Arthur Eddington

Sir Arthur Eddington
Born
Arthur Stanley Eddington

(1882-12-28)28 December 1882
Died22 November 1944(1944-11-22) (aged 61)
Alma materUniversity of Manchester
Trinity College, Cambridge
Known forArrow of time
Eddington approximation
Eddington experiment
Eddington's affine geometry
Eddington limit
Eddington number
Eddington valve
Eddington–Dirac number
Eddington–Finkelstein coordinates
Eddington stellar model
Eddington–Sweet circulation
AwardsRoyal Society Royal Medal (1928)
Smith's Prize (1907)
RAS Gold Medal (1924)
Henry Draper Medal (1924)
Bruce Medal (1924)
Knight Bachelor (1930)
Order of Merit (1938)
Scientific career
FieldsAstrophysics
InstitutionsTrinity College, Cambridge
Academic advisors
Doctoral studentsSubrahmanyan Chandrasekhar[1]
Leslie Comrie
Hermann Bondi
Other notable studentsGeorges Lemaître
Vibert Douglas
George C. McVittie

Sir Arthur Stanley Eddington OM FRS[2] (28 December 1882 – 22 November 1944) was an English astronomer, physicist, and mathematician. He was also a philosopher of science and a populariser of science. The Eddington limit, the natural limit to the luminosity of stars, or the radiation generated by accretion onto a compact object, is named in his honour.

Around 1920, he foreshadowed the discovery and mechanism of nuclear fusion processes in stars, in his paper "The Internal Constitution of the Stars".[3][4] At that time, the source of stellar energy was a complete mystery; Eddington was the first to correctly speculate that the source was fusion of hydrogen into helium.

Eddington wrote a number of articles that announced and explained Einstein's theory of general relativity to the English-speaking world. World War I had severed many lines of scientific communication, and new developments in German science were not well known in England. He also conducted an expedition to observe the solar eclipse of 29 May 1919 on the Island of Príncipe that provided one of the earliest confirmations of general relativity, and he became known for his popular expositions and interpretations of the theory.

  1. ^ Arthur Eddington at the Mathematics Genealogy Project
  2. ^ Plummer, H. C. (1945). "Arthur Stanley Eddington. 1882–1944". Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society. 5 (14): 113–126. doi:10.1098/rsbm.1945.0007. S2CID 121473352.
  3. ^ The Internal Constitution of the Stars A. S. Eddington The Scientific Monthly Vol. 11, No. 4 (Oct., 1920), pp. 297–303 JSTOR 6491
  4. ^ Eddington, A. S. (1916). "On the radiative equilibrium of the stars". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 77: 16–35. Bibcode:1916MNRAS..77...16E. doi:10.1093/mnras/77.1.16.