Robert Earl Jackson (born 1949) is a scientist, who, with Sandra M. Faber, in 1976 discovered the

Faber–Jackson relation The Faber–Jackson relation provided the first empirical power-law relation between the luminosity L and the central stellar velocity dispersion \sigma of elliptical galaxy, and was presented by the astronomers Sandra M. Faber and Robert Earl J ...

between the

luminosity Luminosity is an absolute measure of radiated electromagnetic power (light), the radiant power emitted by a light-emitting object over time. In astronomy, luminosity is the total amount of electromagnetic energy emitted per unit of time by a s ...

of an

elliptical galaxy An elliptical galaxy is a type of galaxy with an approximately ellipsoidal shape and a smooth, nearly featureless image. They are one of the four main classes of galaxy described by Edwin Hubble in his Hubble sequence and 1936 work ''The Rea ...

and the

velocity Velocity is the directional speed of an object in motion as an indication of its rate of change in position as observed from a particular frame of reference and as measured by a particular standard of time (e.g. northbound). Velocity i ...

dispersion in its center. Jackson was a graduate student at the

University of California at Santa Cruz The University of California, Santa Cruz (UC Santa Cruz or UCSC) is a public land-grant research university in Santa Cruz, California. It is one of the ten campuses in the University of California system. Located on Monterey Bay, on the edge of ...

. As a Research Assistant for Faber, he contributed to the data analysis on the project that led to the Faber–Jackson relation (1976). Jackson received his Ph.D. in 1982 with the thesis titled "The

Anisotropy Anisotropy () is the property of a material which allows it to change or assume different properties in different directions, as opposed to isotropy. It can be defined as a difference, when measured along different axes, in a material's phys ...

of the

Hubble Constant Hubble's law, also known as the Hubble–Lemaître law, is the observation in physical cosmology that galaxies are moving away from Earth at speeds proportional to their distance. In other words, the farther they are, the faster they are moving ...

". From 1984 to 1999, he worked for Computer Sciences Corporation at the

Space Telescope Science Institute The Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) is the science operations center for the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), science operations and mission operations center for the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), and science operations center for the ...

Baltimore, Maryland Baltimore ( , locally: or ) is the List of municipalities in Maryland, most populous city in the U.S. state of Maryland, fourth most populous city in the Mid-Atlantic (United States), Mid-Atlantic, and List of United States cities by popula ...

References

American astronomers 1949 births Living people {{US-astronomer-stub