Astronomical News

In Memoriam Stanislav Štefl

Dietrich Baade1 of his thesis to radio wavelengths, from photometry to spectro-interferometry,

Olivier Thizy from photographic plates via electronic 1 ESO imagers to radio receivers.

His modesty and fine Czech humour On 11 June 2014, ALMA and ESO astron- were Stan’s personal trademarks. In the omer Stanislav (Stan) Štefl died in a car same unpretentious way, he served accident in Santiago. He was 58 years the ESO community as VLTI and ALMA old. support astronomer and on the organis- ing committees of two ESO workshops Stan was born in Počátky (Czechoslova- and on many internal committees. kia) and received his PhD from the Charles University in Prague in 1987. He Stan was a passionate and skilled moun- then held a staff position at the Ondřejov taineer: he climbed Aconcagua (but had Observatory. From 1991 to 1993, Stan to halt 200 metres below the summit on worked at ESO Headquarters as a account of bad weather), Chimborazo, research associate and, from 2004 until Kilimanjaro, and many more mountains in 2012, he was a Chile and around the world. A few Interferometer (VLTI) support astronomer months ago, he also undertook a sailing at Paranal Observatory. For the past year expedition with friends to Antarctica. and a half, Stan had been on second- bursts of Be stars their pulsational power ment to the Atacama Large Millimeter/ spectrum changes. Stan initiated the Stan will be remembered as a hard-work- submillimeter Array (ALMA), working in integration of dynamic models of Be star ing and very cooperative colleague, as a Santiago and at Chajnantor. discs with detailed radiative transfer cal- passionate scientist, and as a man of rare culations. He was chair of the Interna- human qualities. He, his wife Magdalena Stan’s premier fields of research were the tional Astronomical Union Working Group and their daughter Marketa were about formation and evolution of rapidly rotating on Active B Stars from 1999 to 2003. to move to Ondřejov, where Stan was to B-type stars that eject matter into a cir- Throughout his career Stan kept expand- lead the ALMA Regional Centre node, cumstellar disc. He was the first to notice ing his observational expertise in an when his life ended so abruptly. Our and demonstrate that during the out- impressive way: from the ultraviolet work thoughts are with them.

Fellows at ESO

Neale Gibson

It was quite late into my undergraduate degree that I considered pursuing astron- omy as a career. As a child I remember staring at pictures in books, in particular being fascinated by the gas giants in the Solar System. Whilst astron- omy may have inspired my interest in ­science, it was many years before I real- ised it was something you could actually do for a living!

I grew up in Carryduff, a small town near Belfast in the north of Ireland. Throughout Neale Gibson

60 The Messenger 156 – June 2014 school, maths, science and art were my ESO where I support FORS2 (one of always a bit of a theorist though... My first favourite subjects, but by the time I had the older VLT instruments), and will also approaches to astronomy were through to apply for university courses I hadn’t support SPHERE (the next generation cosmology books, where closed and settled on anything. All I knew was that imager) in the near future. open spaces were described, where they I wanted to do something science talked about the “seven samurai” and the related, and I ended up choosing a phys- Now about half way through my ESO Fel- Great Attractor. I always liked abstract ics degree at the Queen’s University lowship I continue to worry about how thinking in that sense. of Belfast which allowed me to delay any we can observe exoplanet atmospheres. serious career decisions to later in life. Whilst are relatively nearby When the time came to make an actual For the next few years I really enjoyed compared to most objects of astro­ decision about my university career I was studying physics, but still had no idea physical research (although I have been seriously undecided between astronomy what to do afterwards, other than some- called a cosmologist by Solar System and philosophy; those were two areas thing science related. In my final year folks), they are extremely difficult to study that I felt really passionate about. Before of undergrad, I had the opportunity to due to their faintness and the incon­ that, I thought of doing engineering, since specialise in astrophysics and undertook venient fact that they’re located right next it’s a more standard choice of career in a project studying supernovae. It was to their very bright and noisy host stars. Chile. What put me off that road was the only then that I realised that a career in Development of observational and data comment of my literature teacher back astrophysics research was a realistic analysis techniques has so far enabled then: “anyone can be an engineer but not possibility, and doing a PhD in astronomy us to peer at the atmospheres of hot everyone can be an astronomer... For at Queen’s was the perfect way to Jupiters (gas giants orbiting their host astronomy you really need an abstract explore this and again avoid making any stars much closer than Mercury orbits mind”. So I decided to take up that chal- serious career decisions! our Sun) although this remains challeng- lenge (although his statement was incor- ing. With the next generation of ground- rect... engineering is as difficult!). I began my PhD in the (then) small exo- and space-based instrumentation like planet group at Queen’s working with the James Webb Space Telescope and I may not be like many of the astrono- Don Pollacco, trying to search for and ESO’s E-ELT we might just be able to mers who write about themselves here, characterise exoplanets using high preci- peer into the atmospheres of terrestrial as I have to confess that I never liked sion light curves. This was an planets and even search for life beyond staying up during all the night observing, exciting field to be in – at this time (2006) the Solar System. I have no idea where nor suffering the cold (Oh yes! It really there were only a handful of known trans- I will be after my ESO Fellowship, but I was cold in Santa Martina, the Observa- iting planets, none of them like anything hope to play a part in this search. tory of Universidad Catolica in Chile). I in our Solar System. During my PhD I enjoyed all my courses on astrophysics got my first taste of observing, spending and other theoretical physics courses two months living on the Canary Islands Claudia Lagos much more: general astrophysics, stellar to be near the Roque de los Muchachos and extragalactic astrophysics, mathe- Observatory. We also built an instrument I started to think about astronomy as a matical methods in physics, etc... It was specifically for my project called RISE real possibility for my career option when during my Bachelor degree that I started (Rapid Imager to Search for Exoplanets) I was 16 years old. Before that it always working on galaxy formation and simula- on the Liverpool Telescope, giving me seemed a bit of a dream, a fantasy. It was tions. lots of valuable experience with obser­ only when I was 16 that making life-long vations and instrumentation. It was during choices became reality. I always liked Both my Masters degree and my PhD these years that I decided that I wanted to think about space, about its scales, its were focussed on galaxy formation to continue in astronomy; making a living geometry, its evolution. I think I was ­physics, albeit on very different aspects. by learning new things and thinking about the Universe was just too good to be true.

My next step was taking a postdoc with Suzanne Aigrain and Frederic Pont, start- ing in Exeter and soon moving to Oxford. It was there that I started working on observations of exoplanet atmospheres, and three years later I was delighted to be accepted onto the ESO Fellowship programme in Garching. Aside from pro- viding an exciting research environment, ESO Fellows get the opportunity to par- ticipate in observatory operations. I have joined the User Support Department at Claudia Lagos

The Messenger 156 – June 2014 61 Astronomical News

The former was on active galactic nuclei, I think I did a good job at convincing the and I have also been involved in the accretion onto black holes and spin Fellow selection committee in 2011 that ALMA Helpdesk and the creation of development; while my PhD was focused a theorist at ESO was not oil on water, scheduling blocks. The ALMA Regional on star formation, the interstellar medium but instead a rather natural mixture. I Centre at ESO have been great and and feedback from stars. All of these are joined ESO in October 2012 and I have patient at explaining to an inexperienced challenging and very interesting topics. greatly enjoyed my time here, where I’m modeller how to do certain tasks and I really enjoy working in such a wide field intensively learning about observational how ALMA works. I have another year left as galaxy formation, where a large range astronomy. I perform my duties on ALMA, at ESO and I hope I can squeeze some- of expertise is required. where I have discovered a passion for thing out of every second of it and observing. I act as astronomer on duty, ­continue enjoying its great environment.

Personnel Movements

Arrivals (1 April–30 June 2014) Departures (1 April–30 June 2014)

Europe Europe Álvarez Méndez, Domingo (ES) Detector Engineer Guieu, Sylvain (FR) Fellow Arumugam, Vinodiran (MY) Fellow Karban, Robert (AT) Software Engineer Gotschewski, Katrin (DE) Administrative Assistant Huber, Stefan (DE) Integration Opto-mechanical Technician Ivison, Robert Julian (GB) Director for Science Karabal, Muhammet Emin (TR) Student Chile Steins, Steffi (DE) HR Advisor Andersson Lundgren, Andreas (SE) Deputy Program Manager Aravena, Manuel (CL) Fellow Gitton, Philippe (FR) System Engineer Jager, Henderikus (NL) System Integration Manager Chile Morel, Sébastien (FR) System Engineer Capocci, Robin (FR) Safety Officer Vuckovic, Maja (RS) Fellow Sanhueza, Sebastian (CL) Mechanical Engineer Tristram, Konrad (DE) Operation Staff Astronomer Zins, Gérard (FR) Instrument Software Engineer

62 The Messenger 156 – June 2014