Skip to content
RichseenAtlasAtlasSign in

Payne concludes that stars are mostly hydrogen - and disclaims it

node

Cecilia Payne's Radcliffe doctoral thesis Stellar Atmospheres applied Saha ionisation theory to stellar spectra and derived overwhelming abundances of hydrogen and helium. Henry Norris Russell judged the result impossible, and the thesis as submitted states that the enormous abundance derived for those elements is almost certainly not real. Russell reached a compatible result by a different route in 1929 and acknowledged the agreement. Every subsequent statement about stellar fuel supplies and lifetimes depends on the conclusion she had been persuaded to disown.

A node is not a place. Drawing it on a map would assert something about the world that no stored fact supports.

Read in · 1

Evidence · 1
Timeline

No dated observations are stored for this object. Atlas shows what was observed and when — it does not infer a history.

Connections · 4
Assembled narrative · 1

An assembled narrative is available for this object.

Observed changes · 0

No public Signals are attached to this object. Signals show what changed and when it was observed — never a direction or a rank.

Actions

Read the assembled narrativeContinue in StudioOpen TwinTwin does not start a decision from this kind of object.ShareSaveSaved objects are part of the authenticated projection, which is declared and not yet built.

/atlas?object=EVT_PAYNE_THESIS_1925