Gerard Kuiper
Gerard Peter Kuiper (; ; born Gerrit Pieter Kuiper; December 7, 1905 - December 23, 1973) was a Dutch-born American astronomer.The Kuiper belt is named after him. He discovered two natural satellites of planets in the solar system, namely Uranus's moon Miranda and Neptune's moon Nereid.
Kuiper went to college at the University of Leiden. He graduated in 1927 and went on to earn his doctorate in 1933. That same year, he moved to the United States and began working at the Lick Observatory in California. In 1935, he was a lecturer at Harvard University. In 1936, he moved to the University of Chicago, and in 1943 he became a professor there. He was the director of their observatories from 1947 until 1960. In 1960, Kuiper began work at the University of Arizona, and he started their lunar and planetary laboratory. He was the director of the laboratory until July 1973.
Kuiper found groups of dwarf stars. He was the first person to figure out the diameter of Pluto, and where the poles and equator of Venus are. In the 1960s, he was one of the people who knew the most about the earth's moon, and he worked with NASA.
References
Other websites
Gerard Peter Kuiper: NASA KAO's Namesake
National Academy of Sciences Biographical Memoir
1905 births
1973 deaths
Naturalized citizens of the United States
Dutch astronomers
American astronomers
Scientists from Tucson, Arizona
Educators from Tucson, Arizona