George Herbig

George Herbig
Born	January 2, 1920 Wheeling, West Virginia
Died	October 12, 2013 (aged 93) Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii
Residence	Honolulu, Oahu, Hawaii
Citizenship	United States citizen
Fields	Star formation, interstellar medium
Institutions	University of Hawaii
Alma mater	University of California, Berkeley
Known for	Herbig–Haro objects Herbig Ae/Be stars

George Howard Herbig (January 2, 1920 – October 12, 2013) was an astronomer at the University of Hawaii Institute for Astronomy.^[1] He is perhaps best known for the discovery of Herbig–Haro objects.^[2][3]

Background

Born in 1920 in Wheeling, West Virginia,^[4] Herbig received his Ph.D in 1948 at the University of California, Berkeley; his dissertation is entitled A Study of Variable Stars in Nebulosity. His specialty was stars at an early stage of evolution (a class of intermediate mass pre–main sequence stars are named Herbig Ae/Be stars after him and the interstellar medium. He was perhaps best known for his discovery, with Guillermo Haro, of the Herbig–Haro objects; bright patches of nebulosity excited by bipolar outflow from a star being born. Herbig has also made prominent contributions to the field of diffuse interstellar band (DIB) research, especially through a series of nine articles published between 1963 and 1995 entitled "The diffuse interstellar bands."

Honors

Awards

• Helen B. Warner Prize for Astronomy of the American Astronomical Society (1955)^[5]
• Foreign Scientific Member, Max-Planck-Institut für Astronomie, Heidelberg
• Henry Norris Russell Lectureship of the AAS (1975)^[6]
• Médaille, Université de Liège (1969)
• Bruce Medal of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific (1980)^[1]
• Petrie Prize and Lectureship of the Canadian Astronomical Society (1995)

Named after him

Herbig–Haro object (HH) 212.^[7]

• Asteroid 11754 Herbig
• Herbig Ae/Be stars
• Herbig–Haro objects

Selected publications

• "High-Resolution Spectroscopy of FU Orionis Stars", ApJ 595 (2003) 384–411 ^[8]
• "The Young Cluster IC 5146", AJ 123 (2002) 304–327 ^[9]
• "Barnard's Merope Nebula Revisited: New Observational Results", AJ 121 (2001) 3138–3148 ^[10]
• "The Diffuse Interstellar Bands", Annu. Rev. Astrophys. 33 (1995) 19–73
• "The Unusual Pre-Main-Sequence star VY Tauri", ApJ 360 (1990) 639–649
• "The Structure and Spectrum of R Monocerotis", ApJ 152 (1968) 439
• "The Spectra of Two Nebulous Objects Near NGC 1999", ApJ 113 (1951) 697

References

1. "The Bruce Medalists: George Howard Herbig". Retrieved 2010-02-01.
2. "George Herbig (1920-2013)". AstroWright. 2013-10-13. Retrieved 2013-11-03.
3. Reipurth, B. (2013). "George Herbig (1920–2013) Astronomer who pioneered studies of young stars". Nature 503 (7477): 470. Bibcode:2013Natur.503..470R. doi:10.1038/503470a. PMID 24284724.
5. "Helen B. Warner Prize for Astronomy". American Astronomical Society. Retrieved 2010-02-01.
6. "Henry Norris Russell Lectureship". American Astronomical Society. Retrieved 2010-02-01.
7. "Outbursts from a newborn star". Retrieved 12 October 2015.
8. "High-Resolution Spectroscopy of FU Orionis Stars". Adsabs.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2013-10-14.
9. "The Young Cluster IC 5146". Adsabs.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2013-10-14.
10. Herbig, G. H.; Simon, T. (2001). "Barnard's Merope Nebula Revisited: New Observational Results". The Astronomical Journal 121 (6): 3138–3148. Bibcode:2001AJ....121.3138H. doi:10.1086/321077.

Further reading

• Reipurth, Bo. GEORGE HERBIG and Early Stellar Evolution. Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawaii, Special Publications No. 1.