Roger Cayrel

Roger Victor Emile Cayrel (born December 4, 1925 in Bordeaux , France) is a French astronomer at the Observatoire Paris-Meudon, whose main areas of interest are stellar atmospheres, galactic chemical evolution and very old stars.

Cayrel attended the "Lycée Michel-Montaigne" in Bordeaux and studied physics at the École normal supérieure and the "Faculté des sciences de Paris".

In his long professional career, Roger Cayrel has held a number of managerial positions, including: Director of the CFHT ( Canada-France-Hawaii Telescope ) (1974–1980), President of the International Astronomical Union (IAU) “Star Atmospheres” Commission (1973–1976) , President of the Bureau des Longitudes (1995–1996). Since 1988 he has been a corresponding member of the Académie des sciences . In 1968 he was awarded the “Prix Deslandres” of the Académie des Sciences and in 2001 the Jules Janssen Prize .

He has been married to the astronomer Giusa de Strobel since 1954.

Roger Cayrel and his colleagues discovered thorium and uranium in the spectrum of the ultra-metal-poor star BPS CS31082-001 (since then known by astronomers as “Cayrel's star”). This made it possible to determine the age at 12.5 billion years.

literature

• Cayrel, R .; Hill, V .; Beers, TC; Barbuy, B .; Spite, M .; Spite, F .; Plez, B .; Andersen, J .; Bonifacio, P .; François, P .; Molaro, P .; Nordström, B .; Primas, F., Measurement of stellar age from uranium decay, Nature, Volume 409, Issue 6821, pp. 691-692 (2001)

Web links

• Publications by R. Cayrel in the Astrophysics Data System
• Alphabetical list of the members of the Academy (with a brief portrait).