Osterbrock, Donald E. 1924-2007 (Donald Edward Osterbrock)

OBITUARY NOTICE—

See index for CA sketch: Born July 13, 1924, in Cincinnati, OH; died of heart failure, January 11, 2007, in Santa Cruz, CA. Astronomer, educator, and author. One of the leading astronomers of the twentieth century, Osterbrock made such contributions as explaining the shape of the Milky Way galaxy and the processes that give the Sun its characteristics. He served in the U.S. Army Air Forces during World War II, then attended the University of Chicago. Here he earned a B.S. and Ph.B. in 1948, followed by an M.S. in 1949 and a Ph.D. in 1952. A year teaching at Princeton was followed by several years as an instructor and assistant professor at the California Institute of Technology. Osterbrock was a faculty member at the University of Wisconsin—Madison from 1958 to 1973, also chairing the astronomy department there from 1969 to 1972. He would spend the remainder of his academic career at the University of California at Santa Cruz, where he was professor of astronomy and astrophysics and, from 1973 to 1981, director of the Lick Observatory. He retired in 1992. The author of the standard textbook The Astrophysics of Gaseous Nebulae and Active Galactic Nuclei (1989; revised edition with Gary J. Ferland, 2006), Osterbrock was interested in nebulae and star formation. His first significant discovery was announced in 1951, when he used research on star formation to help determine that the Milky Way has a spiral shape. His work also explained how physics within the Sun worked to maintain its shape and why the corona is actually hotter than the Sun's surface. A president of the American Astronomical Society from 1988 to 1990, Osterbrock received a number of honors for his contributions to the field. For example, he was presented with the Catherine Wolfe Bruce Gold Medal in 1991 and the Royal Astronomical Society Gold Medal in 1997; an asteroid was also named after him in 1996. Among Osterbrock's other publications are the biographies James E. Keeler, Pioneer American Astrophysicist: And the Early Development of American Astrophysics (1984), Pauper and Prince: Richey, Hale, and Big American Telescopes (1993), and Walter Baade: A Life in Astrophysics (2001). He also edited several titles and was the author of the history Yerkes Observatory, 1892-1950: The Birth, Near Death, and Resurrection of a Scientific Research Institution (1997).

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Chicago Tribune, January 14, 2007, Section 4, p. 6.

New York Times, January 27, 2007, p. B10.

Times (London, England), March 14, 2007, p. 73.