A history of astronomical optics in France

James Lequeux (1) , Yvon Georgelin (2)

1 LERMA - Laboratoire d'Etude du Rayonnement et de la Matière en Astrophysique et Atmosphères = Laboratory for Studies of Radiation and Matter in Astrophysics and Atmospheres
2 LAM - Laboratoire d'Astrophysique de Marseille

In this paper, we explore the advances made in France in astronomical optics. They were quite important in the seventeenth century thanks to Mersenne, Auzout and Picard. Progress in the eighteenth century was less remarkable and many instruments had to be imported from England, but in the following century the developments were again significant thanks in particular to Arago, Foucault, Fizeau, Loewy and the Henry brothers, working with very competent instrument builders. The French school of optics flourished at the end of the nineteenth century and during the twentieth century, thanks to Fabry, his collaborators and successors, as illustrated by Perot, Chrétien, Lyot, Danjon, Paul, Couder, Courtès, Connes, Labeyrie, Baranne and Lemaitre, among others. However, from time to time there was a trend to build instruments that were too original and with little or no future, at the expense of more conventional but better-adapted instruments.

Keywords: adaptive optics; Cassegrain telescope; coelostat; coronagraph; coudé equatorial; Danjon astrolabe; instruments for astrometry; interferometer; Lyot's polarizing filter; photometer; polarimeter; quadrant; Richey-Crétien telescope; siderostat; speckle interferometry; spectrometer; 2022JAHHvol25/2022JAHH...25...03L.pdf

Domains: Sciences of the Universe [physics]

James Lequeux, Yvon Georgelin. A history of astronomical optics in France. Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage (ISSN 1440-2807), 2022, 25, pp.3-53. ⟨insu-03667453⟩