THE BIRTH OF

MODERN
ASTRONOMY
• The development of modern
astronomy began with a break from
the philosophical views of the
Greek astronomers and the
religious views of the medieval
Catholic Church.
GALILEO GALILEI(1564-1642)

• Galileo was the greatest Italian

scientist of the Renaissance.
• His the most important contributions
were his description of the behavior of
moving objects.
GALILEO AND HIS TELESCOPE

• Galileo created his own telescope without ever

seeing one. Using it, he was able to view the
universe in a new way.
• He made many important discoveries that
supported Copernicu’s view of the universe.
1. THE DISCOVERY OF FOUR
SATELLITES OF JUPITER

• This proved that the old idea of the

Earth being the only center of motion
was wrong.
• Jupiter was another center of motion
too.
2. THE DISCOVERY THAT PLANETS ARE
CIRCULAR DISKS

• Not just points of lights. This

showed that the planets must be
Earth-like, so Earth wasn’t that
special.
3. THE DISCOVERY THAT THE MOON’S
SURFACE WAS NOT SMOOTH

• Galileo saw mountains, craters,

and very plains, very much like
the ones on Earth.
4. THE DISCOVERY THAT THE SUN HAD
SUNSPOTS, OR DARK REGIONS.

• Galileo tracked the movement of

these spots and estimated the
rotational period of the sun as
just under a month.
JOHANNES KEPLER(1571-1630)

• Johannes Kepler worked as Brahe’s

assistant during Brahe’s last years,
and was convinced of Brahe’s
accuracy.
• Kepler used Brahe’s work to discover
three important laws of planetary
motion.
 KEPLER’S LAWS OF PLANETARY
MOTION
1. Law of Ellipses
- the planets move in ellipses having a
common focus situated at the sun
• Perihelion – closest point to the sun in a
planet’s orbit
• Aphelion – farthest point to the sun in a
planet’s orbit
 KEPLER’S LAWS OF PLANETARY
MOTION
2. Law of Equal Areas
- the planets move around the sun in
such a way that a line drawn from the sun to
the planet sweeps out equal areas in equal
intervals of time
 KEPLER’S LAWS OF PLANETARY
MOTION
3. Law of Harmonies
- the squares of the periods of the
planets are proportional to the cubes of their
mean distances from the sun
THE SOLAR SYSTEM TODAY