Andrew Yee[_1_]
June 17th 08, 03:43 PM
ESO Education and Public Relations Dept.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Text with all links and the photos are available on the ESO Website at URL:
http://www.eso.org/public/outreach/press-rel/pr-2008/pr-18-08.html
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Contacts
Dr. Henri Boffin
ESO Press Officer
Phone: +49 89 3200 6222
Valentina Rodriguez
ESO Press Officer in Chile
Phone: +56 2 463 3123
For Immediate Release: 10 June 2008
ESO Release 18/08
Shaw Prize Goes to Reinhard Genzel
Work on supermassive black hole done with ESO telescopes rewarded
The Shaw Prize in Astronomy for 2008 is awarded to Professor Reinhard
Genzel, Director of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics
(MPE), in recognition of his outstanding contribution in demonstrating that
the Milky Way contains a supermassive black hole at its centre, a result
largely obtained with the help of ESO's telescopes.
The Shaw Prize is awarded annually by the Shaw Prize Foundation in Hong Kong
in the Life Sciences, Mathematical Sciences and Astronomy, each of the three
prizes bearing a monetary award of one million US dollars.
"I warmly congratulate Professor Genzel for this well-deserved award which
highlights some of the best science produced with ESO's telescopes," says
Tim de Zeeuw, ESO's Director General. "Professor Genzel and his team have
made a dedicated, long-term effort, using our telescopes and co-developing
instruments, to study the Centre of our Galaxy, and as such, he has allowed
us to enter an era of observational black hole physics."
In 1969, Donald Lynden-Bell and Martin Rees suggested that the Milky Way
might contain a supermassive black hole at its centre. But evidence for such
an object was lacking at the time because the centre of the Milky Way is
obscured by interstellar dust, and was detected only as a relatively faint
radio source.
Reinhard Genzel and his collaborators obtained compelling evidence for this
black hole by developing state-of-the-art astronomical instruments to be
used on ESO's telescopes and carrying out a persistent programme of
observing the Galactic Centre and its surrounding stars for many years,
which ultimately led to the discovery of a black hole with a mass of about
three million times that of the Sun.
Genzel's group has in particular followed since 1992, the motion of several
stars, around the Galactic Centre. These observations were first done with
the MPE-built near-infrared speckle imaging camera SHARP on ESO's New
Technology Telescope at La Silla, later with the adaptive optics NACO and
SINFONI instruments on the Very Large Telescope (VLT) at Paranal.
NACO observations in 2002 (ESO 17/02) showed one star approaching the
central black hole to within 17 light-hours -- only three times the distance
between the Sun and dwarf planet Pluto -- while travelling at no less than
5000 km/s. The orbital period of the star is just over 15 years, and in
2007, the team had followed a complete orbit.
Subsequent adaptive optics observations revealed powerful infrared flares
coming from the supermassive black hole, strongly suggesting that the
Galactic Centre black hole rotates rapidly (ESO 26/03). SINFONI also enabled
the astronomers to register for the first time the infrared spectrum of a
flare (ESO 21/04).
The centre of our Milky Way galaxy is located in the southern constellation
Sagittarius ("The Archer") and its study, together with that of the
Magellanic Clouds, were the main reasons for Europe to install major
telescopes in the Southern Hemisphere.
The MPE press release is available at
http://www.mpe.mpg.de/Highlights/PR20080610/text.html
and the MPG release at
http://www.mpg.de/english/illustrationsDocumentation/documentation/pressReleases/2008/pressRelease20080610/index.html
More Information
The Shaw Prize is an international award to honour individuals who are
currently active in their respective fields and who have achieved
distinguished and significant advances, who have made outstanding
contributions in culture and the arts, or who in other domains have achieved
excellence.
The Shaw Prize consists of three annual prizes: Astronomy, Life Science and
Medicine, and Mathematical Sciences, each prize bearing a monetary award of
one million US dollars. This will be the fifth year that the Prize has been
awarded and the presentation ceremony is scheduled for Tuesday, 9 September
2008.
The Shaw Prize, established under the auspices of Mr. Run Run Shaw in
November 2002, is managed and administered by The Shaw Prize Foundation
based in Hong Kong.
The selection committee for astronomy for the period 2007-2009 is composed
of Professor Jiansheng Chen (Peking University, PRC), Professor Douglas N.
C. Lin (University of California, Santa Cruz, USA), Dr. John C. Mather
(Astrophysics Science Division, NASA/ GSFC, USA), Professor Michel Mayor
(University of Geneva, Switzerland), and Professor Richard McCray
(University of Colorado, USA).
National contacts for the media:
Belgium: Dr. Rodrigo Alvarez, +32-2-474 70 50
Czech Republic: Pavel Suchan, +420 267 103 040
Denmark: Dr. Michael Linden-Vornle, +45-33-18 19 97
Finland: Ms. Riitta Tirronen, +358 9 7748 8369
France: Dr. Daniel Kunth, +33-1-44 32 80 85
Germany: Dr. Jakob Staude, +49-6221-528229
Italy: Dr. Leopoldo Benacchio, +39-347-230 26 51
The Netherlands: Dr. Marieke Baan, +31-20-525 74 80
Portugal: Prof. Teresa Lago, +351-22-089 833
Spain: Dr. Miguel Mas-Hesse, +34918131196
Sweden: Dr. Jesper Sollerman, +46-8-55 37 85 54
Switzerland: Dr. Martin Steinacher, +41-31-324 23 82
United Kingdom: Mr. Peter Barratt, +44-1793-44 20 25
USA: Dr. Paola Rebusco, +1-617-308-2397
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ESO Press Information is available on Receive email notification
the WWW at about important news from
http://www.eso.org/outreach/press-rel/ ESO - subscribe to the
ESO-NEWS Mailing List.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright ESO Education & Public Relations Department
Karl-Schwarzschild-Strasse 2, D-85748 Garching, Germany
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Text with all links and the photos are available on the ESO Website at URL:
http://www.eso.org/public/outreach/press-rel/pr-2008/pr-18-08.html
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Contacts
Dr. Henri Boffin
ESO Press Officer
Phone: +49 89 3200 6222
Valentina Rodriguez
ESO Press Officer in Chile
Phone: +56 2 463 3123
For Immediate Release: 10 June 2008
ESO Release 18/08
Shaw Prize Goes to Reinhard Genzel
Work on supermassive black hole done with ESO telescopes rewarded
The Shaw Prize in Astronomy for 2008 is awarded to Professor Reinhard
Genzel, Director of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics
(MPE), in recognition of his outstanding contribution in demonstrating that
the Milky Way contains a supermassive black hole at its centre, a result
largely obtained with the help of ESO's telescopes.
The Shaw Prize is awarded annually by the Shaw Prize Foundation in Hong Kong
in the Life Sciences, Mathematical Sciences and Astronomy, each of the three
prizes bearing a monetary award of one million US dollars.
"I warmly congratulate Professor Genzel for this well-deserved award which
highlights some of the best science produced with ESO's telescopes," says
Tim de Zeeuw, ESO's Director General. "Professor Genzel and his team have
made a dedicated, long-term effort, using our telescopes and co-developing
instruments, to study the Centre of our Galaxy, and as such, he has allowed
us to enter an era of observational black hole physics."
In 1969, Donald Lynden-Bell and Martin Rees suggested that the Milky Way
might contain a supermassive black hole at its centre. But evidence for such
an object was lacking at the time because the centre of the Milky Way is
obscured by interstellar dust, and was detected only as a relatively faint
radio source.
Reinhard Genzel and his collaborators obtained compelling evidence for this
black hole by developing state-of-the-art astronomical instruments to be
used on ESO's telescopes and carrying out a persistent programme of
observing the Galactic Centre and its surrounding stars for many years,
which ultimately led to the discovery of a black hole with a mass of about
three million times that of the Sun.
Genzel's group has in particular followed since 1992, the motion of several
stars, around the Galactic Centre. These observations were first done with
the MPE-built near-infrared speckle imaging camera SHARP on ESO's New
Technology Telescope at La Silla, later with the adaptive optics NACO and
SINFONI instruments on the Very Large Telescope (VLT) at Paranal.
NACO observations in 2002 (ESO 17/02) showed one star approaching the
central black hole to within 17 light-hours -- only three times the distance
between the Sun and dwarf planet Pluto -- while travelling at no less than
5000 km/s. The orbital period of the star is just over 15 years, and in
2007, the team had followed a complete orbit.
Subsequent adaptive optics observations revealed powerful infrared flares
coming from the supermassive black hole, strongly suggesting that the
Galactic Centre black hole rotates rapidly (ESO 26/03). SINFONI also enabled
the astronomers to register for the first time the infrared spectrum of a
flare (ESO 21/04).
The centre of our Milky Way galaxy is located in the southern constellation
Sagittarius ("The Archer") and its study, together with that of the
Magellanic Clouds, were the main reasons for Europe to install major
telescopes in the Southern Hemisphere.
The MPE press release is available at
http://www.mpe.mpg.de/Highlights/PR20080610/text.html
and the MPG release at
http://www.mpg.de/english/illustrationsDocumentation/documentation/pressReleases/2008/pressRelease20080610/index.html
More Information
The Shaw Prize is an international award to honour individuals who are
currently active in their respective fields and who have achieved
distinguished and significant advances, who have made outstanding
contributions in culture and the arts, or who in other domains have achieved
excellence.
The Shaw Prize consists of three annual prizes: Astronomy, Life Science and
Medicine, and Mathematical Sciences, each prize bearing a monetary award of
one million US dollars. This will be the fifth year that the Prize has been
awarded and the presentation ceremony is scheduled for Tuesday, 9 September
2008.
The Shaw Prize, established under the auspices of Mr. Run Run Shaw in
November 2002, is managed and administered by The Shaw Prize Foundation
based in Hong Kong.
The selection committee for astronomy for the period 2007-2009 is composed
of Professor Jiansheng Chen (Peking University, PRC), Professor Douglas N.
C. Lin (University of California, Santa Cruz, USA), Dr. John C. Mather
(Astrophysics Science Division, NASA/ GSFC, USA), Professor Michel Mayor
(University of Geneva, Switzerland), and Professor Richard McCray
(University of Colorado, USA).
National contacts for the media:
Belgium: Dr. Rodrigo Alvarez, +32-2-474 70 50
Czech Republic: Pavel Suchan, +420 267 103 040
Denmark: Dr. Michael Linden-Vornle, +45-33-18 19 97
Finland: Ms. Riitta Tirronen, +358 9 7748 8369
France: Dr. Daniel Kunth, +33-1-44 32 80 85
Germany: Dr. Jakob Staude, +49-6221-528229
Italy: Dr. Leopoldo Benacchio, +39-347-230 26 51
The Netherlands: Dr. Marieke Baan, +31-20-525 74 80
Portugal: Prof. Teresa Lago, +351-22-089 833
Spain: Dr. Miguel Mas-Hesse, +34918131196
Sweden: Dr. Jesper Sollerman, +46-8-55 37 85 54
Switzerland: Dr. Martin Steinacher, +41-31-324 23 82
United Kingdom: Mr. Peter Barratt, +44-1793-44 20 25
USA: Dr. Paola Rebusco, +1-617-308-2397
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
ESO Press Information is available on Receive email notification
the WWW at about important news from
http://www.eso.org/outreach/press-rel/ ESO - subscribe to the
ESO-NEWS Mailing List.
----------------------------------------------------------------------------
Copyright ESO Education & Public Relations Department
Karl-Schwarzschild-Strasse 2, D-85748 Garching, Germany
----------------------------------------------------------------------------