Geoff Marcy
Professor of Astronomy
PhD 1982 (University of California, Santa Cruz)
Campus address and phone:
417 Campbell Hall
(510) 642-1952
Email:
Website:
http://astro.berkeley.edu/~gmarcy/
Specialty areas:
Marcy's group has discovered the majority of known extrasolar planets,
with the goal of characterizing their properties and understanding
their origin.
Research projects:
Dr. Marcy's research has focused on the detection of extrasolar planets and brown dwarfs. As of September 2006, his team has discovered more than 120 of the nearly 200 currently known extrasolar planets, allowing study of their masses, radii, and orbits. His research team discovered the first multiple planet system, the first saturn-sized planet, and the most Earth-like planet yet found. His current research focuses on finding other Earth-like planets and solar systems similar to our own. Ongoing work is designed to study the mass distribution of planets and the eccentricity of their orbits. The 5-year goal is to find Jupiter analogs at 5 AU.
Biography:
Dr. Marcy is a Professor of Astronomy at UC Berkeley and an Adjunct Professor of Physics and Astronomy at San Francisco State University. He is the Director of Berkeley's "Center for Integrative Planetary Science'', a research unit designed to study the formation, geophysics, chemistry and evolution of planets. He is an elected member of the National Academy of Sciences and has been the recipient of numerous awards, including the NASA Medal for Exceptional Scientific Achievement. He was named Discovery Magazine's Space Scientist of the Year in 2003. He was also co-recipient of the prestigious Shaw Prize.