Robert Hanbury Brown
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Robert Hanbury Brown AC (31 August 1916 – 16 January 2002) was a British astronomer and physicist born in Aruvankadu, India. Brown studied at the University of London, from where he received a Master's degree in 1935. From 1936 to 1942 he worked for the Air Ministry, where he helped to develop radar. In 1942, he travelled to the United States, spending 3 years in Washington, D.C., where he worked with the Combined Research Group at the Naval Research Laboratory. After World War 2, he was head of the navigation division of the Ministry of Supply, where he helped formulate plans for the construction of telecommunications plants.
Between 1949 and 1964 Brown was a Professor of Physics at the University of Manchester. There he developed some of the earliest devices to be used in radio astronomy. He worked closely with Richard Q. Twiss at the Jodrell Bank Observatory outside of Cheshire on the development of, amongst other things, radio intensity interferometers and the first optical stellar intensity interferometer at Jodrell Bank. Using this instrument he became the first person to measure the diameter of the star Sirius. From 1964 until 1981 he worked at the University of Sydney, constructing the Narrabri Stellar Intensity Interferometer and using it to measure the diameters of many of the brightest stars in the Southern Hemisphere. He and Twiss received the Eddington Medal in 1968. In 1971 he was awarded the Hughes Medal for his contributions for his efforts in developing the optical stellar intensity interferometer and for his observations of Spica. In 1982 he was named President of the International Astronomical Union, a title he retained until the end of his term in 1985. In 1986 he was made a Companion in the Order of Australia.
He wrote a book about the development of airborne and ground based radar, and his subsequent work on radio astronomy called "BOFFIN : A Personal Story of the Early Days of Radar, Radio Astronomy and Quantum Optics" ISBN 0-7503-0130-9.
He died in Andover, Hampshire.
[edit] References
- Hanbury-Brown and Twiss, A test of a new type of stellar interferometer on Sirius Nature, Vol. 178, pp. 1046 1956
- Hanbury-Brown et al., The angular diameters of 32 stars Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., Vol. 167, pp 121-136 1974
- Hanbury-Brown, BOFFIN : A Personal Story of the Early Days of Radar, Radio Astronomy and Quantum Optics ISBN 0-7503-0130-9.
