Paul Herget (January 30, 1908 – August 27, 1981) was an American

astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. Astronomers observe astronomical objects, such as stars, planets, natural satellite, moons, comets and galaxy, galax ...

and director of the

Cincinnati Observatory The Cincinnati Observatory, known locally as Mt. Lookout Observatory, is located in Cincinnati, Ohio, Cincinnati, Ohio (United States) on top of Mount Lookout, Ohio, Mount Lookout. It consists of two observatory buildings housing an 11-inch (28&n ...

, who established the

Minor Planet Center The Minor Planet Center (MPC) is the official body for observing and reporting on minor planets under the auspices of the International Astronomical Union (IAU). Founded in 1947, it operates at the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory. Funct ...

after

World War II World War II or the Second World War (1 September 1939 – 2 September 1945) was a World war, global conflict between two coalitions: the Allies of World War II, Allies and the Axis powers. World War II by country, Nearly all of the wo ...

Career

Herget taught astronomy at the

University of Cincinnati The University of Cincinnati (UC or Cincinnati, informally Cincy) is a public university, public research university in Cincinnati, Ohio, United States. It was founded in 1819 and had an enrollment of over 53,000 students in 2024, making it the ...

. He was a pioneer in the use of machine methods, and eventually digital computers, in the solving of scientific and specifically astronomical problems (for example, in the calculation of

ephemeris In astronomy and celestial navigation, an ephemeris (; ; , ) is a book with tables that gives the trajectory of naturally occurring astronomical objects and artificial satellites in the sky, i.e., the position (and possibly velocity) over tim ...

tables for

minor planet According to the International Astronomical Union (IAU), a minor planet is an astronomical object in direct orbit around the Sun that is exclusively classified as neither a planet nor a comet. Before 2006, the IAU officially used the term ''minor ...

s). During World War II he applied these same talents to the war effort, helping to locate

U-boat U-boats are Submarine#Military, naval submarines operated by Germany, including during the World War I, First and Second World Wars. The term is an Anglicization#Loanwords, anglicized form of the German word , a shortening of (), though the G ...

s by means of the application of

spherical trigonometry Spherical trigonometry is the branch of spherical geometry that deals with the metrical relationships between the edge (geometry), sides and angles of spherical triangles, traditionally expressed using trigonometric functions. On the sphere, ge ...

. Herget established the

at the university after the war in 1947. He was also named director of the

. The Minor Planet Center was eventually relocated in 1978 to the

Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory The Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) is a research institute of the Smithsonian Institution, concentrating on Astrophysics, astrophysical studies including Galactic astronomy, galactic and extragalactic astronomy, cosmology, Sun, solar ...

Cambridge, Massachusetts Cambridge ( ) is a city in Middlesex County, Massachusetts, United States. It is a suburb in the Greater Boston metropolitan area, located directly across the Charles River from Boston. The city's population as of the 2020 United States census, ...

, where it still operates. Herget is also credited with helping design the shape of the Pringles potato-based chip.

Awards and honors

* In 1965 he was awarded the James Craig Watson Medal by the

National Academy of Sciences The National Academy of Sciences (NAS) is a United States nonprofit, NGO, non-governmental organization. NAS is part of the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine, along with the National Academy of Engineering (NAE) and the ...

for, "his scientific accomplishments in celestial mechanics and orbit computation, and particularly for his contributions to the knowledge of the orbits of asteroids". * Asteroid 1751 Herget, discovered by astronomers with the Indiana Asteroid Program at Goethe Link Observatory in 1955, was named in his honor. The official was published by the

on February 20, 1971 (). * On August 1, 1978, asteroid 1755 Lorbach, discovered by Marguerite Laugier at Nice in 1936, was , Anne Lorbach Herget ().

Publication of discovery circumstances

In the 1950s and 1960s, Paul Herget compiled a large number of naming citations for minor planets, giving the discovery circumstances as well as background information on the name's origin and on the involved astronomers. His collected work is known as ''The Names of the Minor Planets'' and was published by the

in 1955 and 1968. The last publication contains details of the discovery and naming of 1,564 minor planets up to the height of WWII in 1943, and spans from the first discovered minor planet, 1 Ceres, up to 1564 Srbija. Herget's discovery circumstances were later incorporated into the ''Dictionary of Minor Planet Names'', which was prepared by astronomer Lutz Schmadel on behalf of IAU's commission 20. In this work, citations that originate from Herget's original compilation are marked with the letter "H" and the corresponding page number.

References

External links

PaulHerget.org

at Columbia University Computing History

* ttp://www.nasonline.org/publications/biographical-memoirs/memoir-pdfs/herget-paul.pdf Paul Herget 1908 - 1981. A Biographical Memoir by Donald E. Ostertbrock and P. Kenneth SeidelmannNational Academy of Sciences) {{DEFAULTSORT:Herget, Paul 1908 births 1981 deaths American astronomers Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences University of Cincinnati alumni University of Cincinnati faculty

Career

Awards and honors

Publication of discovery circumstances

See also

References

External links