William Herschel

It's fact
Despite his numerous important scientific discoveries, Herschel was not averse to wild speculation. In particular, he believed every planet was inhabited, even the Sun: he believed that the Sun had a cool, solid surface protected from its hot atmosphere by an opaque Layer of cloud, and that a race of beings adapted to their strange environment lived there and had enormous heads.



William Herschel
```````````````(1738-1822)
~~~~~~~~~"colombus on the sky"

Birth: November 15th ,1738, in Hanover, Germany. 
Death: August 25th, 1822 SLough, England. 
Nationality: German born British National 
Field: Astronomy ,Optics, Music 

William Herschel's father was a Jewish composer and William 's mothei was a Christian. William's brothers were also musicians. William later moved with the family members to Britain and changed the name Wilhelm to William and permanently settled in England. At the age of 35, he purchased a book on astronomy and discovered his affinity to this discipline. 


Sir William Herschel was an astronomer and composermusician of German origin. He started his career as a musician and at the age of 35, became a full time astronomer. After grinding his own lenses and constructing his own telescopes he discovered the planet Uranus on March 13th, 1781. He also made one of the greatest surveys of the sky and discovered Infrared radiation as well. 



He Later discovered the planet Uranus which made him famous and drove him to a fulltime career in astronomy. This was the first planet found since the ancient times and Herschel was made a fellow of the Royal Society in 1781.

In his later career, Herschel discovered two moons of Saturn, Mimas and Enceladus; as well as two moons of Uranus, Titania and Oberon. He did not give these moons their names; rather, they were named by his son John in 1847 and 1852, respectively, well after his death. 


He worked on creating an extensive catalogue of what were named "nebulae". He continued to work on double stars, and was the first to discover that most double stars are not mere optical doubles as had been supposed previously, but are true binary stars, thus providing the first proof that Newton's Laws of gravitation apply outside the solar system.


From studying the proper motion of stars, he was the first to realize that the solar system is moving through space, and he determined the approximate direction of that movement. He also studied the structure of the Milky Way and concluded that it was in the shape of a disk. 


He also coined the word "asteroid", meaning starlike (from the Greek asteroeides, aster "star" + eidos "form, shape"), in 1802 (shortly after Olbers discovered the second minor planet, Pallas, in late March of the same year), to describe the starlike appearance of the small moons of the giant planets and of the minor planets; the planets all show discs, by comparison. 



Herschel discovered infrared radiation by passing sunlight through a prism and holding a thermometer just beyond the red end of the visible spectrum. This thermometer was meant to be a control to measure the ambient air temperature in the room. He was  
shocked when it showed a higher temperature than the visible spectrum. Further experimentation led to Herschel's conclusion that there must be an invisible form of light beyond the visible spectrum. 

Posted in: Greatest Astronomers