In May of this year the Scientific Council of the French Astronomical Society (Société Astronomique de France) decided to grant its maximum award, the PRIX JULES JANSSEN (2014) to Rafael Rebolo López, astrophysicist and director of the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) and the 2015 award to Suzy Collin-Zahn, Emeritus Astronomer of the Paris Observatory, for the exceptional quality of their work. The ceremony will take place tomorrow 11th December in the Council Chamber of the Paris Observatory.
The Jules Janssen Prize is awarded to honour the French astronomer of that name, who loved scientific expeditions, and who discovered Helium in 1868 whilst observing a Solar Eclipse in India. The prize was created in 1897 and it is awarded in alternate years to outstanding personalities in the field of astronomy, one French and the other of any other nationality.
Among those who have received this prize are Camille Flammarion (1897), Sir Arthur Eddington (1928) Albert Einstein (1931), Harlow Shapley (1933) and Georges Lemaître (1936). The only Spaniard to be awarded the prize until now was Josep Comas i Solà, who received it in 1905.
The presentation and delivery of these prestigious prizes will be made by well known scientists: Françoise Combes, astronomer at the Paris Observatory and member of the French Academy of Sciences, who will present Collin-Zahn, and Roger Ferlet, former president of the French Astronomical Society, who will present Rafael Rebolo. Each of the prize winners will give a lecture before they receive their prize, which includes an engraved bronze medal.
The astrophysicist Suzy Collin-Zahn is an internationally recognized expert, known for her research into the physics of the nuclei of active galaxies (AGN), the accretion discs around massive black holes, and the problems of radiative transport in this type of galaxies. Her books and her implication in the role played by science in society have also been extremely important.
The Spanish astrophysicist Rafael Rebolo has led important projects of research in cosmology, in stellar physics and in exoplanet physics, ranging from the study of the cosmic microwave background to the characterization of substellar objects and black holes, and more recently the search for exoplanets similar to the Earth.
Afterwards another important award, the "Gabrielle and Camille Flammarion Prize" will be presented by David Valls-Gabaud astrophysicist at the Paris Observatory and vice-president of the French Astronomical Society, to the amateur astronomer Mike Simmons, director of AWB Astronomers Without Borders who will also give a lecture about the activities of AWB in its efforts in favour of the popularization of astronomy throughout the world.
