Book contents
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface to the second edition
- Preface to the first edition, 1986
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction to spectroscopy, spectroscopes and spectrographs
- 2 The analysis of sunlight: the earliest pioneers
- 3 The foundations of spectral analysis: from Fraunhofer to Kirchhoff
- 4 Early pioneers in stellar spectroscopy
- 5 Spectral classification at Harvard
- 6 The Doppler effect
- 7 The interpretation of stellar spectra and the birth of astrophysics
- 8 Spectral classification: From the Henry Draper Catalogue to the MK system and beyond
- 9 Spectroscopy of peculiar stars
- 10 Quantitative analysis of stellar spectra
- 11 Some miscellaneous topics in stellar spectroscopy: individual stars of note, stellar chromospheres, interstellar lines and ultraviolet spectroscopy from space
- Figure sources and acknowledgements
- Appendix A List of solar lines designated by letters by Fraunhofer and others
- Appendix B Vogel's first spectral classification scheme of 1874
- Index of names
- Index of star names
- Index of spectral lines
- Index of subjects
Preface to the first edition, 1986
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 05 April 2014
- Frontmatter
- Contents
- Preface to the second edition
- Preface to the first edition, 1986
- Acknowledgements
- 1 Introduction to spectroscopy, spectroscopes and spectrographs
- 2 The analysis of sunlight: the earliest pioneers
- 3 The foundations of spectral analysis: from Fraunhofer to Kirchhoff
- 4 Early pioneers in stellar spectroscopy
- 5 Spectral classification at Harvard
- 6 The Doppler effect
- 7 The interpretation of stellar spectra and the birth of astrophysics
- 8 Spectral classification: From the Henry Draper Catalogue to the MK system and beyond
- 9 Spectroscopy of peculiar stars
- 10 Quantitative analysis of stellar spectra
- 11 Some miscellaneous topics in stellar spectroscopy: individual stars of note, stellar chromospheres, interstellar lines and ultraviolet spectroscopy from space
- Figure sources and acknowledgements
- Appendix A List of solar lines designated by letters by Fraunhofer and others
- Appendix B Vogel's first spectral classification scheme of 1874
- Index of names
- Index of star names
- Index of spectral lines
- Index of subjects
Summary
My main motivation for writing this book was an act of selfindulgence. As a hobby I enjoyed delving into the earlier literature of astronomical spectroscopy. As a practising observational astronomer, I found it especially refreshing to have a feel for the way the topic had developed, and to be able to glimpse at the lives of some of the early pioneers in stellar spectroscopy.
My hobby began in 1974 when I was at the Observatoire de Paris-Meudon on a fellowship. I frequently browsed in the excellent library there, and one day I began reading the collected papers of the eminent English astronomer Sir William Huggins, one of the founders of stellar spectroscopy. Huggins’ lucid and eloquent papers and his many remarkable achievements provided the inspiration from which my interest developed further, to form the basis for this book.
However, I had little time to pursue these interests very intensively until 1981, when an opportunity arose that allowed me to spend a year in Germany with the support of the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation, while on sabbatical from the University of Canterbury. I went to the Landessternwarte (State Observatory) in Heidelberg and resolved to spend most of my time there researching and writing a book on the development of stellar spectroscopy.
This book is not primarily intended for the science historian, nor is it a popular book for the layman, although I hope that readers in both these categories may find material here which is useful or interesting.
- Type
- Chapter
- Information
- The Analysis of StarlightTwo Centuries of Astronomical Spectroscopy, pp. xiii - xivPublisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2014