Albertus Antonie Nijland

Who was Albertus Antonie Nijland?

Albertus Antonie Nijland was a Dutch astronomer.

He was professor of astronomy at the Rijksuniversiteit Utrecht, and served as director of the Sterrewacht Sonnenborgh of the university.

In 1901 he participated in a Dutch solar eclipse expedition to Karang Sago, Sumatra.

He was noted for his observations of variable stars, and published a number of papers on the subject in Astronomische Nachrichten, and elsewhere, from 1917 until 1936. He proposed naming variable stars in each constellation using a simple numbering system beginning with V1, V2, ... and so forth. However the double-letter system starting with RR was already in widespread use. As a result, variable stars after QZ were numbered according to Nijland's system beginning with V335.

The crater Nijland on the Moon is named after him.