In 1925, 24-year-old graduate student Cecilia Payne calculated that the Sun…

Project Gutenberg@mastodon.social · 2026-09-07 16:11

In 1925, 24-year-old graduate student Cecilia Payne calculated that the Sun and other stars were composed overwhelmingly of hydrogen and helium—a result so contrary to accepted astronomy that senior astronomer Henry Norris Russell called it “clearly impossible,”....

By Deep Field · Edited by Lachlan Brown

https://spacedaily.com/t-cecilia-payne-russell-hydrogen-helium-companion/

Stellar atmospheres at PG: https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/73996

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In 1925, 24-year-old graduate student Cecilia Payne calculated that the Sun and other stars were composed overwhelmingly of hydrogen and helium—a result so contrary to accepted astronomy that senior astronomer Henry Norris Russell called it “clearly impossible,” leading her to write in her thesis th

Cecilia Payne's 1925 calculation found hydrogen and helium dominating stellar atmospheres. This companion piece follows the spectral method and Russell's 1929 confirmation.

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katalogeur@mastodon.social 2026-09-07 17:34 edited

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Reminds me of Henrietta Swan Leavitt, a Harvard astronomer and 'human computer' ... who, in the early 1900s, discovered how to measure vast astronomical distances. Not many years afterwards, those distances forced the recognition that we live in 'an island universe' (the Milky Way). Edwin Hubble often declared that she deserved the Nobel Prize for her work.