Fred Hoyle

Sir Fred Hoyle (June 24, 1915 in Yorkshire – August 20in Bournemouth, England, 2001) was a British astronomer, notable for a number of his theories that run counter to current astronomical opinion, and a writer of science fiction, including a number of books co-authored by his son Geoffrey Hoyle. He spent most of his working life at the Institute of Astronomy at Cambridge, and was director of the institute for a number of years.

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~

An early paper of his made an interesting use of the Anthropic Principle. In trying to work out the routes of stellar nucleosynthesis, he observed that one particular nuclear reaction, the Triple-alpha process, which generated carbon, would require the carbon nucleus to have a very specific energy for it to work. The large amount of carbon in the universe, which makes it possible for life to exist, demonstrated that this nuclear reaction must work. Based on this notion, he made a prediction of the energy levels in the carbon nucleus that was later borne out by experiment.

June 24: June 24 is the 175th day of the year (176th in leap years) in the Gregorian Calendar, with 190 days remaining....

1915: 1915 was a common year starting on Friday (see link for calendar)....

Yorkshire: :This article is about the English county. For other uses, see Yorkshire (disambiguation)....

Fred Hoyle related Images and Photos (experimental)

Fred Claus	Fred Durst	Fred Durst	Fred Claus (BD)
Fred Gwynne	Fred Taylor	Fred Astaire	Fred McGriff
Fred Claus (FS/WS/DVD)	Fred Dryer - Hunter	Fred Astaire Print	Lil' Fred Tombstone, Cutout