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The famous astrophysicist Eugene Parker - and namesake of the "Parker Solar Probe" is dead
Photo: Scott Olson/Getty Images
The US space agency Nasa mourns the loss of a visionary: the astrophysicist Eugene Parker.
With Parker, "one of the greatest scientific minds and leaders of our time has passed away," said Bill Nelson, head of NASA, according to a statement.
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Eugene Parker's contributions to science and to understanding how our universe works touch so much of what we do here at NASA.” The physicist's legacy will live on in the space missions.
Parker's death was also mourned in a message from NASA on Twitter.
“We stand on the shoulders of giants.
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Parker helped us touch the sun,” it said.
"The field of heliophysics owes its existence to Eugene Parker"
Parker, who was born in Houghton, Michigan in 1927, was a professor of physics and later a professor of astrophysics at the University of Chicago from 1962 to 1995.
As early as the 1950s, he predicted the existence of solar winds.
He played a key role in shaping the field of heliophysics, which examines the dynamics of the sun.
NASA's director of science, Thomas Zurbuchen, wrote in a tweet: "The field of heliophysics owes its existence largely to Eugene Parker."
And Parker's name should also be given special recognition in space travel: a spaceship that has already come closer to the sun than any terrestrial object before it bears his name - the »Parker Solar Probe«.
This probe was launched into space in August 2018 and flew through the outermost layer of the sun's atmosphere - the so-called corona - in December 2021.
The "Parker Solar Probe", which is protected by a carbon shell almost twelve centimeters thick, is currently circling the sun in large elliptical orbits.
During the mission, which is scheduled to last until 2025, the probe is expected to come within about six million kilometers of the star's surface.
The space vehicle weighs around 7000 kilograms and is the size of a small car.
It has to withstand more heat and radiation than any missile before it and is intended, among other things, to clarify the question of what drives the solar winds.
Parker was the first person NASA named a probe after during its lifetime.
He died on Tuesday at the age of 94.
vki/dpa
