astronomy

Jan van Bemmel

Jan van Bemmel is a astronomy topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Jan van Bemmel rather than just read about it. In short: Jan Hendrik van Bemmel (born 17 November 1938) is a Dutch former professor of medical informatics at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and the Erasmus University Rotterdam. He was rector magnificus of the Erasmus University Rotterdam between 2000 and 2003.

Key takeaways

Jan van Bemmel belongs to astronomy; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Jan van Bemmel to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Jan van Bemmel from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

Jan Hendrik van Bemmel (born 17 November 1938) is a Dutch former professor of medical informatics at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and the Erasmus University Rotterdam. He was rector magnificus of the Erasmus University Rotterdam between 2000 and 2003.

Career Van Bemmel was born in Rotterdam on 17 November 1938. He studied physics at Delft University of Technology, where he obtained a degree in 1963. He subsequently started working for the Medical-Physical Institute of the Netherlands Organisation for Applied Scientific Research (TNO). At the institute he was head of the workgroup of biomedical signalanalysis. Six years later he earned his Doctor title at the faculty of physics and mathematics of the Radboud University Nijmegen. His thesis concerned challenges of signal processing applied to fetal electrocardiography. In 1973 Van Bemmel stopped working for TNO and was appointed as professor of medical informatics at the Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam. In 1987 Van Bemmel became professor of medical informatics at the Erasmus University Rotterdam. He served as rector magnificus of the University between 2000 and 2003. His research has amongst other topics focused on biomedical signal and image analysis, medical information systems and electronic health records. He started his work on the latter during the 1980s and later expanded into the signal and image analytics. The American Medical Informatics Association (AMIA) has called him "instrumental in the development of medical informatics as a discipline". He served as president of the International Medical Informatics Association from 1998 to 2001. Van Bemmel was elected a member of the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences in 1987. He became a corresponding member of the National Academy of Medicine in 1991. In 2015 he won the Morris F. Collen Award of the AMIA. In 2018 a paper in honour of his 80th birthday was published in which Van Bemmel's earlier work was held to the then current scientific state of knowledge. In 2017 Van Bemmel published a book named "Waar was je? Geloven na Darwin en Hubble", describing his views on Christian beliefs and evolution theory.

References

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Jan van Bemmel

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Jan van Bemmel claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In astronomy, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Jan van Bemmel before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Jan van Bemmel ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Jan van Bemmel

In research: Jan van Bemmel appears in astronomy research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Jan van Bemmel in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Jan van Bemmel is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1938 births, Academic staff of Erasmus University Rotterdam, Academic staff of Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Jan van Bemmel outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Jan van Bemmel in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Jan van Bemmel means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Jan van Bemmel out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Jan van Bemmel in simple terms?

Why does Jan van Bemmel matter?

Because it connects several astronomy ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Jan van Bemmel?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Jan van Bemmel.