Background
Giovanni Battista Donati was born on December 16, 1826, in Pisa, Italy.
Donati studied at the University of Pisa, where he was a pupil of Mossotti.
Donati was an associate of the Royal Astronomical Society.
The crater Donati on the Moon.
Donati's Comet, Oxford, 7:30 p.m., October 5, 1858 by William Turner.
The diagram for locating the comet, printed a week before nearest approach.
Giovanni Battista Donati was born on December 16, 1826, in Pisa, Italy.
Donati studied at the University of Pisa, where he was a pupil of Mossotti.
In 1852 Donati went to Florence, where he worked in the observatory, then called “La Specola.” It was directed at that time by Amici, whom Donati succeeded in April 1864. In the years 1854-1873 Donati published about 100 works, many of which were devoted to comets, astrophysics, and atmospheric physics.
After having been in Spain for the eclipse of the sun of June 1860, he devoted himself completely to the application of spectroscopy to the stars and published the results of his studies in Annali del Regio museo di fisica e storia naturale. He pointed out the differences between the spectra of fifteen principal stars and that of the sun. He was also the first to obtain the spectrum of a comet and to interpret the observed features. The sun also was an object of his studies, both as an isolated body and in relation to other celestial bodies.
In 1868 he published two papers on the sun, one on determining its distance from the earth and the other on its physical structure. In 1869 he noted that certain phenomena heretofore thought to have had an atmospheric source actually originated in higher regions. He thus formulated the basis of a cosmic meteorology.
His experimental work brought forth first of all a spectroscope with five prisms, which was used in Sicily to observe an eclipse in 1870. He also devised a spectroscope of twenty-five prisms; it was exhibited in Vienna and Donati used it to make a series of remarkable observations in 1872. He noted the results that he obtained through the use of these spectroscopes and described them in Rapporti sulle osservazioni dell’eclisse totale di sole del 22 dicembre 1870 and in Memorie della Societa degli spettroscopisti italiani.
During the years 1864-1872 Donati was further occupied with the construction of a new observatory at Arcetri, near the house where Galileo died. The observatory was dedicated on October 27, 1872.
Donati’s important work “Sul modo con cui si propagarono i fenomeni luminosi della grande aurora boreale osservata nella notte dal 4 al 5 febbraio 1872” was the first number of the intended periodical Memorie del Regio osservatorio di Firenze ad Arcetri.
Donati died of cholera returning from Vienna, where he had taken part in the International Congress of Meteorology.
Donati was an associate of the Royal Astronomical Society.