| Year | Events in Jean's Life | Events in Astrophysics |
|---|---|---|
| 1877 | born Ormskirk, Lancashire 10 miles north of Liverpool, England Father: Parlimentary Jounalist |
- Schiaparelli sees 'canals' on Mars - Phobos and Diemos discovered by Hall - Stefan-Boltzmann Law Discovered (1879) |
| 1889 | Begins playing the organ, has a fascination for numbers and an excellent memory | - Naked-eye Supernova in the Andromeda Galaxy (1885) - Balmer deduces the hydrogen series formula - Michelson and Morely determine light always travels at the speed of light (1887) - Lick 36" refractor complete on top of Mt. Hamilton - Hertz produces and detects radio waves (1888) |
| 1896 -1900 |
Enters Trinity College, Cambridge with a major Scholarship and is 2nd Wrangler
in Mathematical Tripos Essay: "Equipartition of Energy in Dynamic Systems" |
- Barnard observes the first evidence that nova are exploding stars (1892) - Wein's displacement law (1893) - Bequerel discovers natural radioactivity (1896) - Yerkes 40" Refractor erected (1897) - Otto Struve discovers interstellar clouds of gas and dust - Thompson discovers the electron |
| 1901 -1905 |
Fellow of Trinity College, Gets M.A. University Lecturer in Mathematics Publishes:"Dynamic Theory of Gases" Develops equipartition between radiation and matter (1905) but gives 'ultraviolet catastrophy' |
- Max Planck develops quantum theory of blackbody radiation (1900) but the theory is not readily accepted |
| 1905 -1909 |
Professor of Mathematics at Princeton University Marries Charlotte Tiffany Mitchell (connected to Tiffany family of New York City) Publishes: "Theoretical Mechanics" and "Mathematical Theory of Electricity and Magnetism" |
- Einstein publishes his Special Theory of Relativity, Brownian Motion and Quantized Light - Hartmann discovers spectral lines of interstellar calcium (1904) - Mysterious Explosion near Tunguska in Siberia (1906) - Hale uses Zeeman effect to determine magnetic field on the Sun - Hale builds 60" at Mt. Wilson |
| 1910 -1912 |
Returns to England to become Stokes Lecturer in Applied Mathematics at the University of Cambridge |
- Rutherford Scattering experiments show the nuclear character of the atom (1911) - Meteor kills a dog in Egypt - Halm determines the Mass-Luminosity relationship for stars - Leavitt determines the Period-Luminosity relationship for Cepheid Variables (1912) - Bragg and Van Laue use X-rays to study Crystal structure |
| 1912 - 1922 |
Retires to live in Gilford (age 35) Daughter born (1917) Adams Prize: "Problems of Cosmogony and Stellar Dynamics" in this Jeans proposes that a passing star might have caused the creation of the planets. - Controversy with Eddington over the physics of Cepheid variable oscillation - first signs of heart problems (1919) Royal Medal from Royal Society - becomes Secretary of the Royal Society for 10 years (1922) Gold Medal from Royal Astronomical Society for Cosmogony Work |
- Russel popularizes the Herzsprung Diagram developed in 1905 (1913) - Neils Bohr proposes his quantum theory of the hydrogen atom - Bohr suggests that beta decay is a nuclear process - Millikan determines the value of the electronic charge - Eddington proposes that "spiral nebula" are external galaxies - Adams determines the size of Sirius B from its temperature - white dwarf(1914) - Einstein completes his theory of General Relativity (1915) - Hale builds the 100" Hooker Telescope on Mt Wilson (1917) the largest telescope for 30 years - The distance to the Andromeda Galaxy is determined - Schwarzschile predicts the possibility of black holes from Einsteins General Theory - Shaply makes the first accurate estimates of the size of our galaxy(1918) - Aston builds first mass spectrograph and discovers isotopes - Eddington and co-workers observe the 1919 solar eclipse to verify Einstein's General Theory - IAU formed - Michelson measures the diameter of Betelgeuse |
| 1923 -1934 |
Becomes Research Associate for Mt. Wilson Observatory (1928) Knighted Sir James Jeans - Publishes "Astronomy and Cosmology" (1929) Begins writting a series of popular astonomy books. "The Universe Around Us"(1929) "The Mysterious Universe"(1930) The Stars and Their Courses"(1931) "The New Background of Science"(1933) "Through Space and Time"(1934) - Wife dies |
- 1923 - DeBroglie introduces the wave properties of matter - 1924 - Henry Draper Catalog of Stars Published by Harvard Observatory - Edwin Hubble resolves the Andromeda Galaxy into individual stars showing it not a nebula - Stern and Gerlach show that atoms are small magnets - 1925 Quantum Mechanics developed by Heisenberg - Davisson and Germer show the wave properties of matter - 1926 - Eddington publishes "The Internal Constitution of the Stars" - 1927 - Lemaitre proposes the 'Big Bang' model of the origin of the universe - Oort shows that the Milky Way is a spiral galaxy using the velocity of stars - Heisenberg postulates the uncertainty principle - 1929 - Hubble establishes the expansion of the universe - Dirac introduces the concept of anti-matter - 1930 - Pauli proposes the existence of the neutrino - The Schmidt wide angle telescope developed - Trumpler studies reddening of starlight and shows the existance of interstellar dust - 1931 - Chandrasekhar predicts the existence of white dwarfs with maximum mass of 1.4 solar masses - Jansky measures the first radio emissions from our galaxy - 1932 - Chadwick discovers the neutron - Anderson discovers anti-electron (positron) |
| 1935 -1946 |
Marries Susanne Hock (an organist) Professorship of Astronomy at the Royal Institution Three more children born 1936, 1939, 1944 (Jean's age 67) Publishes "Introduction to the Kinetic Theory of Gases" (1940) "Physics and Philosophy" (1942) |
- 1938 - Bethe and Weizsacker propose nuclear fusion for the sourse of stellar energy - Oppenheimer predicts the existance of rapidly rotating neutron stars - 1939 - Oppenheimer calculates the mass for a collapse star to become a black hole - Meisner and Hahn produce the first nuclear fission - 1942 - Reber makes the first radio maps of the universe - Fermi etal. produce the first controlled nuclear fission chain reaction - 1944 - van de Hulst suggest that interstellar hydrogen will emit 21 cm radiation - 1945 - A.C. Clarke propose the idea of geosynchronous Earth Satellites for communications |
| 1946 | dies - September 17 |