Charles Greeley Abbot

Charles G. Abbot (1934)

Charles Greeley Abbot (born May 31, 1872 in Wilton , New Hampshire , † December 17, 1973 in Riverdale , Maryland ) was an American astrophysicist . He worked in particular in the field of meteorology , the radiation of the stars and the sun . He determined the solar constant and was a co-founder of solar physics . Abbot was among the first to suggest that the sun's radiation fluctuates with time.

Life

Abbey was raised on a farm in New Hampshire, the youngest of four children.

After his master's degree at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1895 Abbey of was Samuel Pierpont Langley to the Smithsonian Institution in Washington, DC called, where he arrived Astrophysical Observatory worked as an assistant. Abbey helped Langley record the sun's infrared spectrum and calculate the solar constant .

Abbot received a position as deputy director after Langley's death in 1906, the following year he was appointed director of the observatory and in this capacity started a program to search for possible deviations in the solar constant. In 1909 he constructed a pyrheliometer with which the first precise measurements of the solar constant were possible. His team was able to detect measurable fluctuations in the constant and he was convinced that these correlated with fluctuations in the earth's weather . Believing that he had discovered an important key to weather forecasting , he spent much of the next 50 years convincing the rest of the world of what he had learned. The cyclical changes in the solar constant observed by Abbot, which were around three to five percent, were in fact due to changing weather conditions and incomplete analysis of his data, as was later demonstrated by satellite measurements over the earth's atmosphere and computer analysis of his data .

Abbot's greatest scientific accomplishments include setting an accurate value for the solar constant - earlier estimates fluctuated considerably - at 1.93 calories per square centimeter per minute on a theoretical surface outside the atmosphere, and his research into how it changes over time. New analyzes of his data and satellite measurements have shown that the solar constant changes every minute, which can be attributed to fluctuations in the number and intensity of sunspots and flares on the solar surface.

Since 1914 he was an elected member of the American Philosophical Society . In 1915 he was elected to the National Academy of Sciences and in 1921 to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences . Abbot was director of the Smithsonian Institute from 1928 until his retirement in 1944. To publicize the benefits of solar energy, he designed solar cookers for his lectures and demonstrations . In retirement, he continued analyzing his solar data as he was still convinced of the fluctuations in the solar constant that he had discovered.

In 1973 the lunar crater Abbot was named after him.

Web links

Commons : Charles Greeley Abbot  - Collection of Images, Videos and Audio Files

• Short biography , Smithonian Institution Archives (English)
• Publications by CG Abbot in the Astrophysics Data System
• Obituaries for CG Abbot in the Astrophysics Data System
• www. britica.com