Martin Schwarzschild

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Martin Schwarzschild (born May 31, 1912 in Potsdam , † April 10, 1997 in Langhorne , Pennsylvania ) was an American astrophysicist of German origin.

life and work

Martin Schwarzschild was born as the son of the astrophysicist Karl Schwarzschild . Soon after his death in 1916, his family moved back to Göttingen , where his father had worked for a long time. Martin Schwarzschild studied there and in Berlin and received his doctorate in 1935 in Göttingen under Hans Kienle on the pulsation theory of δ-Cephei stars . Shortly afterwards, because of his Jewish origins, he left National Socialist Germany in order to settle in the United States after various stops , of which he became a citizen in 1942.

In 1947 he was appointed to Princeton University , with which he stayed until after his retirement in 1979.

Schwarzschild's main area of ​​work was star evolution , the theoretical modeling of which has made great strides with the development of computer technology since the 1950s. Starting with a first model of the structure of the sun from 1946, he opened up the structure and development of stars in ever wider areas of the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram .

Based on the role of convection in stellar atmospheres and observations of the granulation of the solar photosphere , he also turned his interest to high-resolution observations. Together with Lyman Spitzer and James Van Allen , he developed the concept of a telescope carried into the stratosphere by a balloon , which, above a large part of the air turbulence, should allow image quality that is essentially limited by diffraction. With the Stratoscope I and II projects, he realized this idea between 1957 and 1971 and achieved high-resolution images not only of the sun, but also of other objects such as galaxies , the quality of which was in some cases only exceeded by the Hubble space telescope .

Schwarzschild also worked on questions of the dynamics of galaxies since the 1970s. He developed a method of constructing self-consistent models of elliptical galaxies by superimposing many orbits of stars.

Honors

Fonts (selection)

  • On the pulsation theory of the δ Cephei stars (= publications of the Göttingen University Observatory, vol. 45). Göttingen 1935.
  • The fluctuation in the color temperature of α Ursae minoris (= publications of the Göttingen University Observatory, Vol. 46). Göttingen 1936.
  • On Stellar Rotation . In: Astrophysical Journal , No. 95, 1942, pp. 441-453.
  • On the helium content of the Sun . In: Astrophysical Journal , No. 104, 1946, pp. 203-207.
  • On Noise Arising from the Solar Granulation . In: Astrophysical Journal , No. 107, 1948, pp. 1-5.
  • Mass distribution and mass-luminosity ratio in galaxies . In: Astronomical Journal , Vol. 59 (1954), pp. 273-284.
  • Structure and Evolution of the Stars . Princeton University Press, Princeton 1958.
  • The sun as a system (series of lectures by the RIAS-Funk University ). RIAS, Berlin 1967.

literature

  • Art. Schwarzschild, Martin (1912–97) . In: Paul Murdin (ed.): Encyclopedia of Astronomy and Astrophysics . Institute of Physics Publishing, Bristol 2001.

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Member History: Martin Schwarzschild. American Philosophical Society, accessed November 8, 2018 .
  2. ↑ Minor Planet Circ. 41934
personal data
SURNAME Schwarzschild, Martin
BRIEF DESCRIPTION German-American astrophysicist
DATE OF BIRTH May 31, 1912
PLACE OF BIRTH Potsdam
DATE OF DEATH April 10, 1997
Place of death Langhorne , Pennsylvania