DECEASE OF SERGE KOUTCHMY
Photography of Serge Koutchmy, in Angola, in 2017.Credit: IAP
It is with great sadness that the staff of Institut d'astrophysique de Paris learned of the death of Serge Koutchmy on May 27, 2023.
Aged 82, Serge Koutchmy was an emeritus CNRS senior researcher. Born in France and a student in Russia and France, he joined the IAP in 1968. His research was particularly rich and varied, and devoted to zodiacal light, comets, or the rings of Saturn. The Sun, however, occupied most of his career: facules, granulation, spicules, spots, protuberances, corona, his work in solar physics dealt with all the structures of our star. He organized with audacity and inventiveness dozens of solar eclipse observation missions, for example in 1968 in Siberia, in 1973 by Concorde aircraft, in 1991 with the Canada France Hawaii Telescope (TCFH), in Iran (1999), in Angola (2001, 2002, 2017), in Egypt (2006), until 2019 with the New Technology Telescope of the European Southern Observatory (ESO) in Chile. Serge Koutchmy contributed to many instrumental developments, on the ground and in space. He is the author of reference books and hundreds of scientific articles, and has also guided several young scientists by directing their thesis.
At the time of his death, his colleagues and friends at the IAP appreciate how lucky they were to interact with a researcher having such a fruitful career, and such a warm personality.
Links
Press Release from Société française d'astronomie et d'astrophysique (SF2A)
Tributes to Serge Koutchmy from Société astronomique de France (SAF) website (in French)
Pierre Léna and Serge Koutchmy's book: « Soleils éclipsés » (published in June 2023, in French)
Web writing: Guillaume Hébrard, Jean Mouette, Valérie de Lapparent
Layout: Jean Mouette
May 2023