Barbara Bell (astronomer)

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Barbara Bell
BornApril 1, 1922
Evanston, Illinois
DiedSeptember 25, 2017 (aged 95)
OccupationAstronomer

Barbara Bell (April 1, 1922 – September 25, 2017) was an American astronomer, affiliated with Harvard College Observatory, now the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian, for her entire career. In addition to her work in astronomy, she contributed to the field of climate history, with studies of ancient Egypt.

Early life and education[edit]

Bell was born in Evanston, Illinois, the daughter of George Irving Bell and Hazel Seerley Bell.[1] She graduated from Radcliffe College in 1944, then earned a PhD from Harvard University in 1951.[2][3] Her dissertation, "A study of Doppler and damping effects in the solar atmosphere", was supervised by Donald Menzel,[4] and won the Caroline Wilby Prize in 1951.[5] Her younger brother George Irving Bell Jr. was a biophysicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory.[6]

Bell was said to have a sharp and curious mind, with a kind heart and cheerful disposition, especially towards her niece, Carolyn S. Bell.[7]

Career[edit]

Bell was an astronomer affiliated with Harvard College Observatory and the Center for Astrophysics | Harvard & Smithsonian for over fifty years between 1948 to the 1990s[8] working mainly on sunspots,[9][10] geomagnetic storms,[11] and other solar phenomena.[12][13] She served on various committees of the International Astronomical Union.[14]

Bell also researched and wrote on the climate history of ancient Egypt;[15][16] she is credited with being the first to explore climate change as a cause of famine and civil breakdown known as "The First Dark Age in Egypt", using records of the Nile's annual flood levels.[17][18] This research has been used extensively in archeological literature.[11]

Publications[edit]

Astronomy and solar phenomena[edit]

  • "Geomagnetism and the Emission-Line Corona" (1957, with Harold Glazer)[19]
  • "Sunspots and Geomagnetism" (1958)[9]
  • "Some Sunspot and Flare Statistics" (1958, with Harold Glazer)[20]
  • "The Doppler widths of solar absorption lines" (1959, with Alan Meltzer)[21]
  • "On the Magnetic Field Strengths of Sunspots" (1959)[22]
  • "On the Structure of the Sunspot Zone" (1960)[23]
  • "Major Flares and Geomagnetic Activity" (1961)[24]
  • "A long-term North-South asymmetry in the location of solar sources of great geomagnetic storms" (1962)[25]
  • "Solar radio bursts of spectral types II and IV: their relations to optical phenomena and to geomagnetic activity" (1963)[26]
  • "Lunar eclipses and the forecasting of solar minima" (1965, with John G. Wolbach)
  • "Dependence of the lunar modulation of geomagnetic activity on the celestial latitude of the Moon" (1966, with Richard J. Defouw)[27]
  • "Research Directed Toward the Observation and Interpretation of Solar Phenomena" (1968, with Howard L. DeMastus and Donald Menzel)[12]

Paleoclimatology[edit]

  • "Solar variation as an explanation of climate change" (1953)[28]
  • "The Oldest Records of the Nile Floods" (1970)[15]
  • "The Dark Ages in History. I. The First Dark Age in Egypt" (1971)[29]
  • "Climate and the History of Egypt: The Middle Kingdom" (1975)[16]
  • "Analysis of Viticultural Data by Cumulative Deviations" (2014)[30]

Personal life and legacy[edit]

Bell died in 2017, aged 95 years.[2] The Barbara Bell Professor of Egyptology position at Harvard was named in her honor.

References[edit]

  1. ^ "Hazel Bell, 94, Active in Voters' League". The Boston Globe. 1979-01-17. p. 16. Retrieved 2021-12-27 – via Newspapers.com.
  2. ^ a b Hirshfeld, Alan (2017-12-01). "Barbara Bell (1922–2017)". Bulletin of the AAS. 49 (1).
  3. ^ "Barbara Bell" American Men & Women of Science : A Biographical Directory of Today's Leaders in Physical, Biological, and Related Sciences. 2013, v. 1, p588-588
  4. ^ Bell, Barbara (1951). A study of Doppler and damping effects in the solar atmosphere. Published under AMC contract W19-122ac-17 for the establishment of a solar observatory at Sacramento Peak, New Mexico. Harvard University. Special report no. 35. Cambridge, Mass.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link)
  5. ^ "Conant Declares Inflation Threat to Education". The Boston Globe. 1951-06-20. p. 3. Retrieved 2021-12-26 – via Newspapers.com.
  6. ^ Saxon, Wolfgang (2000-06-18). "George Irving Bell, 73, Leader In Studies of Human Genome". The New York Times. ISSN 0362-4331. Retrieved 2021-12-27.
  7. ^ "BARBARA BELL Obituary (1922 - 2017) - Legacy Remembers". Legacy.com. Retrieved 2024-03-20.
  8. ^ "Barbara Bell". library.cfa.harvard.edu. Retrieved 2024-03-20.
  9. ^ a b Bell, Barbara (1958). "Sunspots and geomagnetism". Smithsonian Contributions to Astrophysics. 2 (8): 161–179. Bibcode:1958SCoA....2..161B. doi:10.5479/si.00810231.2-8.161. ISSN 0081-0231.
  10. ^ "16-year Study of Sunspots Evaluated". The Wichita Eagle. 1959-06-04. p. 39. Retrieved 2021-12-27 – via Newspapers.com.
  11. ^ a b "Barbara Bell - Monday, September 25th, 2017". www.keefefuneralhome.com. Retrieved 2024-03-20.
  12. ^ a b Bell, Barbara; DeMastus, Howard L.; Menzel, Donald Howard (1968). Research Directed Toward the Observation and Interpretation of Solar Phenomena. Harvard University, Solar Department of Harvard College Observatory.
  13. ^ "Sun Energy Changes Brought Ice Ages". Tampa Bay Times. 1952-05-25. p. 39. Retrieved 2021-12-27 – via Newspapers.com.
  14. ^ "International Astronomical Union | IAU". International Astronomical Union. Retrieved 2021-12-26.
  15. ^ a b Bell, Barbara (1970). "The Oldest Records of the Nile Floods". The Geographical Journal. 136 (4): 569–573. doi:10.2307/1796184. ISSN 0016-7398. JSTOR 1796184.
  16. ^ a b Bell, Barbara (1975-07-01). "Climate and the History of Egypt: The Middle Kingdom". American Journal of Archaeology. 79 (3): 223–269. doi:10.2307/503481. ISSN 0002-9114. JSTOR 503481. S2CID 192999731.
  17. ^ Smith, Laurence C. (2020-04-21). Rivers of Power: How a Natural Force Raised Kingdoms, Destroyed Civilizations, and Shapes Our World. Little, Brown. ISBN 978-0-316-41198-1.
  18. ^ Thurston, Harry (2012-12-18). Secrets of the Sands: The Revelations of Egypt. Simon and Schuster. ISBN 978-1-61145-848-0.
  19. ^ Bell, Barbara; Glazer, Harold (1957). "Geomagnetism and the emission-line corona, 1950-1953". Smithsonian Contributions to Astrophysics. 2 (5): 51–107. Bibcode:1957SCoA....2...51B. doi:10.5479/si.00810231.2-5.51. ISSN 0081-0231.
  20. ^ Bell, Barbara; Glazer, Harold G. (1958). "Some sunspot and flare statistics". Smithsonian Contributions to Astrophysics. 3 (4): 25–38. doi:10.5479/si.00810231.3-4.25. ISSN 0081-0231.
  21. ^ Bell, Barbara; Meltzer, Alan (1959). "The Doppler widths of solar absorption lines". Smithsonian Contributions to Astrophysics. 3 (5): 39–46. Bibcode:1959SCoA....3...39B. doi:10.5479/si.00810231.3-5.39. ISSN 0081-0231.
  22. ^ Bell, Barbara (1959). "On the Magnetic Field Strengths of Sunspots". Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific. 71 (419): 165–167. Bibcode:1959PASP...71..165B. doi:10.1086/127355. ISSN 0004-6280. JSTOR 40676878. S2CID 120834649.
  23. ^ Bell, Barbara (1960). "On the structure of the sunspot zone". Smithsonian Contributions to Astrophysics. 5 (3): 17–28. Bibcode:1960SCoA....5...17B. doi:10.5479/si.00810231.5-3.17. ISSN 0081-0231.
  24. ^ Bell, Barbara (1961). "Major flares and geomagnetic activity". Smithsonian Contributions to Astrophysics. 5 (7): 69–83. Bibcode:1961SCoA....5...69B. doi:10.5479/si.00810231.5-7.69. ISSN 0081-0231.
  25. ^ Bell, Barbara (1961). "A North-South Asymmetry in Location of Solar Sources of Great Geomagnetic Storms". The Astronomical Journal. 66: 38. Bibcode:1961AJ.....66Q..38B. doi:10.1086/108483. ISSN 0004-6256.
  26. ^ Bell, Barbara (1963). "Solar radio bursts of spectral types II and IV: their relations to optical phenomena and to geomagnetic activity". Smithsonian Contributions to Astrophysics. 5 (15): 239–257. Bibcode:1963SCoA....5..239B. doi:10.5479/si.00810231.5-15.239. ISSN 0081-0231.
  27. ^ Bell, Barbara; Defouw, Richard J. (1966-02-01). "Dependence of the lunar modulation of geomagnetic activity on the celestial latitude of the Moon". Journal of Geophysical Research. 71 (3): 951–957. Bibcode:1966JGR....71..951B. doi:10.1029/jz071i003p00951. ISSN 0148-0227.
  28. ^ Bell, Barbara (1953-12-31), "8. Solar Variation as an Explanation of Climate Change", Climatic Change, Harvard University Press, pp. 123–136, doi:10.4159/harvard.9780674367166.c8, ISBN 9780674367159, retrieved 2021-12-26
  29. ^ Bell, Barbara. "The Dark Ages in History. I. The First Dark Age in Egypt" American Journal of Archaeology 75 (1971), pp. 1-26.
  30. ^ Rotberg, Robert I.; Rabb, Theodore K.; Bell, Barbara (2014-07-14). ""Analysis of Viticultural Data by Cumulative Deviations"". Climate and History: Studies in Interdisciplinary History. Princeton University Press. ISBN 978-1-4008-5410-3.
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