Robert Emden

Robert Emden
Born
Jacob Robert Emden

(1862-03-04)4 March 1862
St. Gallen, Switzerland
Died8 October 1940(1940-10-08) (aged 78)
Zurich, Switzerland
Alma materUniversity of Strasbourg
Known forLane–Emden equation
Children5
Scientific career
FieldsAstrophysicist and Meteorologist
InstitutionsTechnical University of Munich
Bavarian Academy of Sciences and Humanities
Thesis On the Vapour Pressure of Salt Solutions  (1887)

Jacob Robert Emden (4 March 1862 – 8 October 1940) was a Swiss astrophysicist and meteorologist. He is best known for his book, Gaskugeln: Anwendungen der mechanischen Wärmetheorie auf kosmologische und meteorologische probleme (Gas spheres: Applications of the mechanical heat theory to cosmological and meteorological problems), published in 1907. It presents a mathematical model of the behaviour of polytropic gaseous stellar objects under the influence of their own gravity, known as the Lane–Emden equation.