Garik Israelian studies the spectral signatures of stars and other bodies as an astrophysicist at the Gran Telescopio Canarias, home of the world's largest optical-infrared telescope mirror, part of the Institute of Astrophysics on the Canary Islands. He has published more than 150 articles on topics such as extra-solar planets and black hole binary systems, and his observational work -- poring over the spectral data that points to the composition of distant stars -- has led to the discovery of a lithium signature that suggests Sun-sized stars gobble up their planets.
In 1999, Israelian led a collaboration that found the first observational evidence that supernova explosions are responsible for the formation of black holes. He's on the verge of announcing more big news. (And he is one of the astronomers whom Brian May, the guitarist of Queen, credits with persuading him to finish his PhD after 30 years as a rock star.)
Astronomer Garik Israelian (watch his TEDTalk) explained the secrets of spectrography yesterday. And last night, he answered a few of our followup questions by email — including some questions from TED’s Facebook fans: Tell me about your latest work with lithium and its significance for planet-bearing stars. Since year 2000, our group has been working […]
Continue readingAstronomer Garik Israelian spoke at TEDGlobal on Wednesday, July 22, about spectroscopy — the art of examining the spectral signature of a distant object in the universe, and inferring its qualities and behaviors. When I asked him during rehearsal if he could stay for the whole conference, he said he had to leave early — […]
Continue readingGarik Israelian is a spectroscopist, studying the spectrum emitted by a star to figure out what it’s made of and how it might behave. It’s a rare and accessible look at this discipline, which may help us an Earthlike planet friendly to life. (Recorded at TEDGlobal, July 2009, Oxford, UK.Duration: 15:52) Twitter URL: http://on.ted.com/3Z Watch […]
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