Astro Bio Q2 Friedrich Georg Wilhelm von Struve

                                        Friedrich Georg Wilhelm von Struve (1793-1864)

            Friedrich von Struve was born in Altona Germany in 1793. Son of Jacob Struve, Friedrich fled to Dorpat, Estonia in 1808 to avoid being forced into the German army.  There, he attended the University of Dorpat, from which he graduated in 1810, and was later pronounced Director of the Dorpat Observatory in 1817.  He remained at Dorpat, studying double stars and geodesy until 1839 when he transferred to Pulkowa, Russia to monitor construction of the new central observatory being built.

            Friedrich von Struve was best known for his research on double stars, originally discovered by astronomer William Herschel. A double star is a system of two stars revolving around a common center of gravity. In 1827, Struve published a list of all known double stars to date in what is known as the Catalogus novus stellarum duplicium, which exceeded the research of Herschel and all others who came before him.  Based on the locations of the objects and the times that they were observed which matched the predictions formed by the Dorpat Meridian Circle, Struve was able to carefully measure the constant of aberration and is known as one of the first astronomers to deal with parallax.

            Struve was also one of the first astronomers to deal with interstellar extinction, although he was unable to explain the effect. This term refers to the absorption and scattering of electromagnetic radiation from the view of the observer, and although unable to explain the process, Struve was accurately able to predict the average rate of visual extinction at 1mag per kpc, which is still an accepted value to date.

            Along with these studies, Stuve always held on to his interest in geodetics, or the study of the measurement and representation of Earth, including its gravitational and electromagnetic fields. This led him to founding the Struve Geodetic Arc, or a recording of many triangulations from across the world that allow for accurate estimates of Earths size and shape to be made.

            Despite his admirable dedication to his work and hobbies, Friedrich was at the same time a family man.  In 1815, while teaching at the University of Dorpat, Struve married Emilie Wall. Together they had 12 children, of which only 8 survived early childhood.  After Emilie passed away, Struve remarried to Johanna Bartels, who bore him six more children.  Struve was also very politically involved throughout all of this, and was a strong proponent of the liberalist Constitutional Democratic Party as well as the White Movement.

            Although not as well known as many of his preceding astronomers, Friedrich Georg Wilhelm von Struve was clearly a very important member in the progress of astronomical advancement.  His research in the fields of double stars, parallax and aberration, and geodetics clearly paved the way for future research that would continue to advance the modern understanding of our Universe.