Foreword by Rainer Weiss (Nobel Laureate)
Introduction
The electromagnetic spectrum based on a diagram with the different wavelength ranges explained, and the beginning of observations for each range marked as a small range of dates within the XX century. In addition a second diagram will illustrate the non-electromagnetic forms of detection of astronomical sources and the dates of initiation of each of them. 1. Optical astronomy.
The optical telescope . Spectrograph. Photographic plate. CCD.
Important telescopes (Very brief resumé of history to set a scene, including earliest telescopes: Lippershey, Galileo, Newton, Cassegrain, Earl of Rosse, Herschel, Mt. Wilson, Mt. Palomar, Hubble Space Telescope, Adaptive Optics).
Basic results: Images of star clusters, interstellar emitting gas, galaxies, galaxy clusters. Spectra of outstanding objects. Velocities, chemical compositions of objects, temperaturas, gravitational fields. Limitations (dust, very high and very low temperature objects, non-thermal emission).2. Radioastronomy
Jansky, radiostatic from Milky Way. 2nd World War development of radio techniques and receivers. Radio telescopes: Large dishes at Jodrell Bank, Green Bank, Effelsberg, Arecibo. Interferometers: basis, interferometers: Cambridge, Dwingeloo, VLA. High frequencies, (centimetre wave and millimetre wave astronomy). VLBI.
Results: Sun, Jupiter, Centre of Galaxy (Sag A), Supernova remnants, Quasars, pulsars, jets, non-thermal sources in general, Cosmic Microwave Background. HI, molecules (notably H2).
3. Infrared Astronomy
Development of infrared detectors in the 1960's. Ground based infrared telescopes SIRTF, UKIRT. Satellites IRAS, Spitzer (SIRTF).
Infrared astronomy from aircraft, Kuiper and Sofía observatories; Solar IR observations from aircraft, Lear Jet, Concorde eclipse observations.
Basic results: dust penetration, galaxy and star formation, planet detection.
4. Ultraviolet astronomy.
Ozone and nitrogen impede direct observations in most of the UV from the ground. Balloons, rockets, and satellites needed. NASA's orbiting astronomical observatories were dedicated partly to UV astronomy. OAO3 ("Copernicus") measured interstellar deuterium), International Ultraviolet Explorer (NASA, ESA, plus UK) measured spectra of many astronomical sources. Halley's comet, planets, quasars, hot stars. Extreme Ultraviolet explorer, and more recently GALEX, maps of hot components of galaxies.
5. X-ray astronomy
First detections using rocket equipment in 1962 Sco X-1 and the Crab Nebula. Used Geiger counters as detectors. 35 sources by 1965. Cygnus X-1, first stellar mass black hole.
Early satellites HEAO-1 1977, and Einstein. Detected radio pulsars, pulsars, galaxies, quasars, auroras on planets and the X-ray background. Chandra X-ray observatory 1999, and XMM-Newton. X-ray binaries, and supermassive black holes at galaxy centres.6.Gamma-ray astronomyFirst detections with Vela satellites 1960's designed to detect nuclear explosions) detected cosmic gamma ray bursts from distant space. Also discovered from Sun by solar orbiter. Series of satellites, notably OSO-3 (NASA) Cos- B (ESA) through to the Compton Gamma Ray observatory in the 1990's. More recently INTEGRAL and AGILE in Europe and Fermi in US. Ground based gamma-ray telescopes using Cherenkov effect from particle showers produced by high energy gamma rays, (HESS, MAGIC, CTA). Recent catalogue from HESS of Galactic plane sources. High energy gamma ray bursts produced in violent events (hypernovae, neutron star and black hole mergers etc.) Combination and relation of gamma rays with cosmic rays (see also neutrinos).In 2017 a gamma-ray burst was identified with a gravitational wave source as produced b
About the Author:
John Beckman is Emeritus Research Professor of Astrophysics at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias. A graduate of Oxford University in Theoretical Physics, he read for his D.Phil. in Astrophysics at the same university, where he later was awarded the higher doctorate of D.Sc. After a postdoc at University of California Berkeley he took a post at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory, (Caltech) where he was Project Scientist for the infrared radiometer on the Mariner 6 probe to Mars. Returning to England he lectured at Queen Mary University of London, joining a pioneer group in millimetre wave astronomy, where as well as working in solar physics his group was the first to measure the peak in the Cosmic Microwave Background spectrum, almost a decade before the COBE measurement from space. During this period he participated in observing the chromosphere from the Concorde aircraft, during the longest total solar eclipse in history, of 74 minutes' duration. After a period at the European Space Agency's ESTEC facility he was invited to be the first research director of the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias, where he has been working ever since.
His interests have moved outwards from planets, via the Sun, to stars and finally galaxies. His present research is on the structure and evolution of galaxies using the wide range of instruments available at the Canary Island Observatories.
He has directed 35 PhD theses and a similar number of MSc dissertations, and has over 650 entries in the ADS astronomy publications website. His outreach activities have included hundreds of lectures to schools, universities, and amateur astronomy clubs in a dozen countries. He is the scientific director, and lecturer, at the "Jornadas Astronomicas de Almería" which, starting in 2005, has brought high level popular astronomy to the public at an annual event at which, among others, 7 Nobel Laureates and 7 ESA and NASA astronauts have given lectures.
His research experience is unusually varied, The "Festschift" given for John to celebrate his 40 years in astronomy was entitled "Pathways through an Eclectic Universe". This wide range of knowledge makes him a suitable author for a book on Multimessenger Astronomy, in which he aims to incorporate the newest ways of observing the Universe, via neutrinos and gravitational waves, into the panoramic range of observations made using the full span of the electromagnetic spectrum.
