Frank Watson Dyson

Infobox Scientist
name = Sir Frank Watson Dyson, FRS
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birth_date = birth date|1868|01|08
birth_place = Measham, nr Ashby-de-la-Zouch, Leicestershire, England
death_date = death date and age|1939|05|25|1868|01|08
death_place = At sea
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known_for = Astronomer Royal
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Sir Frank Watson Dyson FRS (January 8 1868 – May 25 1939) was an English astronomer who is remembered today largely for introducing time signals ("pips") from Greenwich, England, and for the role he played in testing Einstein's theory of general relativity.

Biography

Dyson was born in Measham, near Ashby-de-la-Zouch, England. He won scholarships to Heath Grammar School, Halifax, and Cambridge University, where he studied mathematics and astronomy. He was Astronomer Royal for Scotland from 1905 to 1910, and Astronomer Royal (and director of the Royal Greenwich Observatory) from 1910 to 1933. In 1928, he introduced a new free-pendulum clock in the Observatory. This wireless transmission meant that Greenwich Mean Time was more accurate. He also invented the "six pips", in 1924.

Dyson was noted for his study of solar eclipses and was an authority on the spectrum of the corona and on the chromosphere. He is credited with organizing expeditions to observe the 1919 solar eclipse at Brazil and Principe, observations from which confirmed Einstein's theory of the effect of gravity on light.

Dyson died while traveling from Australia to England in 1939, and was buried at sea

Honors and memorials

* Fellow of the Royal Society - 1901
* President, Royal Astronomical Society - 1911–1913
* Knighted - 1915
* President, British Astronomical Association, 1916–1918
* Royal Medal of the Royal Society - 1921
* Bruce Medal - 1922
* Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society - 1925
* KBE - 1926
* Between 1894–1906, Dyson lived at 6 Vanbrugh Hill, Blackheath, London SE3, in a house now marked by a blue plaque.
* Dyson crater on the Moon is named after him, as is the asteroid 1241 Dysona.

Frank Dyson and Freeman Dyson are not related. However, the latter does credit Sir Frank with sparking his interest in astronomy; because they shared the same last name, Sir Frank's achievements were discussed by Freeman Dyson's family when he was a young boy. Inspired, Dyson's first attempt at writing was a 1931 piece of juvenilia entitled "Sir Phillip Robert's Erolunar Collision" — Sir Philip being a thinly disguised version of Sir Frank.

Selected writings

* [http://www.journals.royalsoc.ac.uk/content/l30l04qu5m012r87/fulltext.pdf A Determination of the Deflection of Light by the Sun's Gravitational Field, from Observations Made at the Total Eclipse of May 29, 1919] by F. W. Dyson, A. S. Eddington, and C. Davidson, "Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society of London. Series A, Containing Papers of a Math. or Phys. Character", vol. 220, pp. 291 - 333, 1920
* [http://www.archive.org/details/astronomy00dysouoft Astronomy] , Frank Dyson, London, Dent, 1910

References

External links

* [http://www.phys-astro.sonoma.edu/BruceMedalists/Dyson/index.html Bruce Medal page]
* [http://adsabs.harvard.edu//full/seri/PASP./0034//0000002.000.html Awarding of Bruce Medal: PASP 34 (1922) 2]
* [http://adsabs.harvard.edu//full/seri/MNRAS/0085//0000672.000.html Awarding of RAS gold medal: MNRAS 85 (1925) 672]
* [http://adsabs.harvard.edu//full/seri/AN.../0268//0000207.000.html Astronomische Nachrichten 268 (1939) 395/396] (one line)
* [http://adsabs.harvard.edu//full/seri/MNRAS/0100//0000238.000.html Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 100 (1940) 238]
* [http://adsabs.harvard.edu//full/seri/Obs../0062//0000179.000.html The Observatory 62 (1939) 179]
* [http://adsabs.harvard.edu//full/seri/PASP./0051//0000336.000.html Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific 51 (1939) 336]