History of Modern Astronomy

As early as 1666, Isaac Newton proved that sunlight is decomposed into spectra as it passes through the prism. In 1802, British chemist and physicist William Hyde Wollaston (1766-1828) found a dark line in the solar spectrum.

In 1818, Joseph Fraunhofer (1787-1826) led the photographing of the solar spectrum and found 576 dark lines. He marked a more prominent line with the letters A through K. He later discovered that the moon and the planet's light exhibit the same spectral characteristics as the sun's spectrum, that is, that the spectrum of the star differs from this spectrum, and developed a diffraction grating. One of them had 3,625 lines per centimeter.

In 1832, David Brewster showed that cold gas produces a dark absorption line of continuous spectra. In 1847, John W. Draper discovered that hot solids are irradiated in a continuous spectrum and hot gases produce line spectra. In 1859, Gustav Robert Kirchhoff (1824-87) and Robert Bunsen (1811-99) discovered that each chemical element (and compound) shows a characteristic line at the same wavelength in the emission spectrum and absorption spectrum . Therefore, the chemical composition of the light source (including celestial bodies) can be determined by spectral analysis; Kirchoff published a study on the chemical composition of the sun in 1859.

Anders Jonas Angstrom (1818-74) published his solar spectrum and determined the line of chemical elements corresponding to 1863.

In 1864, British amateur William Huggins (1824-1910) published a study on the spectra of stars and nebulae (hence discovered gas characteristics of diffuse nebula and planetary nebula). In the same year, Giovanni Batista Donati showed that the spectrum of the comet contains emission lines. In 1872, the first spectrum (spectrograph) of the star Vega (Alpha Lyrae) was acquired by American amateur Henry Draper (1837-82).

Since Christian Doppler (1803-53) has found that a moving object shows an offset line, the radial velocity can be determined with high accuracy by spectroscopy. William Huggins pointed out that in 1868 the spectral lines of the celestial bodies moving for this effect should be offset. The first measurement of this effect was obtained in 1888 by Hermann Carl Vogel (1841-1907).

In the initial spectral classification scheme, Edward Charles Pickering (1846-1919) and Anne Cannon (1863-1941) were used in their Henry Draper catalog and eventually adopted by the IAU.

Ancient Babylon occupies an extremely important position in the history of modern scientific astronomy. Babylonians recorded astronomical observations with extreme caution every generation. Over time, with the huge cumulative database observed in the past, it became possible to apply mathematics-based rules to predict future events. The Babylonians recognized that the astronomical phenomena were periodic and applied mathematics to their predictions. In addition to numerous accurate astronomical observations, other contributions by Babylonian astronomers include the discovery of the cycle of food and the period of Saros. The periodicity and recurrence of the solar eclipse are controlled by the Saros period, and the period is about 6, 585.3 days (18 years, 11 days, 8 hours). Therefore, Salos can be used to predict the solar eclipse of the sun and moon. Saros' earliest historical record is a new Babylonian astronomer

New Babylonian astronomy refers to astronomy developed by Chaldea astronomers in the history of Mesopotamia of New Babylon, Achaemenes, Cerecus, and Parthia. During the reign of Navona Ser (747-734 BC), the quality and frequency of Babylonian observations have increased significantly. For example, the systematic record of the ominous phenomenon in the Babylonian astronomical diary which began at this time made it possible to discover the repeated 18 year Sarros eclipse cycle. Greek - Egyptian astronomer Ptolemy later restored the beginning of the era using the Law of Navonassar.

Astronomy is one of the oldest natural sciences. The early civilization of history like the Babylonians, the Greeks, the Indians, the Egyptians, the Nubianans, the Iranians, the Chinese, the Mayans, and many ancient American indigenous people, observed the night sky in an orderly manner. Historically, astronomy has included various fields such as astronomy, astronomical navigation, observation of astronomy, calendar production, but now professional astronomy is often considered synonymous with astrophysics.