Jonathan Homer Lane
Jonathan Homer Lane (August 9, 1819 – May 3, 1880) was an American astrophysicist and inventor. Biography Lane's parents were Mark and Henrietta (née Tenny) Lane and his education was at the Phillips Exeter Academy in Exeter, New Hampshire. He graduated from Yale University in 1846. While at Yale, Lane studied under astronomer Denison Olmsted. Olmsted’s interest in meteorology, particularly his support for James P. Espy’s thermodynamic model of storms, appear to closely parallel Lane’s later scientific interests and may have influenced him in that direction. Lane worked for the U.S. Patent Office, and became a principal examiner in 1851, continuing in that position until forced out by a change of political administrations in 1857. From 1860 to 1866, he lived with his brother, a blacksmith, in Franklin, Pennsylvania. During that time, he actively worked on developing an improved "cold apparatus" with which he hoped to reach temperatures as low as -345 °F (-209 ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Geneseo (village), New York
Geneseo is a village in and the county seat of Livingston County in the Finger Lakes region of New York, United States, south of Rochester. The name "Geneseo" is an anglicization of the Iroquois name for the earlier Iroquois town there, ''Gen-nis-he-yo'', which means "beautiful valley". The village of Geneseo lies within the western part of the town of Geneseo at the junction of State Routes 39 and 63 with U.S. Route 20A. The village's population was 8,031 at the 2010 census, out of 10,483 in the town. The United States Department of the Interior designated part of the village—the Geneseo Historic District—a National Historic Landmark in 1991. History The town of Geneseo was established in 1789, before the formation of Livingston County. Settlement began shortly after James and William Wadsworth arrived in 1790. The brothers came to the Genesee Valley from Connecticut as agents of their uncle, Colonel Jeremiah Wadsworth, to care for and sell the land he purchased. ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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National Bureau Of Standards
The National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) is an agency of the United States Department of Commerce whose mission is to promote American innovation and industrial competitiveness. NIST's activities are organized into physical science laboratory programs that include nanoscale science and technology, engineering, information technology, neutron research, material measurement, and physical measurement. From 1901 to 1988, the agency was named the National Bureau of Standards. History Background The Articles of Confederation, ratified by the colonies in 1781, provided: The United States in Congress assembled shall also have the sole and exclusive right and power of regulating the alloy and value of coin struck by their own authority, or by that of the respective states—fixing the standards of weights and measures throughout the United States. Article 1, section 8, of the Constitution of the United States, ratified in 1789, granted these powers to the new Congre ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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1880 Deaths
Year 188 (CLXXXVIII) was a leap year starting on Monday of the Julian calendar. At the time, it was known in the Roman Empire as the Year of the Consulship of Fuscianus and Silanus (or, less frequently, year 941 ''Ab urbe condita''). The denomination 188 for this year has been used since the early medieval period, when the Anno Domini calendar era became the prevalent method in Europe for naming years. Events By place Roman Empire * Publius Helvius Pertinax becomes pro-consul of Africa from 188 to 189. Japan * Queen Himiko (or Shingi Waō) begins her reign in Japan (until 248). Births * April 4 – Caracalla (or Antoninus), Roman emperor (d. 217) * Lu Ji (or Gongji), Chinese official and politician (d. 219) * Sun Shao, Chinese general of the Eastern Wu state (d. 241) Deaths * March 17 – Julian, pope and patriarch of Alexandria * Fa Zhen (or Gaoqing), Chinese scholar (b. AD 100) * Lucius Antistius Burrus, Roman politician (executed) * Ma Xiang, Ch ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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1819 Births
Events January–March * January 2 – The Panic of 1819, the first major peacetime financial crisis in the United States, begins. * January 25 – Thomas Jefferson founds the University of Virginia. * January 29 – Sir Stamford Raffles lands on the island of Singapore. * February 2 – ''Dartmouth College v. Woodward'': The Supreme Court of the United States under John Marshall rules in favor of Dartmouth College, allowing Dartmouth to keep its charter and remain a private institution. * February 6 – A formal treaty, between Hussein Shah of Johor and the British Sir Stamford Raffles, establishes a trading settlement in Singapore. * February 15 – The United States House of Representatives agrees to the Tallmadge Amendment, barring slaves from the new state of Missouri (the opening vote in a controversy that leads to the Missouri Compromise). * February 19 – Captain William Smith of British merchant brig ''Williams'' sights Williams ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Moon
The Moon is Earth's only natural satellite. It is the fifth largest satellite in the Solar System and the largest and most massive relative to its parent planet, with a diameter about one-quarter that of Earth (comparable to the width of Australia). The Moon is a planetary-mass object with a differentiated rocky body, making it a satellite planet under the geophysical definitions of the term and larger than all known dwarf planets of the Solar System. It lacks any significant atmosphere, hydrosphere, or magnetic field. Its surface gravity is about one-sixth of Earth's at , with Jupiter's moon Io being the only satellite in the Solar System known to have a higher surface gravity and density. The Moon orbits Earth at an average distance of , or about 30 times Earth's diameter. Its gravitational influence is the main driver of Earth's tides and very slowly lengthens Earth's day. The Moon's orbit around Earth has a sidereal period of 27.3 days. During each synodic period ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Lane (crater)
Lane is a lunar impact crater. It lies on the far side of the Moon, just to the west of the crater Ten Bruggencate. To the west of Lane is Perepelkin, and to the northwest lies Love. This crater is not heavily eroded, but the rim is somewhat disrupted at the northern and southern ends. To the south the rim has a prominent outward bulge that extends an extra 5–10 km. The interior is somewhat uneven, with low central ridges near the midpoint. The crater was named after American astrophysicist Jonathan Homer Lane by the IAU The International Astronomical Union (IAU; french: link=yes, Union astronomique internationale, UAI) is a nongovernmental organisation with the objective of advancing astronomy in all aspects, including promoting astronomical research, outreach ... in 1970. The crater was known as ''Crater 287'' prior to naming. Satellite craters By convention these features are identified on lunar maps by placing the letter on the side of the crater midpoint tha ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin
William Thomson, 1st Baron Kelvin, (26 June 182417 December 1907) was a British mathematician, mathematical physicist and engineer born in Belfast. Professor of Natural Philosophy at the University of Glasgow for 53 years, he did important work in the mathematical analysis of electricity and formulation of the first and second laws of thermodynamics, and did much to unify the emerging discipline of physics in its contemporary form. He received the Royal Society's Copley Medal in 1883, was its president 1890–1895, and in 1892 was the first British scientist to be elevated to the House of Lords. Absolute temperatures are stated in units of kelvin in his honour. While the existence of a coldest possible temperature ( absolute zero) was known prior to his work, Kelvin is known for determining its correct value as approximately −273.15 degrees Celsius or −459.67 degrees Fahrenheit. The Joule–Thomson effect is also named in his honour. He worked closely with mathematics ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Simon Newcomb
Simon Newcomb (March 12, 1835 – July 11, 1909) was a Canadian–American astronomer, applied mathematician, and autodidactic polymath. He served as Professor of Mathematics in the United States Navy and at Johns Hopkins University. Born in Nova Scotia, at the age of 19 Newcomb left an apprenticeship to join his father in Massachusetts, where the latter was teaching. Though Newcomb had little conventional schooling, he completed a BSc at Harvard in 1858. He later made important contributions to timekeeping, as well as to other fields in applied mathematics, such as economics and statistics. Fluent in several languages, he also wrote and published several popular science books and a science fiction novel. Biography Early life Simon Newcomb was born in the town of Wallace, Nova Scotia. His parents were John Burton Newcomb and his wife Miriam Steeves. His father was an itinerant school teacher, and frequently moved in order to teach in different parts of Canada, particularly in N ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Stellar Evolution
Stellar evolution is the process by which a star changes over the course of time. Depending on the mass of the star, its lifetime can range from a few million years for the most massive to trillions of years for the least massive, which is considerably longer than the age of the universe. The table shows the lifetimes of stars as a function of their masses. All stars are formed from collapsing clouds of gas and dust, often called nebulae or molecular clouds. Over the course of millions of years, these protostars settle down into a state of equilibrium, becoming what is known as a main-sequence star. Nuclear fusion powers a star for most of its existence. Initially the energy is generated by the fusion of hydrogen atoms at the core of the main-sequence star. Later, as the preponderance of atoms at the core becomes helium, stars like the Sun begin to fuse hydrogen along a spherical shell surrounding the core. This process causes the star to gradually grow in size, passing throug ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Density
Density (volumetric mass density or specific mass) is the substance's mass per unit of volume. The symbol most often used for density is ''ρ'' (the lower case Greek letter rho), although the Latin letter ''D'' can also be used. Mathematically, density is defined as mass divided by volume: : \rho = \frac where ''ρ'' is the density, ''m'' is the mass, and ''V'' is the volume. In some cases (for instance, in the United States oil and gas industry), density is loosely defined as its weight per unit volume, although this is scientifically inaccurate – this quantity is more specifically called specific weight. For a pure substance the density has the same numerical value as its mass concentration. Different materials usually have different densities, and density may be relevant to buoyancy, purity and packaging. Osmium and iridium are the densest known elements at standard conditions for temperature and pressure. To simplify comparisons of density across different s ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |
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Temperature
Temperature is a physical quantity that expresses quantitatively the perceptions of hotness and coldness. Temperature is measured with a thermometer. Thermometers are calibrated in various temperature scales that historically have relied on various reference points and thermometric substances for definition. The most common scales are the Celsius scale with the unit symbol °C (formerly called ''centigrade''), the Fahrenheit scale (°F), and the Kelvin scale (K), the latter being used predominantly for scientific purposes. The kelvin is one of the seven base units in the International System of Units (SI). Absolute zero, i.e., zero kelvin or −273.15 °C, is the lowest point in the thermodynamic temperature scale. Experimentally, it can be approached very closely but not actually reached, as recognized in the third law of thermodynamics. It would be impossible to extract energy as heat from a body at that temperature. Temperature is important in all fields of natur ... [...More Info...]       [...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]   |