Together withDidier Queloz in 1995, he discovered51 Pegasi b, the firstextrasolar planet orbiting a sun-like star,51 Pegasi.[6] For this achievement, they were awarded the 2019 Nobel Prize in Physics "for the discovery of an exoplanet orbiting a solar-type star"[7] resulting in "contributions to our understanding of the evolution of the universe and Earth's place in the cosmos".[8]Related to the discovery, Mayor noted that humans will never migrate to such exoplanets since they are "much, much too far away ... [and would take] hundreds of millions of days using the means we have available today".[9] However, due to discoveries by Mayor, searching forextraterrestrial communications fromexoplanets may now be a more practical consideration than thought earlier.[10]
From 1971 to 1984, Mayor worked as a research associate at theObservatory of Geneva, which is home to the astronomy department of theUniversity of Geneva. He became an associate professor at the university in 1984.[2] In 1988, the university named him a full professor, a position he held until his retirement in 2007. Mayor was director of the Observatory of Geneva from 1998 to 2004.[2] He is a professor emeritus at the University of Geneva.[12]
Didier Queloz and Michel Mayor at theLa Silla Observatory (2012)Video: Michel Mayor speaks about the discovery of exoplanets (after 2:07)
Mayor's research interests include extrasolar planets (also known asexoplanets), instrumentation, statistical properties ofdouble stars,globular cluster dynamics, galactic structure andkinematics. Mayor's doctoral thesis at the University of Geneva was devoted to the spiral structure of galaxies.[2]
During his time as a research associate, there had been strong interest in developingphotoelectric-basedDoppler spectrometers to obtain more accurate measurements ofradial velocities of stellar objects compared to existing photographic methods. Following preliminary work byRoger Griffin in 1967 to show the feasibility of photoelectric measurements of radial velocities, Mayor worked with André Baranne at theMarseille Observatory to develop CORAVEL, a photoelectric spectrometer capable of highly accurate radial velocity measurements, which allow measurement of star movements, orbital periods ofbinary stars, and even the rotational speed of stars.[13]
This research led to various fields of interest, including the study of statistical characteristics of solar-type binary stars. With fellow researcher Antoine Duquennoy, they examined the radial velocities of several systems believed to be binary stars in 1991. Their results found that a subset of these may in fact be single star systems with substellar secondary objects.[14] Desiring more accurate radial velocity measurements, Mayor, along with Baranne at Marseille, and with graduate studentDidier Queloz, developedELODIE, a new spectrograph based on the work of CORAVEL, which was estimated to have an accuracy of 15 m/s for bright stars, improving upon the 1 km/s from CORAVEL. ELODIE was developed with the specific intent to determine if the substellar secondary objects werebrown dwarf stars or potentially giant planets.[15]
By 1994, ELODIE was operational at Geneva and Mayor and Queloz began their survey of Sun-like systems with suspected substellar secondary objects.[16] In July 1995, the pair's survey of51 Pegasi affirmed that there was anexoplanet orbiting it, identified as51 Pegasi b, which was later classified as ahot-Jupiter–type planet. This was the first exoplanet to be found orbiting amain-sequence star, as opposed to planets that orbited the remains of a star.[17] Mayor's and Queloz's discovery of an exoplanet launched great interest is searching for other exoplanets since.[18] On 21 March 2022, the 5000th exoplanet beyond theSolar System was confirmed.[19]
Mayor's work focused more on improving instrumentation for radial velocity measurements to improve detecting exoplanets and measuring their properties. Mayor led a team to further improve ELODIE to increase velocity measurement accuracy to 1 m/s via theHigh Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher (HARPS) installed on theESO 3.6 m Telescope atLa Silla Observatory in Chile by 2003.[20] Mayor led the team that used HARPS to seek out other exoplanets. In 2007, Mayor was one of 11 European scientists who discoveredGliese 581c, the first extrasolar planet in a star's habitable zone, from the ESO telescope.[21] In 2009, Mayor and his team discovered the lightest exoplanet ever detected around amain sequence star:Gliese 581e.[22] Nonetheless, Mayor noted that humans will never migrate to such exoplanets since they are "much, much too far away ... [and would take] hundreds of millions of days using the means we have available today".[9] However, due to discoveries by Mayor, searching for extraterrestrial communications from exoplanets may now be a more practical consideration than thought earlier.[10]
In collaboration with Pierre-Yves Frei, Mayor wrote a book in French calledLes Nouveaux mondes du Cosmos (Seuil, 260 pages), which was awarded theLivre de l'astronomie 2001 prize by the 17th Astronomy Festival Haute Maurienne.[25]
Michel Mayor on Nobelprize.org including his Nobel lecture Sunday 8 December 2019 "Plurality of Worlds in the Cosmos: A Dream of Antiquity, A Modern Reality of Astrophysics"
.jpg)
.jpg)
