TAU Mini-Moon Seminar Series No.16

Julio Ángel Fernández

★Professor of Astronomy (retired) and member of the National System of Researchers of Uruguay

★Date and place of birth: 5/4/1946, Montevideo, Uruguay

★Institutional address/phone/E-mail: Departamento de Astronoma, Facultad de Ciencias, Igua 4225, 11400 Montevideo, Uruguay / 598-2 525 8624 / julio@ sica.edu.uy

★Degree: Licenciado en Astronoma (1974, Universidad de la Republica, Montevideo, Uruguay).

★Membership of Academies and Societies: 
→National Academy of Sciences of Uruguay
→Foreign Associate of the US National Academy of Sciences
→Third World Academy of Sciences
→Latin American Academy of Sciences
→International Astronomical Union
→Sociedad Uruguaya de Astronomía
→Sociedad Uruguaya de Física

★Professional career
→Assistant Professor , Dept. Astronomy and Physics, Faculty of Humanities and Sciences (1970-1976).
→Visiting Astronomer, Madrid Observatory, Spain (1979).
→Visiting Researcher, Max-Planck Institut für Aeronomíe and Max- Planck Institut für Kernphysik, Federal Republic of Germany (1980-1983).
→Visiting Professor, Observatorio do Valongo, Federal University of Rio de Janeiro, Brazil (1984-1986).
→Full Professor, Faculty od Sciences, Universidad de la Republica, Montevideo (1987 – 2020).
→Dean of the Faculty of Sciences (2005-2010).

★Membership of academic committees and honors
→President of Commission 20 of the International Astronomical Union “Positions and Motions of Minor Planets, Comets and Satellites” (for the triennium 2006-2009)
→Member of the Scienti c Committee of Commission 15 of the International Astronomical Union \Physical Studies of Comets, Minor Bodies and Meteorites”
→Member of the Small Bodies Names Committee of the International Astronomical Union
→Member of the Editoral Board of the journal Planetary and Space Science (1993-1998)
→Asteroid 5996 was named \Julioangel” by the International Astronomical Union (Resolution July/1996)
→Morosoli Prize in Science and Technology, Uruguay, 2016.
→Gerard P. Kuiper Prize in Planetary Sciences, Division for Planetary Sciences, American Astronomical Society, 2018.

★Highlights of major research accomplishments
My work has fundamentally been related to the formation of the solar system, and the physical and dynamical evolution of comets. Comets are considered to be the most primitive bodies of the solar system, the icy planetesimals that were left after the formation of the planets, so their study is of key importance to understand the accretion processes in the protoplanetary disk. Among the most relevant results of my work I can mention: (1) Jupiter family comets (orbital periods < 20 yr and Tisserand constants > 2) may come from a -at that moment- putative transneptunian belt (Fernandez 1980 MNRAS 192, 481), result that was con rmed several years later. (2) Most Oort cloud comets may come from the Uranus- Neptune zone, from where they were scattered to near-parabolic orbits by the giant planets (Fernández 1980 Icarus 42, 406). (3) The original birthplaces of the giant planets were shown to be dierent from their current locations, so it should have been a substantial migration during their accretion process (Fernández & Ip 1984 Icarus 58, 109). This phenomenon has attracted a lot of attention in the last few years in connection with the discovery of exoplanets very close to their central stars. (5) The theory that the solar system formed within an open cluster, as most stars do, so the structure of the Oort cloud was shaped by the gravitational perturbations of other member stars of the cluster (Fernández 1997 Icarus 129, 106).

★A sample of papers that I consider relevant in my career
→J.A. Fernández (1980). “On the existence of a comet belt beyond Neptune”, Mon. Not. R. Astr. Soc. 192, 481-491.
→J.A. Fernández (1980). “Evolution of comet orbits under the perturbing in uence of the giant planets and nearby stars”, Icarus 42, 406-421.
→J.A. Fernández and W.-H. Ip. (1984). “Some dynamical aspects of the accretion of Uranus and Neptune: The exchange of orbital angular momentum with planetesimals”, Icarus 58, 109-120.
→J.A. Fernández and W.-H. Ip (1996) “Orbital expansion and resonant trapping during the late accretion stages of the outher planets”, Planet. Space Sci. 44, 431-439.
→J.A. Fernández (1997) “The formation of the Oort cloud and the primitive galactic environment”. Icarus 129, 106-119.
→Fernández, J.A., Tancredi, G., Rickman, H., and Licandro, J. (1999) “The population, magnitudes, and sizes of Jupiter family comets”, Astron. Astrophys. 352, 327-340.
→Fernández, J.A., Gallardo, T., and Brunini, A. (2002) “Are there many inactive Jupiter-family comets among the near-Earth asteroid population”, Icarus 159, 358-368.
→Gomes, R.S., Gallardo, T., Fernandez, J.A., and Brunini, A. (2005) “On the origin of the high-perihelion scattered disk: The role of the Kozai mechanism and mean motion resonances”, Cel. Mech. Dyn. Astron. 91, 109-129. 
→Sosa, A., and Fernández, J.A. (2009). “Cometary masses derived from non-gravitational forces”.Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc. 393, 192-214.

Alberto Cellino

★Born in Torino, January 11, 1958

★Degree in Physics, March 1982

★Technician at the Astronomical Observatory of Torino (1981–1990)

★Astronomer at the Astronomical Observatory of Torino (1990–2009)

★“Primo ricercatore” at INAF, Astrophysical Observatory of Torino since 2009

★Duties for the Italian Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica (INAF):
→Member of the Time Allocation Committee of the Telescopio Nazionale Galileo (2004–2005).
→Member of the “Comitato di Macro Area 3” (Sun and Solar System)
of the INAF (2006-2010). 
→Member of the Consiglio di Supporto alla Direzione at the Astronomical Observatory of Torino (2010-2011).
→Member of the INAF Commission for the evaluation of the Euclid, Plato and Solar Orbiter space missions (2011).
→Elected Member of the new “Comitato di Macro Area 3” (Sun and Solar System) of the INAF (2011-2015).
→Member of the INAF Commission for the evaluation of the proposals of research submitted to answer the call for the PRIN INAF 2012 funding program (2013).
→Local coordinator for the preparation of the documents to be submitted by the Torino Astrophysical Observatory to INAF in the framework of the procedures for the evaluation of the Quality of the Research (VQR) of INAF (2015-2016).
→PI and national coordinator for the research project Vesta as benchmark to understand Solar System history funded by INAF in the framework of the 2011 PRIN research projects.

★IAU duties:
→Member of Minor Planet Working Group of IAU Commission 15 (1997-2000).
→Chairman of Asteroid Working Group of IAU Commission 15 (2000-2006).
→Chairman of the Commission 15 Working Group on Asteroid Polarimetric Albedo Calibration (2006-2012).
→Member of the Commission 15 Working Group on Asteroid Magnitudes (2006-2012).
→Vice-President of IAU Commission 15 (2006/2009).
→President of IAU Commission 15 (2009/2012).
→Member of the Steering Committee of IAU Division F (2012-2015).

★Coordination of research programs
→Over the years, Principal Investigator of several approved requests of observation time at observing facilities, including the Italian TNG and the ESO VLT telescopes.
→Principal Investigator of the project for the Spaceguard 1 space mission, submitted to ESA in the framework of the F2/F3 program (2000).
→Principal Investigator of the study Remote Observatons of Near-Earth Objects from Space, under contract from Alenia Spazio funded by ESA.
→Core member of the Gaia Solar System Working Group, and person in charge of the simulation studies for the determination of the spin properties of asteroids based on sparse photometric data (2003 2006).
→Since 2006, Scientist in charge of the development of the software for the determination of the physical properties of Solar System objects based on data of the Gaia space mission of the ESA, and member of the Steering Committee of the Coordination Unit 4 of the Data Processing and Analysis Committee (DPAC) of the Gaia space mission.
→Coordinator of an International Team funded by the International Space Science Institute (ISSI) in Bern, for the research program Light Scattering Phenomena in Small Body Surfaces (2007-2008).
→Scientist in charge of the design and construction of a new polarimeter, funded by the PRIN-INAF 2009 research programs. This Torino polarimeter has been installed at a 1-m telescope in the observing station of Calern (France) in the framework of an international collaboration between INAF and the Observatoire de la Cote d’Azur (France) in the field of polarimetric investigations of solar system objects (2010-2011).
→National Coordinator of the research project Vesta as benchmark to understand Solar System history, funded by INAF in the framework of the 2011 PRIN-INAF program (2011).
→Since 2010, member of the international Consortium for the development of the JEM-EUSO mission, as person in charge for the events of detection of meteors and nuclearites (the latter being possible components of the dark matter). using a telescope aboard the International Space Station (ISS).
→Since 2019, development of numerical simulators for the interpretation of events of detection of meteors and nuclearites from the Russian satellite Lomonosov, and from the mini-Euso telescope, a precursor of the bigger JEM-Euso project, currently active (2020) aboard the ISS.
→Since 2020, development of numerical simulators for the interpretation of events of detection of meteors and nuclearites seen from the miniEuso telescope currently operating (2020) aboard the ISS.