:Robert Woodrow Wilson
{{Short description|American astronomer (born 1936)}}
{{redirect|Robert W. Wilson|the American hedge fund manager and philanthropist|Robert W. Wilson (philanthropist)}}
{{Use mdy dates|date=January 2021}}
{{Infobox scientist
| name = Robert Woodrow Wilson
| image = Robert Wilson (28215880301) (cropped).jpg
| image_size =
| caption = Wilson in 2016
| birth_date = {{birth date and age|1936|1|10}}
| birth_place = Houston, Texas, U.S.
| nationality = American
| death_date =
| death_place =
| field = Physics
| alma_mater = Rice University
California Institute of Technology
| work_institution = Bell Laboratories
Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics
| doctoral_advisor =
| doctoral_students =
| known_for = Cosmic microwave background radiation
| spouse = {{marriage|Elizabeth Rhoads Sawin|1958}}
| prizes = {{nowrap|Henry Draper Medal (1977)
Nobel Prize in Physics (1978)}}
}}
{{Cosmology|scientists}}
Robert Woodrow Wilson (born January 10, 1936) is an American astronomer who, along with Arno Allan Penzias, discovered cosmic microwave background radiation (CMB) in 1964.{{Cite web|url=https://www.space.com/25945-cosmic-microwave-background-discovery-50th-anniversary.html|title=Cosmic Anniversary: 'Big Bang Echo' Discovered 50 Years Ago Today|last=May 2014|first=Mike Wall 20|website=Space.com|date=May 20, 2014|access-date=March 13, 2020}} The pair won the 1978 Nobel Prize in Physics for its discovery.{{Cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/1978/summary/|title=The Nobel Prize in Physics 1978|website=NobelPrize.org|access-date=March 13, 2020}}
While doing tests and experiments with the Holmdel Horn Antenna at Bell Labs in Holmdel Township, New Jersey, Wilson and Penzias discovered a source of noise in the atmosphere that they could not explain.{{cite journal|last1=Penzias|first1 = A.A.|last2 = Wilson|first2=R.W.|title=A Measurement of Excess Antenna Temperature at 4080 Mc/s|journal=Astrophysical Journal|volume=142|pages=419–421|date=1965|doi=10.1086/148307|bibcode=1965ApJ...142..419P|doi-access=free}} After removing all potential sources of noise, including pigeon droppings on the antenna, the noise was finally identified as CMB, which served as important corroboration of the Big Bang theory.
In 1970, Wilson led a team that made the first detection of a rotational spectral line of carbon monoxide (CO) in an astronomical object, the Orion Nebula, and eight other galactic sources.{{cite journal|last1=Wilson|first1 = R.W.|last2 = Jefferts|first2=K.B.|last3=Penzias|first3=A.A.|title=Carbon Monoxide in the Orion Nebula|journal=Astrophysical Journal|volume=161|pages=L43–L44|date=1970|doi=10.1086/180567|bibcode=1970ApJ...161L..43W|doi-access=free}} Subsequently, CO observations became the standard method of tracing cool molecular interstellar gas, and detection of CO was the foundational event for the fields of millimeter and submillimeter astronomy.
Life and work
File:Horn Antenna-in Holmdel, New Jersey - restoration1.jpg that brought their most notable discovery]]
Robert Woodrow Wilson was born on January 10, 1936, in Houston, Texas. He graduated from Lamar High School in River Oaks, in Houston,"[http://www.houstonisd.org/HISDConnectDS/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=c3783acb02efc010VgnVCM10000052147fa6RCRD Distinguished HISD Alumni] {{webarchive|url=https://web.archive.org/web/20120206123543/http://www.houstonisd.org/HISDConnectDS/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=c3783acb02efc010VgnVCM10000052147fa6RCRD |date=February 6, 2012 }}," Houston Independent School District and studied as an undergraduate at Rice University, also in Houston, where he was inducted into the Phi Beta Kappa society. He then earned a PhD in physics at California Institute of Technology. His thesis advisors at Caltech included John Bolton and Maarten Schmidt.{{cite web
| title = Robert Woodrow Wilson / Biographical
| url = https://www.nobelprize.org/prizes/physics/1978/wilson/biographical/
| quote = My thesis project was to have been hydrogen-line interferometry, but when the first plans for a local oscillator system didn’t work out, I used the galactic survey as the basis for my thesis. John Bolton returned to Australia before I completed my Ph.D. Maarten Schmidt, who had previously done galactic research and was currently working on quasars, saw me through the last months of thesis work. I remained at Caltech for an additional year as a postdoctoral fellow to finish several projects in which I was involved.
}}
Wilson and Penzias also won the Henry Draper Medal of the National Academy of Sciences in 1977.{{cite web|title=Henry Draper Medal|url=http://www.nasonline.org/about-nas/awards/henry-draper-medal.html|publisher=National Academy of Sciences|access-date=February 24, 2011}} Wilson received the Golden Plate Award of the American Academy of Achievement in 1987.{{cite web|title= Golden Plate Awardees of the American Academy of Achievement |website=www.achievement.org|publisher=American Academy of Achievement|url=https://achievement.org/our-history/golden-plate-awards/#science-exploration}}
Wilson remained at Bell Laboratories until 1994, when he was named a senior scientist at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics in Cambridge, Massachusetts.{{cite web |url=http://www.fofweb.com/History/MainPrintPage.asp?iPin=AS0290&DataType=AmericanHistory&WinType=Free |title=Facts on File History Database Center |access-date=April 2, 2014 |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20140407073319/http://www.fofweb.com/History/MainPrintPage.asp?iPin=AS0290&DataType=AmericanHistory&WinType=Free |archive-date=April 7, 2014 }}
Wilson has been a resident of Holmdel Township, New Jersey.Nobel Lectures, Physics 1971–1980, Editor Stig Lundqvist, World Scientific Publishing Co., Singapore, 1992. {{Nobelprize|name=Autobiography}}. Accessed March 15, 2011. "We still live in the house in Holmdel which we bought when I first came to Bell Laboratories."
Wilson married Elizabeth Rhoads Sawin{{Cite web|url=https://www.nobelprize.org/nobel_prizes/physics/laureates/1978/wilson-bio.html|title=Robert Woodrow Wilson - Biographical|website=www.nobelprize.org|access-date=June 7, 2016}} in 1958.{{Cite web|url=http://www.nndb.com/people/938/000099641/|title=Robert Woodrow Wilson|website=www.nndb.com|access-date=June 7, 2016}}
Wilson is one of the 20 American recipients of the Nobel Prize in Physics to sign a letter addressed to President George W. Bush in May 2008, urging him to "reverse the damage done to basic science research in the Fiscal Year 2008 Omnibus Appropriations Bill" by requesting additional emergency funding for the Department of Energy's Office of Science, the National Science Foundation, and the National Institute of Standards and Technology.{{Cite web|title=A Letter from America's Physics Nobel Laureates|url=https://fire.pppl.gov/nobel_bush_fy08_050808.pdf}}
Wilson was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 2009.{{Cite web|title=APS Member History|url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=Robert+W.+Wilson&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced|access-date=2021-04-23|website=search.amphilsoc.org}}
References
{{Reflist}}
=Sources=
- [https://web.archive.org/web/20120206123543/http://www.houstonisd.org/HISDConnectDS/v/index.jsp?vgnextoid=c3783acb02efc010VgnVCM10000052147fa6RCRD "Distinguished HISD Alumni]", Houston Independent School District, Houston, Texas, 2008.
- Cite Video | BBC/WGBH Boston | Nova #519 | A Whisper From Space | Copyright 1978 | Available With Permission | Consolidated Aircraft – Ronkonkoma, New York
External links
- {{Nobelprize}} including the Nobel Lecture, December 8, 1978 The Cosmic Microwave Background Radiation
- {{imdb name|7735436}}
- {{discogs artist|Robert Wilson (29)}}
{{Nobel Prize in Physics Laureates 1976-2000}}
{{1978 Nobel Prize winners}}
{{Authority control}}
{{DEFAULTSORT:Wilson, Robert Woodrow}}
Category:American Nobel laureates
Category:21st-century American physicists
Category:Lamar High School (Houston) alumni
Category:California Institute of Technology alumni
Category:Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences
Category:Nobel laureates in Physics
Category:People from Holmdel Township, New Jersey
Category:Rice University alumni