agranok@udenva.UUCP (03/24/87)
A question recently came up regarding quasars in rec.arts.star-trek. It seems that in one episode, the nature of a quasar was depicted inaccurately. What I was wondering is if anyone could tell me (preferably by e-mail or through sci.misc) what they know about quasars in terms of what we *do* know and when we knew it (sounds kind of like ol' Ronnie, doesn't it). I seemed to think that our knowledge of them was somewhat less than perfect during the late 60's, but this could be wrong. -- Alex Granok hao!udenva!agranok "Wait a minute. Strike that. Reverse it."
cc_dgdc@bath63.UUCP (03/27/87)
Joscelyn (Bell) spotted the first quasar when doing postgrad work at Cambridge, England. It must have been 1965. -- Douglas Clark Voice: +44 225 826826*5214 Computer Unit, Bath University, JANET: Clark@UK.AC.AUCC Claverton Down, Bath, Avon, UUCP : seismo!mcvax!ukc!bath63!cc_dgdc England BA2 7AY ARPA : cc_dgdc%ux63.bath.ac.uk@ucl-cs.arpa
clyde@reed.UUCP (03/28/87)
>Joscelyn (Bell) spotted the first quasar when doing postgrad work at >Cambridge, England. It must have been 1965. No she did not. She discovered the first pulsar at about that time and place. Incidently, she hasn't held a steady job since. She's only just now entered into a tenure track position that has promising stability. The job market seems to be rough for an astronomer. Maybe I'm a fool for wanting to be one so badly. -- "For Easter Day is Christmas time, Clyde Bryja And far away is near, And two and two is more than four, tektronix!reed!clyde And over there is here."
nather@ut-sally.UUCP (03/28/87)
In article <877@bath63.ux63.bath.ac.uk>, cc_dgdc@bath63.ux63.bath.ac.uk (Clark) writes: > > Joscelyn (Bell) spotted the first quasar when doing postgrad work at > Cambridge, England. It must have been 1965. > No, that was the discovery of the first PULSAR, not the first quasar. Allan Sandage discovered that the radio source 3C48 was apparently associated with a faint blue star with a spectrum he was unable to decipher. Somewhat later, Cyril Hazard & colleagues observed the occulation of the radio source 3C273 by the moon, and were able to pin-point its position thereby. Maarten Schmidt took a spectum of it, but, like Sandage, was unable to decipher it immediately. Some time later he realized, quite suddenly, that it could be understood as an object with an extreme red shift --- nearly as large as the most distant galaxy measured, and receding from the earth at about 15% the speed of light. Jesse Greenstein, who had a copy of Sandage's spectrum, realized immediately that 3C48 could be explained the same way, except that the red shift was much larger. So you tell me: who ``discovered'' the first quasar? I know the history, but I don't think I can answer that question. -- Ed Nather Astronomy Dept, U of Texas @ Austin {allegra,ihnp4}!{noao,ut-sally}!utastro!nather nather@astro.AS.UTEXAS.EDU