Rebecca Elson
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Rebecca Anne Wood Elson (2 January 1960 – 19 May 1999) was a Canadian–American astronomer and writer.


Early life and education

Rebecca "Becky" Anne Wood Elson was born in Montreal, Quebec, to Jeanne Bridgman, ''née'' Hickey and John Albert Elson (1923–2010), a geologist and professor at McGill University. Her older sister, Sally was born in 1958. As a teenager Elson often travelled Canada with her geologist father as he performed field research. Elson matriculated in 1976, at the age of 16. After initially choosing Biology, with a particular interest in Genetics and then transferring to Astronomy she earned a bachelor's degree from
Smith College Smith College is a Private university, private Liberal arts colleges in the United States, liberal arts Women's colleges in the United States, women's college in Northampton, Massachusetts. It was chartered in 1871 by Sophia Smith (Smith College ...
, where she was taught by Waltraut Seitter. Her degree included a placement at St Andrews University in Scotland. Elson gained a master's degree in Physics from the University of British Columbia, funded by a postgraduate fellowship from the Canadian Natural Sciences and Engineering Research Council, resulting a thesis ''An investigation of models of dynamical friction'''. During this time she undertook summer study visits to the University of St Andrews, and the Royal Observatory, Edinburgh, which led to her first published research article and her interest in globular clusters of stars. Elson undertook her
PhD PHD or PhD may refer to: * Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), an academic qualification Entertainment * '' PhD: Phantasy Degree'', a Korean comic series * ''Piled Higher and Deeper'', a web comic * Ph.D. (band), a 1980s British group ** Ph.D. (Ph.D. albu ...
(1982 - 1986) at the Institute of Astronomy and Christ’s College Cambridge University where she was awarded an Isaac Newton Studentship, an overseas research student award, and a vice chancellor’s bursary. Her primary supervisor was S. Michael Fall and while working on her PhD she spent time at the Mount Stromlo Observatory in
Canberra Canberra ( ) is the capital city of Australia. Founded following the federation of the colonies of Australia as the seat of government for the new nation, it is Australia's largest inland city and the eighth-largest city overall. The ci ...
and
Siding Spring observatory Siding Spring Observatory near Coonabarabran, New South Wales, Australia, part of the Research School of Astronomy & Astrophysics (RSAA) at the Australian National University (ANU), incorporates the Anglo-Australian Telescope along with a coll ...
Coonabarabran, New South Wales, working under Ken Freeman. This period led to several scientific articles, and her PhD thesis, ‘''The rich star clusters in the
Large Magellanic Cloud The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), or Nubecula Major, is a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. At a distance of around 50 kiloparsecs (≈160,000  light-years), the LMC is the second- or third-closest galaxy to the Milky Way, after the ...
''’ which developed the Elson-Fall-Freeman (EFF)
luminosity Luminosity is an absolute measure of radiated electromagnetic power (light), the radiant power emitted by a light-emitting object over time. In astronomy, luminosity is the total amount of electromagnetic energy emitted per unit of time by a st ...
profile and resulted in the discovery of unexpectedly extended profiles in star clusters in the
Large Magellanic Cloud The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC), or Nubecula Major, is a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way. At a distance of around 50 kiloparsecs (≈160,000  light-years), the LMC is the second- or third-closest galaxy to the Milky Way, after the ...
.


Career in astronomy

Elson did her postdoctoral work at the Institute for Advanced Study under the supervision of
John N. Bahcall John Norris Bahcall (December 30, 1934 – August 17, 2005) was an American astrophysicist, best known for his contributions to the solar neutrino problem, the development of the Hubble Space Telescope and for his leadership and development of th ...
, continuing her star cluster work using ground-based telescopes when plans to use the new capabilities of the Hubble Space Telescope were affected by its delayed launch following the Challenger space shuttle disaster. In 1987, she was the first-named author on a major review article on star clusters for the ''
Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics The ''Annual Review of Astronomy and Astrophysics'' is an annual peer reviewed scientific journal published by Annual Reviews. The co-editors are Ewine van Dishoeck and Robert C. Kennicutt. The journal reviews scientific literature pertaining to ...
'', after which she took up a Bunting Fellowship at
Radcliffe College Radcliffe College was a women's liberal arts college in Cambridge, Massachusetts, and functioned as the female coordinate institution for the all-male Harvard College. Considered founded in 1879, it was one of the Seven Sisters colleges and he ...
in 1989, where she taught creative writing, followed by a term teaching a
Harvard Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...
expository writing course on science and ethics. In 1989 she was the youngest astronomer selected to serve on a US National Academy of Sciences decennial review of the field. In the early 1990s she returned to the Institute of Astronomy at Cambridge, UK to accept the research position she would hold for the remainder of her life. Her work centered on globular clusters, chemical evolution and
galaxy A galaxy is a system of stars, stellar remnants, interstellar gas, dust, dark matter, bound together by gravity. The word is derived from the Greek ' (), literally 'milky', a reference to the Milky Way galaxy that contains the Solar System. ...
formation. In April 1990 as the first images were released from the Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers were disappointed that the images were spoiled by the
spherical aberration In optics, spherical aberration (SA) is a type of optical aberration, aberration found in optical systems that have elements with spherical surfaces. Lens (optics), Lenses and curved mirrors are prime examples, because this shape is easier to man ...
in the space telescope mirror. When Hubble was repaired the resulting sharp images led to an acceleration of research, Elson's team successfully bidding for one of the largest allocations of observation orbits at that time.


Author

A volume of wide-ranging poetry and essays she wrote from her teens until shortly before her death was published posthumously as ''A Responsibility to Awe'' in 2001 in the United Kingdom, and in 2002 in the United States. The works were selected by her husband Angelo di Cintio and a friend and fellow poet, Anne Berkeley, from a much larger body of unpublished efforts. Some of the works refer to vast concepts of physics and astronomy, often in unexpectedly abstract or playful ways, to reflect aspects of human experience. Others reflect profound joy with life or poignant observations of her impending death. The collection was selected as one of the best books of the year by '' The Economist''. Elson was lead author on or contributed to seventy scientific contributions, including thirty-eight major articles in the refereed scientific literature research papers in her short career.


Death and legacy

Elson was diagnosed with non-Hodgkin's lymphoma at the age of 29. With treatment, it went into remission, and in 1996, she married the Italian artist Angelo di Cintio. However, the cancer returned soon afterwards. Elson died of the disease in Cambridge in May 1999, at the age of 39. Rebecca Elson's biography was published by the '' Oxford Dictionary of National Biography'' on 13 August 2020 as part of their collection of biographies of astronomers and mathematicians.


Selected works

* ''A Responsibility to Awe'' (2001)


References


External links


Henry Gee "A critical moment in stellar evolution" 2 July 1998, www.nature.com/news
on work by Elson on recently formed white-dwarf stars in a star-cluster in the Large Magellanic Cloud.
Eva K. Grebel and You-Hua Chu, eds. "Rebecca Elson (1960-1999)", in Maghellanic Clouds Newsletter, 33, June 13, 1999, page 2, www.astro.keele.ac.uk
Obituary of Rebecca Elson.
McGill University Earth & Planetary Sciences Alumni Newsletter 13, January 2013, page 16, www.mcgill.ca
Obituary of John A. Elson (1923 – 2010), Rebecca's geology professor father.


Poems by Elson



from Chabot College: Poems ''We Astronomers'' and ''Carnal Knowledge'' from Rebecca Elson: ''A Responsibility to Awe'', OxfordPoets Series. Carcanet. . Retrieved on May 23, 2021.

With full-text poem ''Explaining Relativity'' by Rebecca Elson. Retrieved on May 23, 2021. * [https://www.brainpickings.org/2019/04/29/regina-spektor-reads-rebecca-elson/ Maria Popova: ''The Universe in Verse: Regina Spektor Reads “Theories of Everything” by Astronomer, Poet, and Tragic Genius Rebecca Elson. Lyrical reflections at the crossroads of truth and meaning'', April 29, 2019, www.brainpickings.org]. With full-text poem ''Theories of everything'' by Rebecca Elson. Retrieved on May 23, 2021.
Maria Popova: ''Antidotes to Fear of Death: Astrophysicist Janna Levin Reads Astronomer and Poet Rebecca Elson’s Stunning Cosmic Salve for Our Creaturely Tremblings of Heart, “Sometimes as an antidote to fear of death, I eat the stars.”'', April 10, 2020, www.brainpickings.org
With full-text poem ''Antidotes to Fear of Death'' by Rebecca Elson. Retrieved on May 23, 2021. {{DEFAULTSORT:Elson, Rebecca 1960 births 1999 deaths 20th-century Canadian poets 20th-century Canadian astronomers Canadian women poets Women astronomers Scientists from Montreal Writers from Montreal University of British Columbia alumni Smith College alumni Radcliffe College alumni Deaths from cancer in England 20th-century Canadian women writers 20th-century Canadian women scientists