Reach for the Stars With This Astronomers Quiz

Scientists have shown their deference to history’s most famous scientists by naming elements after them, but the only astronomer to receive the accolade is Nicolaus Copernicus, the father of heliocentrism and modern astronomy, and the namesake of the element copernicium (atomic number 112). Albert Einstein, who was more of a theoretical astrophysicist than an astronomer, also received the honor after the discovery of einsteinium in 1952.

In 1931, Belgian astronomer Georges Lemaître proposed the idea that the universe was born in a massive Big Bang from a primordial “super-atom.” (A more modern version of this theory coalesced in the 1940s.) Interestingly, Lemaître also theorized the continual expansion of the universe, an idea confirmed by Edwin Hubble in 1929.

Annie Jump Cannon revolutionized how astronomers categorize stars. At the turn of the 20th century, she worked at Harvard College Observatory and was part of a famous astronomy group known as the Harvard Computers. These women scientists were horribly underpaid in a male-dominated field, but that didn’t stop Cannon from making significant scientific discoveries.

Much like Galileo ​​Galilei, Giordano Bruno — a Dominican friar turned cosmologist — was persecuted for his forward-thinking beliefs about the universe. Unlike Galileo, Bruno lost his life because of those beliefs. Bruno believed that stars were actually suns in other galaxies with their own planets, a stunning realization for a 16th-century thinker.

One of the most scientifically significant solar eclipses took place on May 29, 1919. On that day, Arthur Eddington proved Albert Einstein’s general theory of relativity as he measured how light traveled around the sun during totality (when the moon blocked out the sun). The results showed a definitive bending around the massive object (known as gravitational lensing), and Einstein became a worldwide celebrity.

British astronomer Caroline Herschel helped break the glass ceiling for women in astronomy. She was the first woman to discover a comet, receive a salary as a scientist, and hold a government position in Britain. She also made significant discoveries, spotting several new comets. Herschel was the younger sister of another famous astronomer, William Herschel, but most of her discoveries were made independently.

Recorded in the ancient Shih Chi and Wen Hsien Thung Khao chronicles, Halley’s Comet (named after Edmond Halley centuries later) was first officially recorded by Chinese astronomers. While some scientists believe the ancient Greeks possibly spotted the comet two centuries earlier, those observations remain unconfirmed.

The Islamic Golden Age, which stretched from around the 7th century to the 13th century, was the keeper of the astronomical flame while Western Europe floundered in the "dark ages." This influence is still felt today. Many stars still have Arabic names, such as Vega, Deneb, and Altair, and many astronomical terms have Middle Eastern origins.

On September 15, 2017, NASA’s Cassini spacecraft, named after Italian astronomer Giovanni Cassini, ended its mission when it crashed into Saturn. First launched in 1997, the Cassini-Huygens mission spent years exploring Saturn, and in 2005, its partner spacecraft, the Huygens probe, landed on Saturn’s largest moon, Titan.

Famous for his precise celestial measurements and observations, Tycho Brahe started a chain reaction of astronomical findings with his work, influencing Kepler’s three laws of planetary motion, which in turn fueled Isaac Newton’s law of universal gravitation. Despite this, the Danish astronomer does not have a NASA spacecraft named after him.

In 1543, Nicholas Copernicus laid out a mathematical model that placed the sun at the center of the solar system, not the Earth. His work set off a revolution in astronomy, rightly called the Copernican Revolution. Unfortunately, the famous astronomer didn’t live to see it as he died shortly after his theory was published.

Kepler’s biggest achievement is his three laws of planetary motion, which lay the mathematical foundation for how planets move. Kepler used a vast dataset, meticulously gathered by fellow astronomer Tycho Brahe, to create these three laws. His observations became the foundation of modern astronomy.

Today, we know that Jupiter has 79 moons, but in 1610, moons orbiting Jupiter seemed impossible until Galileo Galilei pointed his powerful telescope skyward and saw four moons — Io, Ganymede, Callisto, and Europa — orbiting the Gas Giant. Galileo eventually named his discovery after his powerful patrons, the Medici family, but today we know them simply as the Galilean Moons.

Although the Earth is home to many telescopes, peering through the planet’s atmosphere can make it hard to glimpse the cosmos in detail. The Hubble Telescope circumvented that challenge by instead being placed in orbit around the Earth. Hubble first launched in 1990 and has been the backbone of many major astronomy discoveries since.

Because of the subtle perturbations of the orbit of Uranus, first spotted in 1781, astronomers theorized that there must be an eighth planet beyond its orbit. French astronomer Urbain le Verrier began his search for this mysterious planet in 1845, using mathematics instead of a telescope. On September 23, 1846, with help from Verrier’s calculations, astronomers at the Berlin Observatory spotted Neptune, the first planet discovered using only math.

While many of these devices have astronomical uses, it’s the orrery that aims to mechanically recreate the workings of our solar system. The modern orrery was created in 1704 and one of these early devices was presented to Charles Boyle, the 4th Earl of Orrery (hence the name). The tool was often used as an educational device, helping explain the motion of the planets.

While known primarily as a physicist and mathematician, Isaac Newton also applied his scientific genius to uncovering the mysteries of the universe. Despite the story, an apple likely didn’t hit his head, but Newton did observe an apple’s downward trajectory and wondered about the unknown forces behind it. In 1687, he published this law in his famous “Principia” along with his well-known laws of motion.

Although Einstein's theory of general relativity formed a theoretical basis for the existence of black holes, it was the groundbreaking research of Stephen Hawking that attempted to tackle the complicated physics of the universe’s most puzzling celestial objects. In the 1970s, Hawking theorized the existence of mini black holes and exploding black holes by utilizing relativity and quantum mechanics.

Carl Sagan is one of the greatest science communicators who ever lived. An accomplished astronomer, he arguably made his greatest contribution to science with the creation of “Cosmos: A Personal Voyage” in 1980. Today, the series is seen as a watershed moment for science television programming; it was even relaunched in 2014 as “Cosmos: A Spacetime Odyssey.”

Astronomer Claudius Ptolemy believed the Earth was at the center of the universe, and the sun and planets revolved around it, just like Aristotle. Around 150 BCE, Ptolemy supported this idea with a mathematical model that placed a stationary Earth at its center, the geocentric model. It became the accepted model of the solar system until the 16th century.