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The Discovery of Polar Motion and Its Importance

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Space, Time, and Aliens

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Abstract

The study of polar motion, termed “variation of latitude” at the time of its discovery in the late nineteenth century by Karl Friedrich Küstner and Seth Chandler, is of historical interest for many reasons. From a scientific viewpoint, its discovery must be seen in the context of positional astronomy, geodesy and Earth rotation studies. From an institutional viewpoint, the founding of the International Latitude Service (ILS) in 1899 represents an early case of international cooperation in astronomy, preceding the International Astronomical Union by two decades. In addition to discussing these themes in this review, we analyze in some detail the Gaithersburg (USA) station of the ILS as a case study of the early problems and promise of polar motion studies. With milliarcsecond accuracies, polar motion studies are important today not only for astronomy and geophysics, but also for practical problems like spacecraft navigation and positioning.

First published as “Polar Motion: A Historical Overview on the Occasion of the Centennial of the International Latitude Service,” in Polar Motion: Historical and Scientific Problems, S. J. Dick, D. McCarthy and B. Luzum, eds. (San Francisco, 2000), 3–23

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Acknowledgments

The author wishes to thank Dennis McCarthy for discussions and comments on this paper.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Ashburn, VA, USA

    Steven J. Dick

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  1. Steven J. Dick
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Dick, S.J. (2020). The Discovery of Polar Motion and Its Importance. In: Space, Time, and Aliens. Springer, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-41614-0_32

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