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blue shift

(Encyclopedia)blue shift or blueshift, in astronomy, the systematic displacement of individual lines in the spectrum of a celestial object toward the blue, or shorter wavelength, end of the visible spectrum. The am...

Genzel, Reinhard

(Encyclopedia)Genzel, Reinhard, 1952–, German astrophysicist, Ph.D. Univ. of Bonn, 1978. He was on the faculty at the Univ. of California, Berkeley, from 1980 to 1986, when he left to become director at the Max P...

Jansky, Karl Guthe

(Encyclopedia)Jansky, Karl Guthe, 1905–50, American radio engineer; b. Norman, Okla. After graduating (1927) from the Univ. of Wisconson, he joined the Bell Telephone Laboratories. While trying to determine the c...

Virgo

(Encyclopedia)Virgo vûrˈgō [key] [Lat.,=the virgin], constellation lying on the ecliptic (the sun's apparent path through the heavens) between Libra and Leo, and SW of Boötes; it is one of the constellations of...

Doppler effect

(Encyclopedia)Doppler effect, change in the wavelength (or frequency) of energy in the form of waves, e.g., sound or light, as a result of motion of either the source or the receiver of the waves; the effect is nam...

dark matter

(Encyclopedia)dark matter, material that is believed to make up nearly 27% of the mass of the universe but is not readily visible because it neither emits nor reflects electromagnetic radiation, such as light or ra...

star

(Encyclopedia)star, hot incandescent sphere of gas, held together by its own gravitation, and emitting light and other forms of electromagnetic radiation whose ultimate source is nuclear energy. The universe co...

Baade, Walter

(Encyclopedia)Baade, Walter välˈtər bäˈdə [key], 1893–1960, German-born American astronomer. From 1919 to 1931 he was on the staff of the Hamburg observatory; from 1931 to 1958, at the Mt. Wilson observator...

Ozick, Cynthia

(Encyclopedia)Ozick, Cynthia, 1928–, American writer, b. New York City, grad. New York Univ. (B.A., 1949), Ohio State Univ. (M.A., 1950). Her fiction, written with high intelligence, elegant incisiveness, and sha...

Crab Nebula

(Encyclopedia)Crab Nebula, diffuse gaseous nebula in the constellation Taurus; cataloged as NGC 1952 and M1, the first object recorded in Charles Messier's catalog of nonstellar objects (see Messier catalog). It is...

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