Alexander Wilson (astronomer)
Alexander Wilson (* 1714 in St Andrews , † October 18, 1786 in Glasgow ) was a Scottish astronomer and mathematician .
Wilson was initially a pharmacist . From 1760 he was Regius Professor of Astronomy at the University of Glasgow .
In 1748 and 1749, together with Thomas Melvill (1726–1753), he made the first known attempts to determine the temperature of higher air layers by attaching thermometers to kites and allowing them to soar . Later, in the last years of the 19th and the first half of the 20th century, the weather kite was the most important aid to transport meteorological measuring devices into the free atmosphere, alongside the weather balloon .
Wilson discovered in 1769 that sunspots appear sunk into the sun's surface when they are near the edge of the sun ( Wilson effect ). He concluded that sunspots are parts of the sun and not minor planets or similar objects that are in front of the sun.
Wilson was a founding member of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1783 . The lunar crater Wilson is named after him as well as the Scottish physicist Charles Thomson Rees Wilson and the American astronomer Ralph Elmer Wilson .
Individual evidence
- ↑ a b c The University of Glasgow Story Alexander Wilson ; from the University of Glasgow website, accessed January 22, 2015.
- ↑ John L. DuBois, Robert P. Multhauf and Charles A. Ziegler: The Invention and Development of the Radiosonde (PDF; 4.5 MB). In: Smithsonian Studies in History and Technology 53, Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington 2002, p. 3
- ↑ Richard Börnstein : The air electricity . In: Richard Assmann and Arthur Berson (eds.): Wissenschaftliche Luftfahrten , Volume 3, Vieweg, Braunschweig 1900, pp. 269–282
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Wilson, Alexander |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Scottish astronomer and mathematician |
| DATE OF BIRTH | 1714 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | St Andrews |
| DATE OF DEATH | October 18, 1786 |
| Place of death | Glasgow |