Seth Barnes NicholsonBorn 12 Nov 1891; died 2 Jul 1963 at age 71.Seth Barnes Nicholson was an American astronomer best known for discovering four satellites of Jupiter. As a graduate student at the University of California, while photographing the recently-discovered 8th moon of Jupiter with the 36-inch Crossley reflector, he discovered a 9th (1914). During his life career at Mt.Wilson Observatory, he discovered two more Jovian satellites (1938) and the 12th (1951), as well as a Trojan asteroid, and computed orbits of several comets and of Pluto. His main assignment at Mt. Wilson was observing the sun with the 150-foot solar tower telescope, and he produced annual reports on sunspot activity and magnetism for decades. With Edison Pettit, he measured the temperatures of the moon, planets, sunspots, and stars in the early 1920s. |
