Pons, Jean Louis, 1761-1831

Biography

Jean-Louis Pons (24 December 1761 – 14 October 1831) was a French astronomer. Despite humble beginnings and being self-taught, he went on to become the greatest visual comet discoverer of all time: between 1801 and 1827 Pons discovered thirty-seven comets, more than any other person in history. Pons worked at three observatories in his career, Marseille Observatory, where he was also trained, a short-lived observatory at Royal Park La Marlia in Tuscany, and finally at an observatory in Florence. Pons's work supported some famous comet recoveries of the 19th century, including Encke's Comet and Crommelin's Comet. However, most of the comets he discovered had parabolic orbits and would not return for a time as long as several millennia.

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