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| Animation of Jupiter's three nearest moons over 2.5 hours; Credit: Purnendu Gupta; Sep 26, 2022 |
It was the night of January 7, 1610. A man in his mid forties stood in the back garden of his three story home in Padua, Italy. In his hand was his home made telescope pointed at the planet Jupiter. He was the chair of mathematics at the university of Padua. Though well known by then, he had not quite become the icon that he would go on to be. Most of his remarkable achievements still lay in the future. But one that he would make over the next few days would etch his name in the history of astronomy forever.
