User:NoetherIsLikeNoOther/sandbox

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Nicole-Reine Lapaute[edit]

Nicole-Reine Lapaute was a French astronomer and mathematician in the mid 1700s. She calculated the time of return of Halley's Comet, the timing of an eclipse, and started a catalog of the stars. I would like to add more details about her personal life as well as all of her accomplishments. Everything currently in the Wikipedia article is about how she got slighted by male scientists and mathematicians at the time. I would like to expand that but also focus more on what she did. Otherwise people will never know how awesome she is.

Nicole-Reine Lepaute
Born(1723-01-05)5 January 1723
Luxembourg Palace, Paris
Died6 December 1788(1788-12-06) (aged 65)
France
CitizenshipFrench
Scientific career
FieldsAstronomy

Nicole-Reine Lepaute (née Étable de la Briere; also known as Hartense Lepaute or Hortense Lepaute), (5 January 1723 – 6 December 1788) was a French astronomer and mathematician. She predicted the return of Halley's Comet, calculated the timing of a solar eclipse and constructed a group of catalogs for the stars. She was also a member of the Scientific Academy of Béziers.

Biography[edit]

Nicole-Reine Lepaute was born in the Luxembourg Palace in Paris as the daughter of Jean Etable, valet in the service of Louise Élisabeth d'Orléans. Her father had worked for the royal family for a long time, both in the service of the duchess de Berry and her sister Louise. As a child she was described as precocious and intelligent. She stayed up all night "devouring" books and read every book in the library.[1] In August 1748, she married Jean-André Lepaute, who was a royal clockmaker in the Luxembourg Palace. He quickly became famous all over Europe for his exceptional work. Nicole Lepaute constructed a clock with an astronomical function together with her spouse. The clock was constructed on her suggestion, and she also participated in its construction. The clock was presented to the French Academy of Science in 1753, where it was inspected and approved by Jérôme Lalande. Lepaute was a member of the French Academy of Science.[2]

After completing the clock with her husband, she worked with both him and Lalande on a book titled "Traite d'horlogerie (Treatise of Clockmaking)[3] that was published in 1775 under her husband's name. Though she did not receive authorship, Lalande sang her praises later, saying, "Madame Lepaute computed for this book a table of numbers of oscillations for pendulums of different lengths, or the lengths for each given number of vibrations, from that of 18 lignes, that does 18000 vibrations per hour, up to that of 3000 leagues."[4]

Jérôme Lalande recommended her along with the mathematician Alexis Clairault to calculate the predicted return of Halley's Comet, as well as to calculate the attraction of Jupiter and Saturn of the Halley's comet.[5] The team worked on the calculations for more than six months straight, barely stopping for food.[1] In November 1758, the team presented their conclusion that the comet would arrive on 13 April 1759.[6] They were almost correct, as the comet arrived on 13 March 1759.[7] As a result of their calculations, this was the first time scientists had successfully predicted when the comet would cross the perihelion, i.e. the point of the comet orbit closest to the Sun.[1] Clairault did not recognize her work at all in his work, which upset Lalande who considered Lepaute the "most distinguished female French astronomer ever."[4] Jérôme Lalande acknowledged her help in an article.

In 1759, she was again a part of Lalande's team and worked with him to calculate the ephemeris of the transit of Venus. It is not documented what should be attributed to her personally, but in 1761, she was acknowledged by being inducted as an honorary member of the distinguished Scientific Academy of Béziers. Lalande also collaborated with Lepaute for fifteen years on the Academy of Science's annual guides for astronomers and navigators by developing ephemerides: tables that predict the location of the stars on each day of the year[3], and after her death, wrote a brief biography about her contributions to astronomy.[8][9]

In 1762, Lepaute calculated the exact time of a solar eclipse that occurred on 1 April 1764. She wrote an article in which she gave a map of the eclipse's extent in 15-minute intervals across Europe and predicted the time and percentage each are in Europe would experience[4]. The article was published in Connaissance des temps (Knowledge of the times). She also created a group of catalogs of the stars which were useful for the future of astronomy. She calculated the ephemeris of the Sun, the Moon and the planets for the years 1774–1784.

Nicole Lepaute took care of her terminally ill husband from 1767 until her death on December 6th, 1788. While childless herself, she adopted her husband's nephew, Joseph Lepaute Dagelet, a future member of the French Academy of Science, in 1768.

Legacy[edit]

The asteroid 7720 Lepaute is named in her honour, as is the lunar crater Lepaute.

See also[edit]

Notes[edit]

Philibert Commerson attempted to name the Hydrangea flower after Lepaute. Since the flower's accepted name became "Hortensia", it is often believed Hortense was Lepaute's name as well.[10]

References[edit]

  1. ^ a b c "Nicole-Reine Étable de la Brière Lepaute (1723–1788) | The Unforgotten Sisters: Female Astronomers and Scientists before Caroline Herschel - Credo Reference". search.credoreference.com. Retrieved 8 February 2018.
  2. ^ Osen, Lynn M. (1975). Women in Mathematics. MIT Press. p. 7. ISBN 9780262650090.
  3. ^ a b C., Haines, Catharine M. (2001). International women in science : a biographical dictionary to 1950. Santa Barbara, Calif.: ABC-CLIO. ISBN 1576070905. OCLC 50174714.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  4. ^ a b c The biographical dictionary of women in science : pioneering lives from ancient times to the mid-20th century. Ogilvie, Marilyn Bailey., Harvey, Joy Dorothy. New York: Routledge. 2000. ISBN 9780415920407. OCLC 40776839.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  5. ^ Grier, David Alan (2005). "The First Anticipated Return: Halley's Comet 1758". When Computers Were Human. Princeton: Princeton University Press. pp. 11–25. ISBN 0-691-09157-9.
  6. ^ Skinner, David (Spring 2006). "The Age of Female Computers". The New Atlantis (12): 96–103.
  7. ^ Garber, Megan (16 October 2013). "Computing Power Used to Be Measured in 'Kilo-Girls'". The Atlantic. Retrieved 20 October 2013.
  8. ^ Alic, Margaret (1986). Hypatia's Heritage: A History of Women in Science from Antiquity through the Nineteenth Century. Boston: Beacon Press. pp. 123–124. ISBN 080706730X.
  9. ^ de Lalande, Joseph-Jérôme (1803). Bibliographie astronomique, avec l'histoire de l'astronomie depuis 1781 jusqu'à 1802. Paris, France: l'Imprimerie de la République. pp. 676–687.
  10. ^ The Observatory, Vol. 34, p. 87-88

Article Evaluation[edit]

This is a place to leave notes about my observations and learning

First Evaluation: New Delhi metallo-beta-lactamase-1

  • Is everything in the article relevant to the article topic? Is there anything that distracted you?
    • Everything in the article had to do with NDM-1 and nothing seemed distracting
  • Is the article neutral? Are there any claims, or frames, that appear heavily biased toward a particular position?
    • There were lots of comments about the name chosen for the MBL and whether or not it was appropriate to name it after a city in India simply because one of the first cases reported was in India. However, there are numerous comments throughout the article mentioning that most people who had been found to have this MBL had been in India or recently been with someone who was in India. It felt biased in how often these comments were made.
  • Are there viewpoints that are overrepresented, or underrepresented?
    • There isn't really much about the science. It is far more about the name and the different cases that have been found throughout the world.
  • Check a few citations. Do the links work? Does the source support the claims in the article?
    • All of the links seem to work and support the claims being made.
  • Is each fact referenced with an appropriate, reliable reference? Where does the information come from? Are these neutral sources? If biased, is that bias noted?
    • Many facts are from reputable news sources like the Associated Press or literature articles, including one from ACS. However, there aren't citations for some of the facts in certain areas. Most citations appear to be from neutral sources and no bias is noted.
  • Is any information out of date? Is anything missing that could be added?
    • There could be a lot more in-depth discussion of the chemistry involved, as well as the structure of the MBL. There's a ton of information from 2009-2010 and some from 2014 and 2016 but nothing new after that.
  • Check out the Talk page of the article. What kinds of conversations, if any, are going on behind the scenes about how to represent this topic?
    • There was tons of discussion about whether or not the article was politicized, whether or not it was correct to call the MBL NDM-1 because of the political and geographical connotations. Lots of the users were practically fighting behind the scenes over how to word certain parts of the article. Additionally, comments were made requesting that more science and updated references be added (just as I had mentioned above).
  • How is the article rated? Is it a part of any WikiProjects?
    • It is rated start class and a low importance part of WikiProject Microbiology, WikiProject Molecular and Cell Biology, and WikiProject Medicine
  • How does the way Wikipedia discusses this topic differ from the way we've talked about it in class?
    • It is far more political and also focuses on the human impact, rather than the structure or mechanisms involved.
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