Related papers: Hubble's Nobel Prize
The effect of the expanding universe on planetary motion is considered to first order in the Hubble constant H. Orbital elements are shown to be unaffected, but there is a small change in the connection between planetary proper time and…
Astronomers occasionally detect an object having unexpected shape, unexplainable photometry, or unprecedented spectra that are inconsistent with our contemporary knowledge of the universe. Upon careful assessment, many of these anomalies…
The inadequacy of the present cosmological picture is underlined. The central issue of energy and particles-photons number conservation is addressed. It is shown that consideration of gravitational self energy is paramount both for matter…
The Nobel Prize is awarded annually for outstanding scientific discoveries and inventions. Most scientific papers today are co-authored by a large number of researchers. However, very few scientists can receive the Nobel Prize according to…
The NSF's Astronomy and Astrophysics Postdoctoral Fellowship (AAPF) is exceptional among the available postdoctoral awards in Astronomy and Astrophysics. The fellowship is one of the few that allows postdoctoral researchers to pursue an…
Cosmological discoveries over the past century have completely changed our picture of our place in the universe. New observations have a realistic chance of probing nature on heretofore unimaginable scales, and as a result are changing the…
The galaxy image pair CSL-1 has been a leading candidate for a cosmic string lens. High quality imaging data from the Hubble Space Telescope presented here show that it is not a lens but a pair of galaxies. The galaxies show different…
The last decade has shown a considerable development of gravitational lensing for cosmology because it probes the amount and the nature of dark matter, and provides information on the density parameter $\Omega$, the cosmological constant…
Nuclear Astrophysics is a vibrant field at the intersection of nuclear physics and astrophysics that encompasses research in nuclear physics, astrophysics, astronomy, and computational science. This paper is not a review. It is intended to…
Two of the major achievements of Stephen Hawking are described in elementary terms. They are his work on the beginning of the universe and his work on the end of black holes. These are perhaps the scientific achievements for which he is…
I review the current state of determinations of the Hubble constant, which gives the length scale of the Universe by relating the expansion velocity of objects to their distance. There are two broad categories of measurements. The first…
Honorary degrees and particularly doctorates are important instruments to enhance the standing of universities and professors, in addition to receiving these as a measure of a scientist's recognition. Jacobus C. Kapteyn from the University…
For the better part of a century the field of nuclear astrophysics has aimed to answer fundamental questions about nature, such as the origin of the elements and the behavior of high-density, low-temperature matter. Sustained and concerted…
From a modern perspective cosmology is a historical science in so far that it deals with the development of the universe since its origin some 14 billion years ago. The origin itself may not be subject to scientific analysis and…
Recently, the idea of using neutrino oscillations to measure the Hubble constant was introduced. We show that such a task is unfeasible because for typical energies of cosmic neutrinos, oscillations average out over cosmological distances…
We discuss scientific realism from the perspective of modern cosmology, especially primordial cosmology: i.e. the cosmological investigation of the very early universe. We first (Section 2) state our allegiance to scientific realism, and…
Some attack scientific rationality, others defend it, but both miss the point. What both parties take to be scientific rationality is actually a species of irrationality masquerading as scientific rationality. The current orthodox…
It is well-known that Einstein got the 1921 Nobel prize not for his theory of relativity, but for his theory of photoelectricity. It is not that well-known that he did not get the prize in 1921. Why not, and when did he get it?
Over the last few decades, the nature of scientific research has changed in response to external influences. Firstly, powerful networked computers have become a standard tool. Secondly, society presses ever harder for research to deliver…
In this contribution to the proceedings of the 182nd Nobel Symposium, I reflect on the concept of "discovery" as it is used by physicists and astronomers. In particular, I comment on how the scientific community distinguishes discoveries…