Robert Grant Aitken
Robert Grant Aitken (born December 31, 1864 in Jackson , California , † October 29, 1951 in Berkeley , California) was an American astronomer .
Life
From 1895 to 1935 R. G. Aitken worked at the Lick Observatory in California, whose director he was 1930-1935.
He specialized in the observation of binary stars , of which he discovered 3,100 new pairs. In 1923 he discovered a weak companion of Mira . His main work , which he wrote together with William Joseph Hussey (1862–1926), is the two-volume New General Catalog of Double Stars within 120 degrees of the North Pole . It contains information on 17,180 binary stars and was published in 1932. A second important publication was The Binary Stars from 1918 (second, expanded edition 1935).
In addition to his publications, he measured and calculated the orbits of comets , moons and minor planets .
Aitken was a member of the National Academy of Sciences since 1918 and of the American Philosophical Society since 1919 . In 1932 he was awarded the gold medal of the Royal Astronomical Society . The asteroid (3070) Aitken and a crater on the back of our moon are named after him.
Works
- RG Aitken: Life on Other Worlds. In: Journal of the Royal Astronomical Society of Canada . Volume 5, No. 5, 1911, p. 291.
literature
- Joseph S. Tenn: Robert G. Aitken, the Twenty-First Bruce Medalist . In: Mercury. Volume 22, No. 6, 1993, p. 20.
Web links
- Homepage of the Lick Observatory
- Publications by R. G. Aitken in the Astrophysics Data System
- Obituaries for R. G. Aitken in the Astrophysics Data System
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Aitken, Robert Grant |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | American astronomer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | December 31, 1864 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Jackson , California |
| DATE OF DEATH | October 29, 1951 |
| Place of death | Berkeley, California , USA |