Brian May is the famous guitarist of the
Queen,
Freddie Mercury's rock band (and one of my favourite band!), but is also an
astrophysicist!
He wasborn 19 July 1947 in Twickenham, London. He studied mathematics and physics at Imperial College, where he started also the PhD program, but he abandoned when
Queen became a succesful band in the world. He
completed his PhD in 2007(5), but he did not forget his research activity, indeed he written with
Patrick Moore and
Chris Lintott Bang! – The Complete History of the Universe (2006)... but... just a moment...
research activity? Yeah!
In
1972 and
1973 two papers signed by Mr.May are be published:
MgI Emission in the Night-Sky Spectrum and
An Investigation of the Motion of Zodiacal Dust Particles (Part I), written with Mr.
Hicks and Mr.
Reay.
May and collegues are interestend in zodiacal light, in particular in Mg
I spectrum, near the 5183.62 Å wavelength.
The importance of this kind of studies is that the Mg
I and Mg
II formation is one feature in the interaction between atmosphere and star radiations
(2, 3).
But go to the papers: in order to determine the absorbtion lines from zodiacal light, Brian and friends used the
Fabry-Perot interferometer:
The method was to sample, for 48 s, each of up 18 points acrossthe spectral interval. Pulse counting electronics and a line printer recordedthe signal levelat each sample point. A second channel of pulse counting monitored the overall sky background over a widewaveband, thus allowing correction forfluctation in sky transparency. The resolving power of the interferometer was 3500, corresponding to an instrumental profile width of 1.5 Å.
Obesrvation time is September, October 1971 and April 1972 from the observatory at Izana on Tenerife, Canary Islands.
