astronomy

William Henry Lang

William Henry Lang 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 William Henry Lang rather than just read about it. In short: William Henry Lang FRS FRSE FLS (12 May 1874–29 August 1960) was a British botanist and specialist in paleobotany who served as Barker professor of cryptogamic botany at the University of Manchester. Life The son of Thomas Bilsland Lang, a medical practitioner, and his wife Emily Smith, he was born in Groombridge in Sussex on 12 May 1874.

Key takeaways

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

Reference excerpt

Life The son of Thomas Bilsland Lang, a medical practitioner, and his wife Emily Smith, he was born in Groombridge in Sussex on 12 May 1874. Lang was educated at Dennistoun Public School in Glasgow before being accepted into the University of Glasgow, where he graduated with a BSc (Hons) in botany and zoology in 1894. He qualified for medicine in 1895 but never became a practising doctor; thanks to his own enthusiasm and the encouragement of his teacher Frederick Orpen Bower he instead became a professional botanist. His first research was on the structure of ferns, something Bower was apparently an authority on, and Lang soon followed him in that regard. He moved to study at the Jodrell Laboratory on a Robert Donaldson scholarship in 1895, where he focused on the apomixis of ferns, and discovered a sporangium on the prothallus of a fern at a time when biologists were exploring alternate means of reproduction in plants. In 1899 he travelled to Sri Lanka and Malaya to study tropical cryptogams and collect samples, returning to Britain in 1902, when he became a lecturer at the University of Glasgow; while there he worked closely with D. T. Gwynne-Vaughan and Bower, with the three of them being known as the "triumvirate". After Gwynne-Vaughan's death in 1915 he studied preserved plant remnants in Aberdeen, making great insights into the nature of Psilophyton, which until then had been neglected. In 1900 he was awarded a Doctor of Science degree by the University of Glasgow, and when the Barker chair of cryptogamic botany was created at the University of Manchester Lang was the first choice. He took up his duties in 1909 and was elected to membership of the Manchester Literary and Philosophical Society on 2 November 1909, later serving as Secretary (1924–7). In 1911 he was made a Fellow of the Royal Society and was awarded a Royal Medal in 1931 for 'his work on the anatomy and morphology of the fern-like fossils of the Old Red Sandstone.' In 1926 he was elected a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh. His proposers were Frederick Orpen Bower, Sir John Graham Kerr, Diarmid Noel Paton and George Alexander Gibson. He won the Society's Neill Prize for the period 1915-1917. In 1932 he received an honorary doctorate (LLD) from the University of Glasgow, followed by a second honorary doctorate from Manchester University in 1942. He was also a foreign member of the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences. Lang was noted for his encouragement of women's education and influenced the botanists Irene Manton, Marjorie Lindsey, and Grace Wigglesworth. After his retirement he moved to Westmorland. His wife died in 1959 following a period of ill-health, and he followed barely a year later at his home in Milnthorpe on 29 August 1960.

Family He married his cousin, Elsa Valentine, in 1910. They had no children.

Publications A Textbook of Botany (1912) Makers of British Botany: William Griffith (1810-1845) (1913) Palaeobotany (1926) co-written with Robert Kidston

Botanical References

References

External links Works by or about William Henry Lang at Wikisource

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with William Henry Lang

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what William Henry Lang 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 William Henry Lang 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 William Henry Lang 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 William Henry Lang

In research: William Henry Lang 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 William Henry Lang 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: William Henry Lang is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1874 births, 1960 deaths, Academics of the University of Manchester, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for William Henry Lang 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 William Henry Lang in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what William Henry Lang 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 William Henry Lang out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is William Henry Lang in simple terms?

William Henry Lang FRS FRSE FLS (12 May 1874–29 August 1960) was a British botanist and specialist in paleobotany who served as Barker professor of cryptogamic botany at the University of Manchester. Life The son of Thomas Bilsland Lang, a medical practitioner, and his wife Emily Smith, he was born…

Why does William Henry Lang 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 William Henry Lang?

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 William Henry Lang.