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This blink comparator at Lowell Observatory was used in the discovery of Pluto in 1930.
A blink comparator is a viewing apparatus formerly used by astronomers to find differences between two photographs of the night sky. It permits rapid switching from viewing one photograph to viewing the other, "blinking" back and forth between the two images taken of the same area of the sky at different times. This allows the user to more easily spot objects in the night sky that have changed position or brightness. It was also sometimes known as a blink microscope. It was invented in 1904 by physicist Carl Pulfrich at Carl Zeiss AG, then constituted as Carl-Zeiss-Stiftung.[1]
In photographs taken a few days apart, rapidly moving objects such as asteroids and comets would stand out, because they would appear to be jumping back and forth between two positions, while all the distant stars remained stationary. Photographs taken at longer intervals could be used to detect stars with large proper motion, or variable stars, or to distinguish binary stars from optical doubles.
The most notable object in our solar system to be found using this technique is Pluto, discovered by Clyde Tombaugh in 1930.
The Projection Blink Comparator (PROBLICOM), invented by amateur astronomer Ben Mayer, is a low-cost version of the professional tool. It consists of two slide projectors with a rotating occluding disk that alternately blocks the images from the projectors. This tool allowed amateur astronomers to contribute to some phases of serious research.
A blinkcomparator is a viewing apparatus formerly used by astronomers to find differences between two photographs of the night sky. It permits rapid switching...
as they change over time (SN 1987A is a spectacular example). The blinkcomparator is an instrument that is used to compare two nearly identical photographs...
considered to be included in this group. Traditionally, devices like a blinkcomparator were used in astronomy to detect objects in the Solar System, because...
an icy planetoid with an orbit between Saturn and Uranus. He used a blinkcomparator, the same device that had allowed Clyde Tombaugh to discover Pluto...
photographs of the same section of sky several nights apart. He then used a blinkcomparator to compare the different images. When he shifted between the two images...
processing". Blinkcomparator Difference matte Image stabilization Dark frame subtraction – where a neutral "blank" frame is subtracted to reduce noise Blink comparator...
known for the invention of the projection blinkcomparator (PROBLICOM), a low-cost version of the blinkcomparator. This inexpensive tool allowed amateur...
Rather than looking through the telescope, it was discovered by using a blinkcomparator with images taken by an astrograph. By the late 20th century, electronic...
pair and determine whether any objects had shifted position. Using a blinkcomparator, he rapidly shifted back and forth between views of each of the plates...
Phoebe in 1898. Pluto was discovered using photographic plates in a blinkcomparator; its moon Charon was discovered 48 years later in 1978 by U.S. Naval...
looking at photographs (i.e. 'plates' in astronomy vernacular) in a blinkcomparator taken with a refracting telescope, an astrograph with a 3 element 13-inch...
information Antikythera mechanism – Ancient analogue astronomical computer Blinkcomparator – Astronomical instrument used to measure movements or variations in...
texts by eye. The idea built on earlier work such as Carl Pulfrich's blinkcomparator used to help identify the former planet Pluto, and Hinman's work analysing...
He then placed both images of each section in a machine called a blinkcomparator, which by exchanging images quickly created a time lapse illusion of...
observations from here in the 1940s and 1950s. A spectrohelioscope and a blinkcomparator were added in the mid-1940s. It participated in Carte du Ciel between...
and concluded that he had made a serious error. He used a stereo blinkcomparator to compare new plates with plates some 10–20 years old. By blinking...
the same telescope in 1908 by FC Jordan, allowing Hale to use of a blinkcomparator to study any changes in the nebula. NGC 2261 was imaged by the Hubble...
to repeat the same series of images and compare the results with a blinkcomparator. In doing so, he discovered 379 new variable stars and over 1000 stars...
2021-02-03 · WGPSN Pulfrich Carl Pulfrich, German physicist who developed the blink-comparator used to discover Pluto 2020-08-05 · WGPSN Simonelli Damon Simonelli...
professional organisations in NSW. One example of such an instrument is the blinkcomparator commissioned by Father O'Leary of the Riverview College Observatory...
(Pulfrich) 37.7 2020 Carl Pulfrich, German physicist and inventor of the blinkcomparator, the device used to discover Pluto WGPSN Simonelli 12°47′N 314°46′E...
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