Frederik Kaiser (Amsterdam, 10 June 1808 – Leiden, 28 July 1872) was a Dutch astronomer.[1] He was director of the Leiden Observatory from 1838 until his death.
He is credited with the advancement of Dutch astronomy through his scientific contributions of positional measurements, his popularization of astronomy in the Netherlands, and by helping to build a state-of-the-art observatory in 1861. Today it is known as the "Old Observatory"). Among his students were Jean Abraham Chrétien Oudemans, Johannes van der Waals, Hendricus Gerardus van de Sande Bakhuyzen and Hendrik Antoon Lorentz.
Kaiser made a series of drawings of Mars at its opposition in 1862 and made a fairly precise determination of its rotational period by comparing his drawings with those of Christiaan Huygens.
Craters on Mars[2] and on the Moon are named in his honour, as well as asteroid 1694 Kaiser.
In Richard Proctor's now-abandoned Martian nomenclature, Syrtis Major Planum was called the "Kaiser Sea". This nomenclature was later dropped in favor of the one introduced by Giovanni Schiaparelli.
Kaiser's parents were Johann Wilhelm Keyser and Anna Sibella Liernur but he was raised by his uncle Johan Frederik Keyser from the age of eight.[3]
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Grave of Frederik Kaiser on the Groenesteeg graveyard in Leiden, the Netherlands. Grave number 400, 2021. -
The Old Observatory in Leiden, 2006. -
The Old Observatory after restoration, 2013.
References
edit- ^ Rob van den Berg, Een passie voor precisie. Frederik Kaiser (1808-1872). Vader van de Leidse Sterrewacht. Amsterdam: Prometheus, 2022. 384 pages (in Dutch).
- ^ Bolt, Marvin; Hockey, Thomas; Palmeri, JoAnn (2007). Trimble, Virginia; Williams, Thomas R.; Bracher, Katherine; Jarrell, Richard; Marché, Jordan D.; Ragep, F. Jamil (eds.). Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers. Springer Science & Business Media. ISBN 978-0387304007.
- ^ Hockey, Thomas (2009). The Biographical Encyclopedia of Astronomers. Springer Publishing. ISBN 978-0-387-31022-0. Retrieved August 22, 2012.
External links
edit
Media related to Frederik Kaiser at Wikimedia Commons- L., W.T. (1873). "Professor Frederik Kaiser". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 33: 209–211. Retrieved 10 August 2022.
- Petra van der Heijden (2003). "Frederik Kaiser (1808-1872) and the modernisation of Dutch astronomy". Archived from the original on 28 September 2006. Retrieved 10 August 2022.
Like many of his foreign contemporaries, Kaiser concentrated his research on positional astronomy.
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