Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel (; 22 July 1784 – 17 March 1846) was a German
astronomer
An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, natural satellite, moons, comets and galaxy, g ...
,
mathematician
A mathematician is someone who uses an extensive knowledge of mathematics in their work, typically to solve mathematical problems.
Mathematicians are concerned with numbers, data, quantity, structure, space, models, and change.
History
On ...
,
physicist
A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe.
Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...
, and
geodesist
Geodesy ( ) is the Earth science of accurately measuring and understanding Earth's figure (geometric shape and size), orientation in space, and gravity. The field also incorporates studies of how these properties change over time and equivale ...
. He was the first astronomer who determined reliable values for the distance from the sun to another star by the method of
parallax
Parallax is a displacement or difference in the apparent position of an object viewed along two different lines of sight and is measured by the angle or semi-angle of inclination between those two lines. Due to foreshortening, nearby objects ...
. A special type of mathematical functions were named
Bessel function
Bessel functions, first defined by the mathematician Daniel Bernoulli and then generalized by Friedrich Bessel, are canonical solutions of Bessel's differential equation
x^2 \frac + x \frac + \left(x^2 - \alpha^2 \right)y = 0
for an arbitrary ...
s after Bessel's death, though they had originally been discovered by
Daniel Bernoulli
Daniel Bernoulli FRS (; – 27 March 1782) was a Swiss mathematician and physicist and was one of the many prominent mathematicians in the Bernoulli family from Basel. He is particularly remembered for his applications of mathematics to mechan ...
and then generalised by Bessel.
Life and family
Bessel was born in
Minden
Minden () is a middle-sized town in the very north-east of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany, the greatest town between Bielefeld and Hanover. It is the capital of the district (''Kreis'') of Minden-Lübbecke, which is part of the region of Detm ...
,
Westphalia
Westphalia (; german: Westfalen ; nds, Westfalen ) is a region of northwestern Germany and one of the three historic parts of the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. It has an area of and 7.9 million inhabitants.
The territory of the regio ...
, then capital of the Prussian administrative region
Minden-Ravensberg
Minden-Ravensberg was a Prussian administrative unit consisting of the Principality of Minden and the County of Ravensberg from 1719–1807. The capital was Minden. In 1807 the region became part of the Kingdom of Westphalia, a client state o ...
, as second son of a civil servant into a large family. At the age of 14 Bessel was apprenticed to the import-export concern Kulenkamp at
Bremen
Bremen (Low German also: ''Breem'' or ''Bräm''), officially the City Municipality of Bremen (german: Stadtgemeinde Bremen, ), is the capital of the German state Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (''Freie Hansestadt Bremen''), a two-city-state consis ...
. The business's reliance on cargo ships led him to turn his
mathematical
Mathematics is an area of knowledge that includes the topics of numbers, formulas and related structures, shapes and the spaces in which they are contained, and quantities and their changes. These topics are represented in modern mathematics ...
skills to problems in
navigation
Navigation is a field of study that focuses on the process of monitoring and controlling the movement of a craft or vehicle from one place to another.Bowditch, 2003:799. The field of navigation includes four general categories: land navigation, ...
. This in turn led to an interest in
astronomy
Astronomy () is a natural science that studies astronomical object, celestial objects and phenomena. It uses mathematics, physics, and chemistry in order to explain their origin and chronology of the Universe, evolution. Objects of interest ...
as a way of determining
longitude
Longitude (, ) is a geographic coordinate that specifies the east–west position of a point on the surface of the Earth, or another celestial body. It is an angular measurement, usually expressed in degrees and denoted by the Greek letter l ...
.
Bessel came to the attention of a major figure of German astronomy at the time,
Heinrich Wilhelm Olbers
Heinrich Wilhelm Matthias Olbers (; ; 11 October 1758 – 2 March 1840) was a German physician and astronomer.
Life and career
Olbers was born in Arbergen, Germany, today part of Bremen, and studied to be a physician at university of Götting ...
, by producing a refinement on the orbital calculations for
Halley's Comet
Halley's Comet or Comet Halley, officially designated 1P/Halley, is a short-period comet visible from Earth every 75–79 years. Halley is the only known short-period comet that is regularly visible to the naked eye from Earth, and thus the o ...
in 1804, using old observation data taken from
Thomas Harriot
Thomas Harriot (; – 2 July 1621), also spelled Harriott, Hariot or Heriot, was an English astronomer, mathematician, ethnographer and translator to whom the theory of refraction is attributed. Thomas Harriot was also recognized for his cont ...
and
Nathaniel Torporley in 1607.
Franz Xaver von Zach
Baron Franz Xaver von Zach (''Franz Xaver Freiherr von Zach''; 4 June 1754 – 2 September 1832) was a Hungarian astronomer born at Pest, Hungary (now Budapest in Hungary).
Biography
Zach studied physics at the Royal University of Pest, and se ...
edited the results in his journal ''Monatliche Correspondenz''.
Two years later Bessel left Kulenkamp and became assistant at
Johann Hieronymus Schröter
Johann Hieronymus Schröter (30 August 1745, Erfurt – 29 August 1816, Lilienthal) was a German astronomer.
Life
Schröter was born in Erfurt, and studied law at Göttingen University from 1762 until 1767, after which he started a ten-y ...
's private observatory in
Lilienthal near
Bremen
Bremen (Low German also: ''Breem'' or ''Bräm''), officially the City Municipality of Bremen (german: Stadtgemeinde Bremen, ), is the capital of the German state Free Hanseatic City of Bremen (''Freie Hansestadt Bremen''), a two-city-state consis ...
as successor of
Karl Ludwig Harding
Karl Ludwig Harding (29 September 1765 – 31 August 1834) was a German astronomer, who discovered 3 Juno, the third asteroid of the main-belt in 1804. The lunar crater '' Harding'' and the asteroid 2003 Harding are named in his honor. ...
. There he worked on
James Bradley
James Bradley (1692–1762) was an English astronomer and priest who served as the third Astronomer Royal from 1742. He is best known for two fundamental discoveries in astronomy, the aberration of light (1725–1728), and the nutation of the ...
's stellar observation data to produce precise positions for some 3,222 stars.
Despite lacking any higher education, especially at university, Bessel was appointed director of the newly founded
Königsberg Observatory
Koenigsberg Observatory (german: Sternwarte Königsberg; Königsberger Universitätssternwarte; obs. code: 058) was an astronomical observatory and research facility which was attached to the Albertina University in Königsberg, what is now Kal ...
by King
Frederick William III of Prussia
Frederick William III (german: Friedrich Wilhelm III.; 3 August 1770 – 7 June 1840) was King of Prussia from 16 November 1797 until his death in 1840. He was concurrently Elector of Brandenburg in the Holy Roman Empire until 6 August 1806, wh ...
in January 1810, at the age of 25, and remained in that position until his death. On the recommendation of fellow mathematician and physicist
Carl Friedrich Gauss
Johann Carl Friedrich Gauss (; german: Gauß ; la, Carolus Fridericus Gauss; 30 April 177723 February 1855) was a German mathematician and physicist who made significant contributions to many fields in mathematics and science. Sometimes refer ...
, with whom he corresponded from 1804 to 1843, he was awarded an honorary doctor degree from the
University of Göttingen
The University of Göttingen, officially the Georg August University of Göttingen, (german: Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, known informally as Georgia Augusta) is a public research university in the city of Göttingen, Germany. Founded ...
in March 1811.
Around that time, the two men engaged in an epistolary correspondence. However, when they met in person in 1825, they quarrelled; the details are not known.
In 1842 Bessel took part in the annual meeting of the
British Association for the Advancement of Science
The British Science Association (BSA) is a charity and learned society founded in 1831 to aid in the promotion and development of science. Until 2009 it was known as the British Association for the Advancement of Science (BA). The current Chie ...
in Manchester, accompanied by the geophysicist
Georg Adolf Erman
Georg Adolf Erman (12 May 1806 – 12 July 1877) was a German physicist.
Erman was born in Berlin as the son of Paul Erman. He studied natural science at the universities of Berlin and Königsberg, spent from 1828 to 1830 in a journey round t ...
and the mathematician
Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi
Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi (; ; 10 December 1804 – 18 February 1851) was a German mathematician who made fundamental contributions to elliptic functions, dynamics, differential equations, determinants, and number theory. His name is occasiona ...
.
Bessel married Johanna, the daughter of the chemist and pharmacist
Karl Gottfried Hagen
Karl Gottfried Hagen (24 December 1749 – 2 March 1829) was a German chemist.
Hagen was born and died in Königsberg, Prussia.
He founded the first German chemical laboratory at the University of Königsberg, thus establishing the scientific dis ...
who was the uncle of the physician and biologist
Hermann August Hagen
Hermann August Hagen (30 May 1817 – 9 November 1893) was a German entomologist who specialised in Neuroptera and Odonata. He had established himself as one of Europe's preeminent entomologists by 1867 when he accepted a position at Harvard Unive ...
and the hydraulic engineer
Gotthilf Hagen
Gotthilf Heinrich Ludwig Hagen (3 March 1797 – 3 February 1884) was a German civil engineer who made important contributions to fluid dynamics, hydraulic engineering and probability theory.
Life and work
Hagen was born in Königsberg, East Prus ...
, the latter also Bessel's student and assistant from 1816 to 1818. The physicist
Franz Ernst Neumann
Franz Ernst Neumann (11 September 1798 – 23 May 1895) was a German mineralogist, physicist and mathematician.
Biography
Neumann was born in Joachimsthal, Margraviate of Brandenburg, near Berlin. In 1815 he interrupted his studies at Berlin to ...
, Bessel's close companion and colleague, was married to Johanna Hagen's sister Florentine. Neumann introduced Bessel's exacting methods of measurement and data reduction into his mathematico-physical seminar, which he co-directed with
Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi
Carl Gustav Jacob Jacobi (; ; 10 December 1804 – 18 February 1851) was a German mathematician who made fundamental contributions to elliptic functions, dynamics, differential equations, determinants, and number theory. His name is occasiona ...
at Königsberg. These exacting methods had a lasting impact upon the work of Neumann's students and upon the Prussian conception of precision in measurement.
Bessel had two sons and three daughters. His elder son became an architect but died suddenly in 1840 aged 26; his younger son died shortly after birth. His eldest daughter, Marie, married the physicist
Georg Adolf Erman
Georg Adolf Erman (12 May 1806 – 12 July 1877) was a German physicist.
Erman was born in Berlin as the son of Paul Erman. He studied natural science at the universities of Berlin and Königsberg, spent from 1828 to 1830 in a journey round t ...
, member of the scholar family
Erman Erman Rašiti may refer to:
Given name
* Erman Bulucu (born 1989), Turkish footballer
* Erman Eltemur (born 1993), Turkish karateka
* Erman Güraçar (born 1974), Turkish footballer
* Erman Kılıç (born 1983), Turkish footballer
* Erman Kunter (b ...
. One of their sons in turn was the renowned
Egyptologist
Egyptology (from ''Egypt'' and Greek , '' -logia''; ar, علم المصريات) is the study of ancient Egyptian history, language, literature, religion, architecture and art from the 5th millennium BC until the end of its native religious ...
Adolf Erman
Johann Peter Adolf Erman (; 31 October 185426 June 1937) was a renowned German Egyptologist and lexicographer.
Life
Born in Berlin, he was the son of Georg Adolf Erman and grandson of Paul Erman and Friedrich Bessel.
Educated at Leipzig and Ber ...
. His third daughter Johanna married the politician
Adolf Hermann Hagen
Adolf Hermann Wilhelm Hagen (23 September 1820 – 17 August 1894) was a public official in Prussia. He was also a banker and a liberal politician.
He is known for the "Hagen resolution", presented in the Prussian House of Representatives in 1 ...
, their son was the physicist
Ernst Bessel Hagen.
After several months of illness Bessel died in March 1846 at his observatory from
retroperitoneal fibrosis
Retroperitoneal fibrosis or Ormond's disease is a disease featuring the proliferation of fibrous tissue in the retroperitoneum, the compartment of the body containing the kidneys, aorta, renal tract, and various other structures. It may present wi ...
.
Work
![Koenigsberg observatory](https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/7/78/Koenigsberg_observatory.jpg)
While the observatory was still in construction Bessel elaborated the ''Fundamenta Astronomiae'' based on Bradley's observations. As a preliminary result he produced tables of
atmospheric refraction
Atmospheric refraction is the deviation of light or other electromagnetic wave from a straight line as it passes through the atmosphere due to the variation in air density as a function of height. This refraction is due to the velocity of light t ...
that won him the
Lalande Prize
The Lalande Prize (French: ''Prix Lalande'' also known as Lalande Medal) was an award for scientific advances in astronomy, given from 1802 until 1970 by the French Academy of Sciences.
The prize was endowed by astronomer Jérôme Lalande in 1801 ...
from the
French Academy of Sciences
The French Academy of Sciences (French: ''Académie des sciences'') is a learned society, founded in 1666 by Louis XIV of France, Louis XIV at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, to encourage and protect the spirit of French Scientific me ...
in 1811. The Königsberg Observatory began operation in 1813.
Starting in 1819, Bessel determined the position of over 50,000 stars using a
meridian circle
The meridian circle is an instrument for timing of the passage of stars across the local meridian, an event known as a culmination, while at the same time measuring their angular distance from the nadir. These are special purpose telescopes moun ...
from
Reichenbach, assisted by some of his qualified students. The most prominent of them was
Friedrich Wilhelm Argelander
Friedrich Wilhelm August Argelander (22 March 1799 – 17 February 1875) was a German astronomer. He is known for his determinations of stellar brightnesses, positions, and distances.
Life and work
Argelander was born in Memel in the Kingd ...
.
With this work done, Bessel was able to achieve the feat for which he is best remembered today: he is credited with being the first to use the
stellar parallax
Stellar parallax is the apparent shift of position of any nearby star (or other object) against the background of distant objects, and a basis for determining (through trigonometry) the distance of the object. Created by the different orbital p ...
in
calculating the distance to a star. Astronomers had believed for some time that parallax would provide the first accurate measurement of interstellar distances. In 1838 Bessel announced that
61 Cygni
61 Cygni is a binary star system in the constellation Cygnus, consisting of a pair of K-type dwarf stars that orbit each other in a period of about 659 years. Of apparent magnitude 5.20 and 6.05, respectively, they can be seen ...
had a parallax of 0.314
arcsecond
A minute of arc, arcminute (arcmin), arc minute, or minute arc, denoted by the symbol , is a unit of angular measurement equal to of one degree. Since one degree is of a turn (or complete rotation), one minute of arc is of a turn. The na ...
s; which, given the diameter of the
Earth
Earth is the third planet from the Sun and the only astronomical object known to harbor life. While large volumes of water can be found throughout the Solar System, only Earth sustains liquid surface water. About 71% of Earth's surfa ...
's orbit, indicated that the star is 10.3
ly away. Given the current measurement of 11.4 ly, Bessel's figure had an error of 9.6%.
Thanks to these results astronomers had not only enlarged the vision of the universe well beyond the cosmic magnitude, but after the discovery in 1728 by
James Bradley
James Bradley (1692–1762) was an English astronomer and priest who served as the third Astronomer Royal from 1742. He is best known for two fundamental discoveries in astronomy, the aberration of light (1725–1728), and the nutation of the ...
of the
aberration of light
In astronomy, aberration (also referred to as astronomical aberration, stellar aberration, or velocity aberration) is a phenomenon which produces an apparent motion of celestial objects about their true positions, dependent on the velocity of t ...
a second empirical evidence of the Earth's relative movement was produced.
Nearly at the same time
Friedrich Georg Wilhelm Struve
Friedrich Georg Wilhelm von Struve (russian: link=no, Василий Яковлевич Струве, trans. ''Vasily Yakovlevich Struve''; 15 April 1793 – ) was a Baltic German astronomer and geodesist from the famous Struve family. He is best ...
and
Thomas Henderson measured the parallaxes of
Vega
Vega is the brightest star in the northern constellation of Lyra. It has the Bayer designation α Lyrae, which is Latinised to Alpha Lyrae and abbreviated Alpha Lyr or α Lyr. This star is relatively close at only from the Sun, an ...
and
Alpha Centauri
Alpha Centauri ( Latinized from α Centauri and often abbreviated Alpha Cen or α Cen) is a triple star system in the constellation of Centaurus. It consists of 3 stars: Alpha Centauri A (officially Rigil Kentaurus), Alpha Centaur ...
.
As well as helping determine the parallax of 61 Cygni, Bessel's precise measurements using a new meridian circle from Adolf Repsold allowed him to notice deviations in the motions of
Sirius
Sirius is the list of brightest stars, brightest star in the night sky. Its name is derived from the Ancient Greek language, Greek word , or , meaning 'glowing' or 'scorching'. The star is designated α Canis Majoris, Latinisation ...
and
Procyon
Procyon () is the brightest star in the constellation of Canis Minor and usually the eighth-brightest star in the night sky, with an apparent visual magnitude of 0.34. It has the Bayer designation α Canis Minoris, which is Latinize ...
, which he deduced must be caused by the gravitational attraction of unseen companions.
His announcement of Sirius's "dark companion" in 1844 was the first correct claim of a previously unobserved companion by positional measurement, and eventually led to the discovery of
Sirius B
Sirius is the brightest star in the night sky. Its name is derived from the Greek word , or , meaning 'glowing' or 'scorching'. The star is designated α Canis Majoris, Latinized to Alpha Canis Majoris, and abbreviated Alpha CMa ...
.
Bessel was the first scientist who realized the effect later called ''
personal equation The term personal equation, in 19th- and early 20th-century science, referred to the idea that every individual observer had an inherent bias when it came to measurements and observations.
Astronomy
The term originated in astronomy, when it was ...
'', that several simultaneously observing persons determine slightly different values, especially recording the transition time of stars.
In 1824, Bessel developed a new method for calculating the circumstances of eclipses using the so-called
Besselian elements
The Besselian elements are a set of values used to calculate and predict the local circumstances of occultations for an observer on Earth. This method is particularly used for solar eclipses, but is also applied for occultations of stars or planets ...
. His method simplified the calculation to such an extent, without sacrificing accuracy, that it is still in use today.
Bessel's work in 1840 contributed to the
discovery of Neptune
The planet Neptune was mathematically predicted before it was directly observed. With a prediction by Urbain Le Verrier, telescopic observations confirming the existence of a major planet were made on the night of September 23–24, 1846, at the ...
in 1846 at
Berlin Observatory
The Berlin Observatory (Berliner Sternwarte) is a German astronomical institution with a series of observatories and related organizations in and around the city of Berlin in Germany, starting from the 18th century. It has its origins in 1700 w ...
, several months after Bessel's death. On Bessel's proposal (1825) the
Prussian Academy of Sciences
The Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences (german: Königlich-Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften) was an academy established in Berlin, Germany on 11 July 1700, four years after the Prussian Academy of Arts, or "Arts Academy," to which "Berlin ...
started the edition of the ''Berliner Akademische Sternkarten'' (''Berlin Academic Star Charts'') as an international project. One unpublished new chart enabled
Johann Gottfried Galle
Johann Gottfried Galle (9 June 1812 – 10 July 1910) was a German astronomer from Radis, Germany, at the Berlin Observatory who, on 23 September 1846, with the assistance of student Heinrich Louis d'Arrest, was the first person to view the pl ...
to find Neptune near the position calculated by LeVerrier in 1846.
In the second decade of the 19th century while studying the dynamics of 'many-body' gravitational systems, Bessel developed what are now known as
Bessel function
Bessel functions, first defined by the mathematician Daniel Bernoulli and then generalized by Friedrich Bessel, are canonical solutions of Bessel's differential equation
x^2 \frac + x \frac + \left(x^2 - \alpha^2 \right)y = 0
for an arbitrary ...
s. Critical for the solution of certain
differential equations
In mathematics, a differential equation is an equation that relates one or more unknown functions and their derivatives. In applications, the functions generally represent physical quantities, the derivatives represent their rates of change, an ...
, these functions are used throughout both classical and
quantum physics
Quantum mechanics is a fundamental theory in physics that provides a description of the physical properties of nature at the scale of atoms and subatomic particles. It is the foundation of all quantum physics including quantum chemistry, qua ...
.
Bessel is responsible for the correction to the formula for the
sample variance
In probability theory and statistics, variance is the expectation of the squared deviation of a random variable from its population mean or sample mean. Variance is a measure of dispersion, meaning it is a measure of how far a set of numbers ...
estimator named in his honour. This is the use of the factor ''n'' − 1 in the denominator of the formula, rather than just ''n''. This occurs when the ''sample mean'' rather than the ''population mean'' is used to centre the data and since the sample mean is a linear combination of the data the residual to the sample mean overcounts the number of degrees of freedom by the number of constraint equations — in this case one. ''(Also see
Bessel's correction
In statistics, Bessel's correction is the use of ''n'' − 1 instead of ''n'' in the formula for the sample variance and sample standard deviation, where ''n'' is the number of observations in a sample. This method corrects the bias in t ...
)''.
An additional field of work was
geodesy
Geodesy ( ) is the Earth science of accurately measuring and understanding Earth's figure (geometric shape and size), orientation in space, and gravity. The field also incorporates studies of how these properties change over time and equivale ...
.
Bessel published a method for solving the main
geodesic problem.
He was responsible for the survey of East Prussia which joined the Prussian and Russian
triangulation network
In surveying, triangulation is the process of determining the location of a point by measuring only angles to it from known points at either end of a fixed baseline by using trigonometry, rather than measuring distances to the point directly as ...
s.
He also obtained an estimate of increased accuracy for the
Earth's ellipsoid
An Earth ellipsoid or Earth spheroid is a mathematical figure approximating the Earth's form, used as a reference frame for computations in geodesy, astronomy, and the geosciences. Various different ellipsoids have been used as approximatio ...
, nowadays called the
Bessel ellipsoid
The Bessel ellipsoid (or Bessel 1841) is an important reference ellipsoid of geodesy. It is currently used by several countries for their national geodetic surveys, but will be replaced in the next decades by modern ellipsoids of satellite geod ...
, based on several
arc measurements
Arc measurement, sometimes degree measurement (german: Gradmessung), is the astrogeodetic technique of determining of the radius of Earth – more specifically, the local Earth radius of curvature of the figure of the Earth – by relating the ...
.
Honors and prizes
* Honorary doctor degree from the
University of Göttingen
The University of Göttingen, officially the Georg August University of Göttingen, (german: Georg-August-Universität Göttingen, known informally as Georgia Augusta) is a public research university in the city of Göttingen, Germany. Founded ...
in March 1811
* Member of the
Prussian Academy of Sciences
The Royal Prussian Academy of Sciences (german: Königlich-Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften) was an academy established in Berlin, Germany on 11 July 1700, four years after the Prussian Academy of Arts, or "Arts Academy," to which "Berlin ...
in 1812
* Member of the
French Academy of Sciences
The French Academy of Sciences (French: ''Académie des sciences'') is a learned society, founded in 1666 by Louis XIV of France, Louis XIV at the suggestion of Jean-Baptiste Colbert, to encourage and protect the spirit of French Scientific me ...
in 1816
* Foreign member of the
Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences
The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences ( sv, Kungliga Vetenskapsakademien) is one of the Swedish Royal Academies, royal academies of Sweden. Founded on 2 June 1739, it is an independent, non-governmental scientific organization that takes special ...
in 1823
* Fellow of the
Royal Society
The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...
in 1825
* Foreign Honorary Member of the
American Academy of Arts and Sciences
The American Academy of Arts and Sciences (abbreviation: AAA&S) is one of the oldest learned societies in the United States. It was founded in 1780 during the American Revolution by John Adams, John Hancock, James Bowdoin, Andrew Oliver, and ...
in 1832
* Member of the Royal Institute of the Netherlands, predecessor of the
Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
The Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences ( nl, Koninklijke Nederlandse Akademie van Wetenschappen, abbreviated: KNAW) is an organization dedicated to the advancement of science and literature in the Netherlands. The academy is housed ...
in 1827
* Member of the
American Philosophical Society
The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...
in 1840
* Bessel won the
Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society
The Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society is the highest award given by the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS). The RAS Council have "complete freedom as to the grounds on which it is awarded" and it can be awarded for any reason. Past awar ...
twice, in 1829 and 1841.
The largest
crater
Crater may refer to:
Landforms
*Impact crater, a depression caused by two celestial bodies impacting each other, such as a meteorite hitting a planet
*Explosion crater, a hole formed in the ground produced by an explosion near or below the surfac ...
in the Moon's
Mare Serenitatis
Mare Serenitatis (Latin ''serēnitātis'', the "Sea of Serenity") is a lunar mare located to the east of Mare Imbrium on the Moon. Its diameter is .
Geology
Mare Serenitatis is located within the Serenitatis basin, which is of the Nectarian ep ...
and the
main-belt
The asteroid belt is a torus-shaped region in the Solar System, located roughly between the orbits of the planets Jupiter and Mars. It contains a great many solid, irregularly shaped bodies, of many sizes, but much smaller than planets, called ...
asteroid
1552 Bessel, as well as two fjords in Greenland,
Bessel Fjord, NE Greenland and
Bessel Fjord, NW Greenland
Bessel Fjord ( da, Bessels Fjord) is a fjord in northwestern Greenland. Administratively it belongs to the Avannaata municipality.
Knud Rasmussen described the fjord entrance in the following terms:
Geography
Bessel Fjord stretches roughly from ...
, were named in his honour.
Publications
;Latin
*
*
;German
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
*
** Vol. 1: ''I. Bewegungen der Körper im Sonnensystem. II. Sphärische Astronomie''. Leipzig 1875
** Vol. 2: ''III. Theorie der Instrumente. IV. Stellarastronomie. V. Mathematik''. Leipzig 1876
** Vol. 3: ''VI. Geodäsie. VII. Physik. VIII. Verschiedenes – Literatur''. Leipzig 1876.
*
;Correspondence
* Königlich Preußische Akademie der Wissenschaften, ed. (1880)
''Briefwechsel zwischen Gauss und Bessel.'' orrespondenceLeipzig.
See also
*
Carlos Ibáñez e Ibáñez de Ibero
Carlos Ibáñez e Ibáñez de Ibero, 1st Marquis of Mulhacén, (14 April 1825 – 28 or 29 January 1891) was a Spanish divisional general and geodesist. He represented Spain at the 1875 Conference of the Metre Convention and was the first presid ...
– 1st president of the
International Committee for Weights and Measures
The General Conference on Weights and Measures (GCWM; french: Conférence générale des poids et mesures, CGPM) is the supreme authority of the International Bureau of Weights and Measures (BIPM), the intergovernmental organization established i ...
and president of the
International Geodetic Association )
, merged =
, successor =
, formation =
, founder =
, founding_location =
, extinction =
, merger =
, type = scholarly society
, tax_id ...
References
*
John Frederick William Herschel
Sir John Frederick William Herschel, 1st Baronet (; 7 March 1792 – 11 May 1871) was an English polymath active as a mathematician, astronomer, chemist, inventor, experimental photographer who invented the blueprint and did botanical wo ...
, ''A brief notice of the life, researches, and discoveries of Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel'', London: Barclay, 1847
on-line
*
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Jürgen Hamel
Jürgen Hamel (born 6 June 1951) is a German astronomy historian. His research areas are the history of astronomy in the Middle Ages and the early modern period, the period around 1800, the history of astrophysics, astronomy and cultural history, ...
: Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel. Leipzig 1984 .
* Kasimir Ławrynowicz: Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel, 1784–1846. Basel, Boston, Berlin 1995, .
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Publications of Friedrich Wilhelm Bessel Astrophysics Data System ADS
Further reading
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{{DEFAULTSORT:Bessel, Friedrich Wilhelm
1784 births
1846 deaths
19th-century German mathematicians
Fellows of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences
Foreign Members of the Royal Society
19th-century German astronomers
German geodesists
Honorary members of the Saint Petersburg Academy of Sciences
Members of the French Academy of Sciences
Members of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences
People from Minden
People from East Prussia
People from the Kingdom of Prussia
Recipients of the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society
Recipients of the Lalande Prize
Recipients of the Pour le Mérite (civil class)
Members of the Göttingen Academy of Sciences and Humanities