Alois Purgathofer
Alois Purgathofer (born February 18, 1925 in Bruck an der Mur ; † March 13, 1984 Calar Alto, Spain ) was an Austrian astronomer.
Life
Alois Purgathofer researched and taught - apart from a few longer stays abroad - from 1954 to 1984 at the University Observatory Vienna , since 1968 as a university lecturer and since 1974 as an associate professor. He mainly worked on the photometry of galactic star clusters , but also on the minor planet (51) Nemausa . In 1969 the Leopold Figl observatory with the 1.5 m Ritchey-Chretien telescope was built on the Mitterschöpfl under his significant technical and celestial supervision . His knowledge of instruments, especially in the field of optics, electronics and image converters, was unsurpassed. Alois Purgathofer died unexpectedly on March 13, 1984 while on a business trip.
In his honor, Rudolf Pressberger named his self-built observatory in Klosterneuburg-Kierling “ Purgathofer Observatory ”. It is located around 10 km west of Vienna and has the second largest telescope mirror in Austria (1 m diameter). After Purgathofer, the asteroid (5341) was also named Purgathofer .
His son Werner Purgathofer (* 1955) is a professor at the Vienna University of Technology and head of the Institute for Computer Graphics and Algorithms , and his brother Peter Purgathofer (* 1963) is an associate professor at the Institute for Design and Effectiveness Research at the Vienna University of Technology.
Web links
- Purgathofer observatory
- Publications by A. Purgathofer in the Astrophysics Data System
- A. Schnell, WM Tscharnuter: Alois Purgathofer † Communications from the Astronomical Society, Vol. 61 (1984), p. 7. (Obituary)
| personal data | |
|---|---|
| SURNAME | Purgathofer, Alois |
| BRIEF DESCRIPTION | Austrian astronomer |
| DATE OF BIRTH | February 18, 1925 |
| PLACE OF BIRTH | Bruck an der Mur |
| DATE OF DEATH | March 13, 1984 |
| Place of death | Calar Alto Observatory |