William+Herschel

William Herschel (1738-1822) made great advancements in astronomy late in the Enlightenment Age. While his contemporaries studied the Sun, Moon, and planets close to Earth, Herschel studied objects in space that were further in the distance. In order to do so, he needed higher quality telescopes to see further in space. Using copper, antimony, and tin to create his telescopes, it was not long before he wiped out the supplies of these metals at local metal shops. By the time of his death, he had created telescopes that had exceeded the quality of the telescopes based in the Greenwich Observatory.

In 1781, Herschel discovered Uranus, which was the first planet to be discovered since ancient times. King George III of England appointed Herschel to be his personal astronomer as a result of his discovery. From this point, Herschel shifted his interests to studies of the stars. In an effort to explain the differences in appearance and density of stars, Herschel proposed his theory on the evolution of stars. He also contributed a theory that nebulae are made up of stars, rather than of "luminous fluid" as his predecessors had suggested.

Impact:

Herschel made the first considerable attempt to count the number of stars in the sky. He listed 2,500 nebulae and 848 star pairs in his catalogs. While previous astronomers focused (no pun intended) on the Sun, Moon, and planets near Earth, astronomers after Herschel began to study objects in space that were further off in the distance. Despite his contributions to astronomy, Herschel further contributed to science with his discovery of infrared radiation.

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