Instead of listing the five most important natural scientists, this list generally defines five important natural scientists. It is very difficult to say which scientist is more important than another, so that’s why this list doesn’t put scientists in order. This list defines five natural scientists that have made remarkable findings related to astronomy and cosmology.

Recently died Arthur C. Clarke (1927-2008) is the first one who came up with an idea of geostationary satellites. This English natural scientists and author calculated that a satellite orbiting in the altitude of 35.880 km would circulate the planet in 24 hours. In 1945 Clarke estimated that only three satellites are needed in order to send messages anywhere in the planet. During the world war Arthur C. Clarke worked in radar development projects, and in 1954 he published an article describing the future telecommunication network and global television network in which nodes communicate through geostationary satellites. This happened twelve years before the first satellite was launched and 20 years before the first geostationary satellite was launched and over 40 years before the first direct television broadcasts.

One of the most influential researcher of 1900-tales, Ernest Rutherford (1871-1937) born in New Zealand, received the Nobel Prize (1908) for his studies of radio activity. During his studies of the decay of Alpha particles Ernest Rutherford verified the existence of subatomic particles. The biggest mistake Rutherford made was that he never believed that nuclear power could be utilized. While others claimed that one day human beings can create a bomb utilizing atom energy, Ernest Rutherford replied by saying that the commentators don’t know what they are talking about. Ernest Rutherford died two years before the invention of nuclear fission.

Probably the best known natural scientist of all time is English Isaac Newton (1642-1727). As many of us know, Isaac Newton was a genius with mathematical theories, but he was also known from his empirical studies of optics. In 1672 he was accepted as a member of Royal Society, but his biggest success came from his answers to the questions of gravity published in 1687 in Principia. Isaac Newton is best known from his theories of gravity and is considered as an archetype of a genius. During his time Isaac Newton was probably the most influential scientists, not just because of his findings in science, but also because of his position as the leader of The Royal Mint and the chairman of Royal Society. It is also known that it was very difficult to get along with Isaac Newton.

Estonian Bernhard Schmidt (1879-1935) is probably one of not so well-known scientists. Bernhard Schmidt was a telescope builder who developed the wide angle telescope that was used in photographing the night sky. Schmidt found a solution to the problem of traditional mirror telescopes that provided only limited sharpness. Schmidt invented the telescope which corrected for the optical errors of spherical aberration, coma, and astigmatism, making possible for the first time the construction of very large, wide-angled reflective cameras of short exposure time for astronomical research. Bernhardt Schmidt built his first telescope in 1930 and his name appears widely in telescope technology. An example of the results of his work is so called Schmidt camera which is an astronomical camera designed to provide wide fields of view with limited aberrations. Other similar designs are the Wright Camera and Lurie-Houghton telescope.

American Eugene Shoemaker (1928-1997) studied the geology of the Moon, but he is best known as the finder of Shoemaker-Levy 9 comet. Eugene Shoemaker and David Levy found the comet that slammed into Jupiter in 1994. Even though Shoemaker is known as a comet hunter, his probably most important findings are related to the research of the Barringer crater in Arizona. As a moon geologist Eugene Shoemaker affected very much the studies of the Moon. For example, Mr. Shoemaker joined the planning of unmanned Ranger flights as well as many other lunar research projects.

Which natural scientists you would consider important and why? Please leave your opinion into comments.