Who was responsible for the initial heavy lifting in measuring the recessional velocities of spiral nebulae decades before Hubble related velocity to distance?
Answer
Vesto Slipher
While Edwin Hubble is famous for establishing the proportionality between velocity and distance, the crucial preliminary work of determining these velocities was largely completed by astronomer Vesto Slipher much earlier. Slipher painstakingly observed dozens of the enigmatic 'nebulae,' measured their redshifts, and established the critical finding that nearly all of these objects were moving away from the Earth, providing the necessary velocity catalog ($v$) for Hubble's subsequent distance correlation.
Related Questions
What framework did Edwin Hubble successfully apply and calibrate in the 1920s to measure galactic distances?What physical phenomenon, resulting from the Doppler effect, was crucial for determining the recession speed of distant objects?Who was responsible for the initial heavy lifting in measuring the recessional velocities of spiral nebulae decades before Hubble related velocity to distance?What mathematical relationship, represented by $v = H_0 d$, defines the correlation Hubble found between recession velocity ($v$) and distance ($d$)?What term is used to describe astronomical objects whose known intrinsic brightness allows astronomers to calculate their distance using apparent brightness?What specific luminous, pulsating star was Hubble’s primary tool for deriving distances to remote galaxies like Andromeda (M31)?What crucial physical link concerning Cepheid variables was discovered by Henrietta Swan Leavitt?Which geometric method was necessary for the initial calibration step to determine the true baseline luminosities of nearby Cepheid variables?What was the approximate numerical value for the Hubble Constant ($H_0$) calculated by Hubble in his early publications around 1929?What brighter standard candles, which must be calibrated using Cepheid distances, are now used to measure objects billions of light-years away?