Famous Astronomers

Many Astronomers have contributed to our understanding of the Universe in which we live.

A list of some of the most famous is given below (apologies for missing someone out!):

Classical Period 

Claudius Ptolemy (90-168); Greek; compiled the Almagest a treatise on Astronomy, in it he defined 48 Constellations of the 88 in use today.

Nicolaus Copernicus  1473-1543; Polish;  developed a simple heliocentric model of the solar system that explained planetary retrograde motion and overturned Greek astronomy. 

Tycho Brahe  1546-1601; Danish;  observed a supernova now known as ``Tycho's supernova''; made the most precise observations of stellar and planetary positions then known. 

Galileo Galilei  1564-1642; Italian;  performed fundamental observations, experiments, and mathematical analyses in astronomy and physics; discovered mountains and craters on the moon, the phases of Venus, and the four largest satellites of Jupiter: Io, Europa, Callisto, and Ganymede. 

Johannes Kepler  1571-1630; German;  established the most exact astronomical tables then known; established the three laws of planetary motion. 

John Babtist Riccioli  1598-1671; Italian; made telescopic lunar studies and published detailed lunar maps in which he introduced much nomenclature for lunar objects; discovered the first double star (Mizar).

Giovanni Cassini  1625-1712; Italian-born French;  measured rotational periods of Jupiter and Mars; discovered four satellites of Saturn and the gap in Saturn's rings now known as ``Cassini's division'' 

Christiaan Huygens  1629-1695; Dutch; discovered Saturn's first satellite, Titan, and the true shape of Saturn's rings 

Sir Isaac Newton  1642-1727; English; developed theories of gravitation and mechanics, and invented differential calculus. 

Edmund Halley  1656-1742; English; used his theory of cometary orbits to predict that the comet of 1682 (later named ``Halley's comet'') was periodic 

Charles Messier  1730-1817; French; discovered 19 comets, 13 being original and 6 independent co-discoveries; compiled a famous catalogue of deep-sky objects. 

Joseph-Louis Lagrange  1736-1813; French; developed new methods of analytical mechanics; made many theoretical contributions to astronomy, improving our understanding of lunar motion and the perturbing effects of planets on cometary orbits; found solution to 3-body problem showing there could be two points (now called Lagrange points) in orbit of Jupiter where minor planets could stay almost indefinitely - the Trojan group of asteroids were later discovered at these positions. 

William Herschel  1738-1822; England; discovered Uranus and its two brightest moons, Titania and Oberon; discovered Saturn's moons, Mimas and Enceladus; discovered the ice caps of Mars, several asteroids and binary stars; catalogued 2,500 deep sky objects 

Giuseppe Piazzi  1746-1826; Italian; discovered the largest asteroid, Ceres; accurately measured positions of many stars, resulting in a star catalogue 

Johann Bode  1747-1826; German;  popularized a relationship giving planetary distances from the Sun, which became known as ``Bode's law''; predicted an undiscovered planet between Mars and Jupiter, where the asteroids were later found. 

Pierre-Simon Laplace  1749-1827; French; made important mathematical contributions to differential equations; promoted the solar nebula hypothesis for the origin of the solar system. 

Heinrich Wilhelm Olbers  1758-1840; German; invented first successful method for calculating cometary orbits; discovered several comets, including the comet of 1815, now called Olber's comet; discovered the asteroids Pallas and Vesta; posed the famous Olber's paradox: ``Why is the night sky dark?''.  

Friedrich Bessel  1784-1846; Prussian; first to measure distance to the star 61 Cygni; proposed that Sirius has an unseen companion; worked out the mathematical analysis of what are now known as Bessel functions. 

Joseph von Fraunhofer  1787-1826; German; made detailed wavelength measurements of hundreds of lines in the solar spectrum; designed an achromatic objective lens. 

Johann Franz Encke  1791-1865; German; discovered the first short-period comet, now called Encke's comet .

Friedrich von Struve  1793-1864; German-born Russian; founded the study of double stars; published catalogue of over 3000 binary stars; first to measure distance to the star Vega. 

Wilhelm Beer  1797-1850; German; prepared and published maps of the Moon and Mars 

Thomas Henderson  1798-1844; Scottish; first to measure distance to a star (Alpha Centauri) 

William Lassell  1799-1880; English; discovered Triton, the largest satellite of Neptune 

Sir George Airy  1801-1892; English; improved orbital theory of Venus and the Moon; studied interference fringes in optics; made a mathematical study of the rainbow. 

Urbain Le Verrier  1811-1877; French; accurately predicted the position of Neptune, which led to its discovery.  

Johann Gottfried Galle  1812-1910; German; first person to observe Neptune, based on calculations by French mathematician, Urbain Le Verrier; however, Neptune's discovery is usually credited to Le Verrier and English astronomer, John Crouch Adams, who first predicted its position. 

Anders Ångström  1814-1874; Swedish; discovered hydrogen in the solar spectrum; source of the Angstrom unit .

Daniel Kirkwood  1814-1895; American; discovered the ``Kirkwood gaps'' in the orbits of the asteroids between Mars and Jupiter; explained the gaps in Saturn's rings 

William Huggins  1824-1910; England; first to show that some nebulae, including the great nebula in Orion, have pure emission spectra and thus must be gaseous  

Sir Joseph Lockyer  1836-1920; English; discovered in the solar spectrum a previously unknown element that he named helium 

Henry Draper  1837-1882; American  made first photograph of a stellar spectrum (that of Vega); later photographed spectra of over a hundred stars and published them in a catalogue; studied spectrum of Orion Nebula, which he showed was a dust cloud 

Edward Charles Pickering  1846-1919; American; discovered the first spectroscopic binary star, Mizar 

Jacobus Cornelius Kapteyn  1851-1922; Dutch; discovered that the proper motions of stars were not random, but stars could be divided into two streams moving in opposite directions, representing the rotation of our galaxy 

Edward Barnard  1857-1923; American; discovered fourteen comets and co-discovered two others; as well as Almathea, the fifth moon of Jupiter; also discovered star with largest proper motion, now called Barnard's star.  

Nobel Laureates 

Hannes Alvén  1908-1995; Swedish; developed the theory of magnetohydrodynamics 

Subramanyan Chandrasekhar  1910-1995; Indian-born American; made important theoretical contributions concerning the structure and evolution of stars, especially white dwarfs. 

William Fowler  1911-1995; American; carried out extensive experimental studies of nuclear reactions of astrophysical significance; developed, with others, a complete theory of the formation of chemical elements in the universe. 

Antony Hewish  1924; English; led the research group that discovered the first pulsar. 

Arno A. Penzias  1933-; German-born American;  co-discovered the cosmic microwave background radiation. 

Robert W. Wilson  1936 -; American; co-discovered the cosmic microwave background radiation 

Joseph H. Taylor, Jr.  1941- ; American; co-discovered the first binary pulsar. 

Russell Alan Hulse  1950- ;American; co-discovered the first binary pulsar. 

Others 

Annie Jump Cannon  1863-1941; American; classified spectra of many thousands of stars; published catalogues of variable stars (including 300 she discovered).  

Maximilian Wolf  1863-1932; German; discovered hundreds of asteroids using photography 

George E. Hale  1868-1938; American; revolutionized spectral observations by inventing and using the spectroheliograph; discovered magnetic fields in sunspots; first astronomer to be officially called an astrophysicist; founded the Yerkes, Mt. Wilson, and Palomar Observatories  

Henrietta Swan Levitt  1868-1921; American; discovered the period-luminosity relation for Cepheid variables 

Willem de Sitter  1872-1934; Dutch;  studied the astronomical consequences of Einstein's theory of general relativity; deduced that a near-empty universe would expand. 

Ejnar Hertzsprung  1873-1967; Danish; invented the colour-magnitude diagram; by studying star clusters, independently discovered the relationship between absolute magnitude and spectral types of stars; a plot of this relationship is now called a Hertzsprung-Russell diagram (or H-R diagram); determined distance to the Small Magellanic Cloud 

Karl Schwarzschild  1873-1916; German; first to give an exact solution of Einstein's equations of general relativity, giving an understanding of the geometry of space near a point mass; also made the first study of black holes  

Vesto M. Slipher  1875-1969; American; first to measure the radial velocity of the Andromeda Galaxy 

Walter Sydney Adams  1876-1956; American; identified Sirius B as the first white dwarf star known. 

Henry Norris Russell  1877-1957; American;  used photographic methods to measure stellar parallaxes, leading to the discovery of the relationship between absolute magnitude and spectral types of stars; a plot of this relationship is now called a Hertzsprung-Russell diagram (or H-R diagram) 

Bernhard Schmidt  1879-1935; Swedish-Estonian;  invented and constructed the first Schmidt reflecting telescope using a corrector plate he devised to eliminate aberration of the image.  

Arthur S. Eddington  1882-1944; English; first to confirm Einstein's prediction that light will bend near a star; discovered the mass-luminosity relation for stars; theoretically explained the pulsation of Cepheid variables. 

Harlow Shapley  1885-1972; American; discovered the size of our galaxy and the direction of its center by studying the distribution of globular clusters; determined the orbits of many eclipsing binary stars. 

Edwin Hubble  1889-1953; American; first to measure distance to the Andromeda nebula, establishing it to be a separate galaxy; later measured distances to other galaxies and discovered that they recede at a rate proportional to their distance (Hubble's law). 

Walter Baade  1893-1960; German-born American; discovered the asteroids Hidalgo and Icarus; established two different stellar classes: the younger, hotter ``Population I'' and the older, cooler ``Population II''.  

Georges-Henri Lemaitre  1894-1966; Belgian; advanced idea that the Universe originated as a small, dense ``cosmic egg'' that exploded and set its expansion into motion  

Rudolph Minkowski  1895-1976; German; divided supernovae into Types I and II; optically identified many of the early radio sources. 

Bernard-Ferdinand Lyot  1897-1952; French; invented the coronagraph. 

Otto Struve  1897-1963; Russian-born American; made detailed spectroscopic studies of close binary stars; discovered interstellar matter (H II regions). 

Fritz Zwicky  1898-1974; Swiss-born American; observed Coma cluster of galaxies and determined that most of the cluster must be ``dark matter''; proposed existence of and then observed dwarf galaxies; proposed existence of supernovas (a term he coined) and that their collapse might lead to neutron stars; anticipated discovery of quasars by proposing that compact blue galaxies might be mistaken for stars; anticipated that dark matter could be studied by observing galaxies that acted as gravitational lenses. 

Jan Hendrik Oort  1900-1992; Dutch; calculated distance to center of galaxy; determined period for sun to complete one revolution of Milky Way; calculated the mass of the Milky Way; proposed existence of huge spherical cloud of icy comets (the Oort cloud) left behind from formation of the solar system 

George Gamow  1904-1968; Russian-born American; first suggested hydrogen fusion as source of solar energy.

Karl G. Jansky  1905-1950; American; discovered radio waves from space, thereby pioneering the birth of radio astronomy. 

Gerard P. Kuiper  1905-1973; Dutch-born American; discovered Miranda, the fifth satellite of Uranus; discovered Nereid, the second satellite of Neptune; discovered the atmosphere of Titan, Saturn's largest satellite; his spectroscopic studies of Uranus and Neptune led to discovery of comet-like debris at the edge of the solar system, now called ``Kuiper's belt''. 

Bruno B. Rossi  1905-1993-; Italian; pioneer of x-ray astronomy and space plasma physics; participated in discovery of the first known x-ray source outside the solar system (Scorpius X-1).

Bart Jan Bok  1906-1983; Dutch; suggested that small dark globules of interstellar gas and dusk (now called Bok globules) are collapsing to form new stars 

Clyde Tombaugh  1906-1997; American; discovered the dwarf planet Pluto. 

Fred Whipple  1906-2004; American; proposed the ``dirty snowball'' model of cometary structure. 

Grote Reber  1911-2002; American; built the first radio telescope (a parabolic reflector 31 feet in diameter), thereby becoming the first radio astronomer.

Carl K. Seyfert  1911-1960; American; discovered the first active galaxy, part of a group now called Seyfert Galaxies. 

John A. Wheeler  1911-2008; American; made theoretical contributions to understanding of quantum gravity; coined the term ``black hole''; introduced the concept of ``spacetime foam'' 

Karl F. von Weizsäcker  1912-2007; German; contributed to the development of the model nebular theory for the formation of the solar system; proposed (with Hans Bethe) the proton-proton reaction as the thermonuclear energy source for the sun. 

James A. Van Allen  1914-2006; American; a space scientist best known for discovering the Earth's magnetosphere. 

Sir Fred Hoyle  1915-2001; English; proponent of the steady-state model of the universe; well-known author of science fiction; proposed that earliest forms of life were carried through space on comets and that these primitive forms of life found their way to Earth; derisively coined the term ``Big Bang'' for a cosmic theory with which he did not and does not agree. 

Robert H. Dicke  1916-1997; American; proposed that radiation near 1-cm wavelength is left over from the hot Big Bang; invented the microwave radiometer, used to detect this radiation. 

George H. Herbig  1920-; American; independently discovered the Herbig-Haro objects, which are gas clouds associated with young stars.  

E. Margaret Burbidge  1919; English; performed observational research on the spectra of quasars and other peculiar galaxies; contributed to understanding of stellar nucleosynthesis.  

Allan R. Sandage  1926-; American; identified the first quasar, and discovered many more; determined ages of many globular clusters. 

Vera Rubin  1928-; American; measured rotation curves for distant galaxies and ultimately concluded that 90% or more of the universe is made of invisible dark matter.  

Riccardo Giacconi  1931-; Italian; pioneer of x-ray astronomy; participated in discovery of the first known x-ray source outside the solar system (Scorpius X-1). 

John N. Bahcall  1934-2005; American; made important theoretical contributions to understanding solar neutrinos and quasars. 

Carl Sagan  1934-1996; American  was a leader in the search for extraterrestrial intelligence; contributed to most of the space missions to explore Mars and the outer planets; warned that all-out nuclear war could lead to a ``nuclear winter''. 

James W. Christy  1938-; American; discovered Pluto's satellite, Charon. 

William K. Hartmann  1939-; American; well-known painter of astronomical themes; co-developed the most widely accepted theory of the formation of the Moon (from the collision of a giant planetismal with the Earth at the close of the planet-forming period of the solar system). 

Kip S. Thorne  1940-; American; contributed to the theoretical understanding of black holes and gravitational radiation; co-founded the Laser Interferometer Gravitational Wave Observatory Project (LIGO).

Stephen W. Hawking  1942-; English; combined general relativity with quantum theory to predict that black holes should emit radiation and evaporate  

Sir Roger Penrose  1931-; English; contributed to the development of general relativity by showing the necessity for cosmological singularities; elucidated the physics of black holes.  

Jocelyn Burnham-Bell  1943-Irish; co-discovered the first pulsar. 

Charles Thomas Bolton  1943-; Canadian  identified Cygnus X-1 as the first black hole.
Johann Galle
Urbain Le Verrier
John Couch Adams
The Discoverers of the Planet Neptune 23rd September 1846
Image Full Name Born Died Nationality Fame Details
Abbe Nicolas Louis de Lacaille 15th March 1713; Rumigny, Ardennes, France. 21st March 1762; Paris, France. France Compilation of a Catalogue of Stars in the Southern Hemisphere - 'Coelum australe stelliferum (1763)'. Naming of 15 New Southern Constellations. More...
Albert Einstein 14th March 1879; Ulm, Germany 18th April 1955; Princeton, New Jersey, USA. USA Special and General Theories of Relativity; Revision of Newton's Laws of Gravity. More...
Anders Jonas Angstrom 13th August 1814; Medelpad, Sweden. 21st June 1874; Uppsala, Sweden. Sweden Spectroscopy, Unit of Wavelength of Light More...
Annie Jump Cannon 11th December 1863; Dover, Delaware, USA. 13th April 1941; Cambridge, Massachusetts, USA. USA Spectral Classification of Stars: O, B, A, F, G, K, M. More...
Arthur Stanley Eddington 28th December 1882; Kendal, England. 22nd Ovember 1944; Cambridge, England. England Structure of Stars More...
Caroline Herschel 16th March 1750; Hanover, Germany. 9th January 1848; Hanover, Germany. Germany Assisted her brother William Herschel in compiling a Catalogue of Nebulae and Star Clusters. This formed the basis of the Dreyer's HGC. More...

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