Sampson, Ralph Allen (1866–1939)

British astronomer. He developed the theory of the complex motions of the four major satellites of Jupiter; the resulting tables still form the basis of the data on Jupiter's satellites given in almanacs.

He also investigated possible improvements in the performance of reflectors, and developed the techniques of photographic spectrophotometry and used them to investigate the energy distribution in stellar spectra.

Sampson was born in Skull, County Cork, and educated at Cambridge. He was professor of mathematics at the University of Durham 1893–1910, and Astronomer Royal for Scotland 1910–37.