Backlund, Jöns Oskar

Suresh, Raghini S.

doi:10.1007/978-1-4419-9917-7_93

Raghini S. Suresh⁹

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BornWermland, Sweden, 28 April 1846

DiedPulkovo, Russia, 29 August 1916

Jöns Backlund is best known for his lifelong research on the motion and brightness of comet 2P/Encke. A mathematician and theoretical astronomer, Backlund earned his doctorate degree in astronomy from the University of Uppsala, Sweden, in 1875. He was hired as assistant director of the Russian Royal Observatory at Pulkovo in 1879 by Otto Wilhelm Struve . In 1883, Backlund was elected to the Imperial Russian Academy of Sciences of Petrograd, which allowed him to move to Saint Petersburg. Backlund was called upon by the Russian Academy to become the director of Pulkovo Observatory in 1895, following the resignation of Fedor Bredikhin . Backlund served in this capacity for 21 years, during which time he successfully improved the work of the observatory by employing large numbers of staff.

Backlund devoted himself to what became the passion of his lifetime, computing the orbit of the comet named for Johann Encke...

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Selected References

Baker, H. F. (1917). “Johan Oskar Backlund.” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 77: 310–314.
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McAdie, Alexander (1914). “The Award of the Bruce Medal to Dr. J. O. Backlund.” Publication of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific 26: 15–18.
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Newall, H. F. (1909). “Address Delivered by the President, Mr. H. F. Newall, on Presenting the Gold Medal of the Society to Dr. Oskar Backlund.” Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 69: 324–331.
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Tenn, Joseph S. (1991). “Oskar Backlund: The Eleventh Bruce Medalist.” Mercury 20, no. 6: 175–179.
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Kent State University, Kent, OH, USA
Raghini S. Suresh

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Raghini S. Suresh
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Correspondence to Raghini S. Suresh .

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Department of Earth Science, University of Northern Iowa, Cedar Falls, IA, USA
Thomas Hockey
University of California, Irvine School of Physical Sciences, Irvine, CA, USA
Virginia Trimble
Rice University, Houston, TX, USA
Thomas R. Williams
Whitman College, Walla Walla, WA, USA
Katherine Bracher
York Univesity, Toronto, ON, Canada
Richard A. Jarrell
University of Wisconsin, Madison, WI, USA
Jordan D. Marché II
University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK, USA
JoAnn Palmeri
Harvard University, Cambridge, MA, USA
Daniel W. E. Green

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Suresh, R.S. (2014). Backlund, Jöns Oskar. In: Hockey, T., et al. Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers. Springer, New York, NY. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-9917-7_93

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-1-4419-9917-7_93
Published: 24 December 2016
Publisher Name: Springer, New York, NY
Print ISBN: 978-1-4419-9916-0
Online ISBN: 978-1-4419-9917-7
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