Eclipsed Suns, the Solar Corona and Exoplanets

Pierre Léna, born in 1937, is an astrophysicist at the Observatoire de Paris (Paris Sciences Lettres) and a member of the Académie des sciences since 1991. Professor emeritus at the Université Paris Cité, he has trained many young people in their discovery of astronomy and their entry into research. His scientific career is rounded off by his work with La main à la pâte, of which he is one of the three co-founders, to promote the discovery of science in elementary school in France and around the world, and by his numerous publications aimed at the general public. In particular, he contributed to the installation of adaptive optics and interferometry on the European Very Large Telescope, which has been in Chile since 1998, and to the major results this made possible.

Serge Koutchmy (1940-2023), born in Le Creusot (Saône-et-Loire), is an astrophysicist and research director at the Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique in Paris. After studying at Moscow's Lomonossov University and obtaining a PhD from Paris University in 1972, he joined the Institut d'astrophysique (CNRS and Sorbonne University). A world specialist in the physics of the solar corona and its observation methods from the largest terrestrial observatories, as well as from space (CNES medal, 1983), he has collaborated with the USA, Japan and Russia, organized numerous expeditions to observe total solar eclipses and always supported amateur astronomers within the Société Astronomique de France, from which he received the prestigious Janssen medal in 1998.

PART I The longest total eclipse ever observed.- Opening.- Chapter 1. Of eclipses and men.- Chapter 2. Concorde, a dream that takes flight.- Chapter 3. This dark light that falls from the stars.- Chapter 4. Towards the longest total eclipse in history.- Chapter 5. No need to be alarmed, it’s simply an eclipse.- Chapter 6. What harvest of science after these 74 minutes?.- Epilogue to Part I.- PART II Solar corona, total eclipses and exoplanets.- Chapter 7 The solar corona (K and F).- Chapter 8 Debris disks, exoEarths and coronagraphy.- Conclusion.- Appendix 1 How total eclipses occur.- Appendix 2 The Concorde plane.