Loading AI tools
Swedish astronomer (1862–1934) From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Carl Vilhelm Ludwig Charlier (1 April 1862 – 4 November 1934) was a Swedish astronomer. His parents were Emmerich Emanuel and Aurora Kristina (née Hollstein) Charlier.
![]() | This article includes a list of general references, but it lacks sufficient corresponding inline citations. (September 2020) |
Carl Vilhelm Ludwig Charlier | |
---|---|
![]() Professor Carl Charlier in 1923. | |
Born | |
Died | 4 November 1934 72) | (aged
Known for | Charlier polynomials Charlier universe Gram–Charlier A series Siriometer |
Awards | Bruce Medal (1933) James Craig Watson Medal (1924) |
Charlier was born in Östersund. He received his Ph.D. from Uppsala University in 1887, later worked there and at the Stockholm Observatory and was Professor of Astronomy and Director of the Observatory at Lund University from 1897.
He made extensive statistical studies of the stars in our galaxy and their positions and motions, and tried to develop a model of the galaxy based on this. He proposed the siriometer as a unit of stellar distance.
Charlier was also interested in pure statistics and played a role in the development of statistics in Swedish academia. Several of his pupils became statisticians, working at universities and in government and companies.[1]
Related to his work on galactic structure, he also developed a cosmological theory based on the work of Johann Heinrich Lambert. In the resulting Lambert-Charlier Hierarchical Cosmology, increasingly large areas of space contain decreasing densities of matter, the principle being introduced to avoid the observational inconsistency that would otherwise emerge from Olbers's paradox.
Late in his career, he translated Isaac Newton's Principia into Swedish. He died in Lund, aged 72.
Named after him
Seamless Wikipedia browsing. On steroids.
Every time you click a link to Wikipedia, Wiktionary or Wikiquote in your browser's search results, it will show the modern Wikiwand interface.
Wikiwand extension is a five stars, simple, with minimum permission required to keep your browsing private, safe and transparent.