Jean-Louis Pons - Career As An Astronomer

Career As An Astronomer

Pons made his first comet discovery, jointly attributed to Charles Messier, on 11 July 1801. He appears to have used telescopes and lenses of his own design; his "Grand Chercheur" ("Great Seeker") seems to have been an instrument with large aperture and short focal length, similar to a "comet seeker". However, he was not an especially diligent recorder of his observations, and his notes were often extremely vague.

In 1819, Pons became the director of the new observatory at Marlia near Lucca, which he left in 1825 to teach astronomy at La Specola, in Florence.

He discovered four periodic comets, two of which, 7P/Pons-Winnecke and 12P/Pons-Brooks, bear his name. One observed on 26 November 1818 was named Comet Encke after Johann Franz Encke, who calculated its orbit and its remarkably short period (Encke, however, continued to refer to the comet as "Pons's Comet"). Pons also co-discovered the comet formerly known as "Pons-Coggia-Winnecke-Forbes" and today known as 27P/Crommelin after Andrew Crommelin, who calculated its orbit.

Pons received the French Academy of Sciences's Lalande Prize in 1818 for his discovery of three comets in that year.

By 1827, Pons's eyesight had begun to fail, and he retired from observing altogether shortly before his death.