biography
pronunciation:
[shmit]
| sex:
| male
|
| lived:
| (1929– )
|
| biography:
| Astronomer, born in Groningen, The Netherlands. He studied at Groningen and Leyden, moved to the California Institute of Technology in 1959, and became director of the Hale Observatories in 1978. He studied the spectrum of an optically identified quasar, and discovered that the peculiarities of its spectrum were caused by a massive redshift, which appeared to be receding at nearly 16% of the speed of light. Such high velocities are now interpreted as implying that quasars are very distant objects. He also found that the number of quasars increases with distance from Earth, providing evidence for the ‘big bang’ theory for the origin of the universe. |
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