two days of its launch.

J.J.L. Duyvendak

In 1942, Duyvendak published one of the first articles in a Western language on the Crab Nebula supernova as observed by Chinese astronomers in 1054 during the Song dynasty.

James Clerk Maxwell Telescope

Continuum emission is a tracer of star formation in other galaxies and gives astronomers clues to the presence, distance, and evolution history of galaxies other than our own.

JCPM Yakiimo Station

It was at the JCPM Yakiimo Station that on November 23, 1990, Japanese astronomers Akira Natori and Takeshi Urata discovered the asteroid 6042 Cheshirecat.

Kevola Observatory

The association was founded by Yrjö Väisälä, Liisi Oterma, Hilkka Rantaseppä-Helenius, and other astronomers working at University of Turku.

Kyneton

Being located well away from any heavily populated areas and their inherent light pollution, Kyneton is also a destination for astronomers seeking a clear view of the Southern Hemisphere night skies.

Laurent Cassegrain

In 1997 two French astronomers, Andre Baranne and Francois Launay, after a long and meticulous investigation including a search for unpublished manuscripts and the analysis of parish registers in the places where Cassegrain lived (Chartres first and then Chaudon, near Nogent-le-Roi), identified Laurent Cassegrain as the most likely candidate.

Lawrence Parsons, 4th Earl of Rosse

Although overshadowed by his father (when astronomers speak of "Lord Rosse", it is almost always the father that they refer to), he nonetheless pursued some astronomical observations of his own, particularly of the Moon.

Maunder Minimum

This was not due to a lack of observations; during the 17th century, Giovanni Domenico Cassini carried out a systematic program of solar observations at the Observatoire de Paris, thanks to the astronomers Jean Picard and Philippe de La Hire.

Mohawk Valley Astronomical Society

On May 31, 1989, seven amateur astronomers held an organizational meeting in the Solar Classroom at Hamilton College in Clinton, New York to plan the formation of an astronomy club.

Musca Borealis

Subsequent astronomers renamed it into "Musca Borealis", to distinguish it from the southern fly, Musca Australis.

National Optical Astronomy Observatory

The National Science Foundation (NSF) funds NOAO to provide forefront astronomical research facilities for US astronomers.

For example, Gemini astronomers, along with their collaborators at the 10m W. M. Keck Observatory, recently announced the first images of an extra solar system with three detected planets circling their parent star, an A-type star known as HR 8799.

National Register of Historic Places listings in Washtenaw County, Michigan

Numerous notable astronomers worked or trained at the site, including Franz Brünnow, Cleveland Abbe, James Craig Watson, Asaph Hall, Otto Julius Klotz, Robert Simpson Woodward, and John Martin Schaeberle.

Nyrölä Observatory

Discoveries: asteroid 22978 Nyrölä that was the first asteroid discovered by Finnish amateur astronomers, Harri Hyvönen, Marko Moilanen and Arto Oksanen.

Otto Wilhelm von Struve

By the initiative of Struve, two US astronomers, Simon Newcomb and Asaph Hall were appointed as Foreign Members of the Russian Academy of Sciences.

Part III of the Mathematical Tripos

Several notable astronomers and astrophysicists have been awarded the Tyson Medal in the history of Part III maths, including Jayant Narlikar, Ray Lyttleton and Edmund Whittaker.

Philip III, Landgrave of Hesse-Butzbach

Philip III also corresponded with the astronomers Kepler and Galileo.

Radis

With his startling discovery of the planet Neptune, among other things, he became one of Germany's most important astronomers.

RTMC

RTMC Astronomy Expo, a gathering of amateur astronomers, formally known as Riverside Telescope Makers Conference.

Ryk Tulbagh

These included the astronomers Nicolas-Louis de La Caille, Charles Mason and Jeremiah Dixon and the French writer Bernardin de Saint-Pierre.

Shang Dynasty

Other advances included the invention of many musical instruments and observations of Mars and various comets by Shang astronomers.

Skalnaté Pleso

a shorthand for the Atlas Coeli Skalnate Pleso 1950.0, a popular sky atlas for amateur astronomers that was compiled at the observatory.

Solar eclipse of April 6, 1875

Astronomers J. N. Lockyer and Arthur Schuster traveled to observe the eclipse and measure spectral lines to determine the elemental contents of the solar corona.

Solar eclipse of July 28, 1851

United Kingdom astronomers, Robert Grant and William Swan, and Austrian astronomer Karl Ludwig von Littrow observed this eclipse and determined that prominences are part of the Sun because the Moon is seen to cover and uncover them as it moves in front of the Sun.

Stephen J. Edberg

For his long commitment in bringing amateur and professional astronomers together, Minor planet 3672 Stevedberg (1985 QQ) was named in honor of Stephen J. Edberg in 1987.

Tamakasuga Ryōji

Known as 8432 Tamakasuga, it was named by astronomers at an observatory in his home prefecture.

Titanium dioxide

The exterior of the Saturn V rocket was painted with titanium dioxide; this later allowed astronomers to determine that J002E3 was the S-IVB stage from Apollo 12 and not an asteroid.

Tomás de Suría

The two astronomers, Ciriaco Zevallos and José Espinosa y Tello, are immortalized in the places names for the Vancouver Island town of Zeballos and the nearby Espinoza Inlet.

William Johnson McDonald

At the time, the university had no faculty of astronomy, so in 1932 it formed a collaboration with Otto Struve at the University of Chicago, who supplied astronomers.


see also