Science Fair Project Encyclopedia
André Danjon
André-Louis Danjon (April 6, 1890 – April 21, 1967) was a French astronomer born in Caen, France.
Danjon devised a method to measure "Earthshine" on the Moon using a telescope in which a prism split the Moon's image into two identical side-by-side images. By adjusting a diaphragm to dim one of the images until the sunlit portion had the same apparent brightness as the earthlit portion on the unadjusted image, he could quantify the diaphragm adjustment, and thus had a real measurement for the brightness of Earthshine. He recorded the measurements using his method (now known as the Danjon Scale, on which zero equates to a barely visible Moon) from 1925 until the 1950s.
He won the Gold Medal of the Royal Astronomical Society in 1958.
Danjon died in 1967 in Paris, France.
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