Philip Herbert Cowell

Philip Herbert Cowell FRS[2] (1870 – 1949) was a British astronomer.[3][4][5]

Minor planets discovered: 1 [1]
4358 Lynn5 October 1909MPC

Philip Herbert Cowell was born in Calcutta, India on the 7 August 1870, and educated at Eton and Trinity College, Cambridge.[6] He became second chief assistant at the Royal Greenwich Observatory in 1896 and later became the Superintendent of HM Nautical Almanac Office between 1910 and 1930. He worked on celestial mechanics, and orbits of comets and minor planets in particular. He also carefully studied the discrepancy that then existed between the theory and observation of the position of the Moon.

Cowell was elected a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society on 14 February 1896.[7] On 27 October 1897 he was elected a member of the British Astronomical Association.[8] He was also elected a Fellow of the Royal Society on 3 May 1906.[2][9] In 1911 he won the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society.

In 1909, he discovered 4358 Lynn, a 10-kilometer sized main-belt asteroid and member of the Eunomia.[10][11]

In 1910, for their work on Halley’s Comet Cowell and Andrew Crommelin jointly received the Prix Jules Janssen, the highest award of the Société astronomique de France, the French astronomical society and the Lindemann Prize of the Astronomische Gesellschaft.[12][13]

He died in Aldeburgh, Suffolk on 6 June 1949. The main-belt asteroid 1898 Cowell is named after him.[14]

References
  1. "Minor Planet Discoverers (by number)". Minor Planet Center. 23 May 2016. Retrieved 9 June 2016.
  2. Whittaker, E. T. (1949). "Philip Herbert Cowell 1870–1949". Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society. 6 (18): 375–384. doi:10.1098/rsbm.1949.0003. JSTOR 768930. S2CID 192042515.
  3. Jackson, J. (December 1949). "Obituary Notices : Cowell, Philip Herbert". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 110 (2): 125–128. Bibcode:1950MNRAS.110R.125.. doi:10.1093/mnras/110.2.125a.
  4. "Notes : Obituaries". The Observatory. 69: 159–160. August 1949. Bibcode:1949Obs....69..159.
  5. "General Notes". Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. 61 (362): 241. October 1949. Bibcode:1949PASP...61..241.. doi:10.1086/126191.
  6. "Cowell, Philip Herbert (CWL889PH)". A Cambridge Alumni Database. University of Cambridge.
  7. "1896MNRAS..56..174. Page 174". Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society. 56: 174. 1896. Bibcode:1896MNRAS..56..174. Retrieved 10 June 2021.
  8. "1897JBAA....7..473. Page 473". Journal of the British Astronomical Association. 7: 473. 1897. Bibcode:1897JBAA....7..473. Retrieved 10 June 2021.
  9. "List of fellows of the Royal Society 1660–2007" (PDF). The Royal Society – Library and Information Services. p. 83. Retrieved 9 June 2016.
  10. "4358 Lynn (A909 TF)". Minor Planet Center. Retrieved 9 June 2016.
  11. "LCDB Data for (4358) Lynn". Asteroid Lightcurve Database (LCDB). Retrieved 9 June 2016.
  12. Cowell, Philip Herbert; Crommelin, Andrew Claude De la Cherois (1910). Essay on the return of Halleys comet. University of California Libraries. Leipzig, In kommission bei W. Engelmann. Bibcode:1910erhc.book.....C.
  13. "1910JBAA...20..387. Page 391". articles.adsabs.harvard.edu. Retrieved 10 June 2021.
  14. Schmadel, Lutz D. (2007). "(1898) Cowell". Dictionary of Minor Planet Names – (1898) Cowell. Springer Berlin Heidelberg. p. 152. doi:10.1007/978-3-540-29925-7_1899. ISBN 978-3-540-00238-3.


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