Fred Hoyle

Fred Hoyle. British astronomer . He was one of the most tenacious defenders of the theory of the universe proposed by Thomas Gold and Hermann Bondi, the steady state theory, according to which the continuous expansion of the universe would be compensated by a constant creation of matter, which would keep its density unchanged.

Summary

[ disguise ]

• 1 Biographical summary
  • 1 Birth
  • 2 Studies
  • 3 Death
• 2 Contributions
• 3 Works
• 4 Sources

Biographical summary

Birth

Born in Bingley, United Kingdom, 1915 .

Studies

He studied and was a professor of astronomy at the University of Cambridge . From 1967 to 1973 he directed the Institute of Theoretical Astronomy of the same university. In 1957 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society.

Death

He published many popular books on astronomy and works on science fiction. He died on August 20 , 2001 in Bournemouth ( England ).

Contributions

He formulated various theories about the origin of stars ; He calculated their age and predicted the existence of bodies that would be discovered later.

In his studies on the genesis of elements he maintained that the heaviest ones are developed from hydrogen , an idea commonly accepted today. Less credit was given to his theory of the extraterrestrial origin of life, according to which the first microorganisms were formed in space from cosmic dust and were brought to Earth ( and other worlds) by comets.

Plays

Author of popular science works such as Frontiers of Astronomy ( 1955 ), Astronomy and Cosmology ( 1975 ) or Ice ( 1981 ) and the autobiography The Small World of Fred Hoyle ( 1986 ). He also excelled as a science fiction writer.