![]() ![]() Nonetheless, Slipher consulted with astronomers at other observatories and experimented with equipment, including faster lenses and observing techniques that might minimize the difficulty. This task was difficult, however, because these objects were faint. In 1909, Slipher began recording spectra of spiral nebulae, urged on by Lowell, who thought they might show spectral similarities to our solar system. Some thought they were within the Milky Way, embryonic planetary systems in their early stages of formation. But the evidence of their nature was slow in coming. The German natural philosopher Immanuel Kant had suggested they were separate, large “island universes” of matter as early as 1755. These numerous, faint, diffuse objects had remained mysterious for a century and a half. He then turned toward solving the biggest mystery of the age, the nature of so-called spiral nebulae. ![]() This put Slipher on the map, with a legitimate claim to a major discovery in astrophysics. The discovery of matter among the stars of the Pleiades was a big one. Proving that the dust near the star Merope in this cluster was shining only by reflected light demonstrated the existence of stuff between the stars that stuff came to be called the interstellar medium. ![]() Moreover, in December 1912, Slipher used the spectrograph to discover the presence of dust - or “pulverulent matter,” as he termed it - between the stars of the famous Pleiades Cluster. Observations in the 1920s would finally prove Slipher correct. From this he concluded in 1909 that interstellar gas must exist in widely separated regions of space, producing what he called “selective absorption of light in space.” Some astronomers congratulated Slipher for this conclusion, but many others ignored the findings for a long time. He found that certain spectral lines in the otherwise blurred spectra of some stars were sharp and stationary, and noted this phenomenon in a variety of stars in Scorpius, Perseus, and Orion. His work here led to a major breakthrough, hailed by astronomers as a milestone. It was Miller who turned Slipher’s interests toward the heavens and Cogshall who introduced him to the idea of moving west to work at an observatory.ĭuring his time spent on planetary research, Slipher also managed to keep investigating spectroscopic binary stars. Another professor was John Miller, an astronomer who later became director of Sproul Observatory in Pennsylvania. One of his professors was Wilbur Cogshall, who had worked as an astronomer at Lowell in 18. Slipher graduated from high school, taught briefly at a country school, and then enrolled at Indiana University in Bloomington. Slipher, who would also grow up to be an astronomer and work at Lowell Observatory.īut during Slipher’s youth, this was all a distant future dream. Slipher had a brother, eight years his junior, Earl C. Many years later, astronomers remarked on his ability to climb mountain peaks, staying well ahead of those who were much younger. Certainly growing up on a farm kept Slipher in robust shape. Slipher,” he had an unspectacular childhood in the American Midwest, with few details of his youth ever recorded. ![]() Vesto Melvin Slipher was born on a farm in Mulberry, Indiana, on November 11, 1875. But fewer astronomy enthusiasts know that a decade before Hubble’s discovery, a little-known astronomer at Lowell Observatory in Flagstaff, Arizona, discovered the expanding universe. That breakthrough helped set the cosmic distance scale and the overall nature of the cosmos. Edwin Hubble revolutionized astronomy in 1923 when he discovered that the “Andromeda Nebula” was actually a distant island galaxy full of stars, gas, and dust. ![]()
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