Gustave-Adolphe Hirn (21 August 1815 – 14 January 1890) was a French physicist, astronomer, mathematician, and engineer who made important measurements of the mechanical equivalent of heat and contributions to the early development of thermodynamics. He further applied his science in the practical development of steam engines.
Charles Joseph Étienne Wolf (9 November 1827 in Vorges – 4 July 1918) was a French astronomer.
In 1862, Urbain Le Verrier offered him a post as assistant at the Paris Observatory.
In 1867 he and Georges Rayet discovered Wolf–Rayet stars.
He was elected to the positions of Vice-President (1897) and President (1898) of the French Academy of Sciences.
Félix Savary, who was born on 4 October 1797 in Paris and died on 15 July 1841 in Estagel, was a French astronomer.He studied at the École Polytechnique, where he was later a professor of astronomy. He was a librarian at the Bureau des Longitudes between 1823 and 1829, and was elected to the French Academy of Sciences on 24 December 1832.In his works Mémoire sur les orbites des étoiles doubles and Sur la détermination des orbites que décrivent autour de leur centre de gravité deux étoiles très rapprochées l'une de l'autre, published in 1827, he was the first to use observations of a visual binary star to calculate the orbit of one star about the other. He applied his method to the star ξ Ursae Majoris.He worked with Ampère, publishing in 1823 the work Mémoire sur l'application du calcul aux phénomènes électro-dynamiques.
Frédéric Petit (Muret, 1810 – Toulouse, 1865) was a French astronomer. He was the first director of the Toulouse Observatory, located in Toulouse, France, serving from 1838 to 1865. In 1846 he announced that he had discovered a second moon of Earth. The theory was later dismissed by his peers, although the concept of a second smaller satellite of the Earth was used by Jules Verne in his novel From the Earth to the Moon.
Henri Joseph Anastase Perrotin (December 19, 1845 – February 29, 1904) was a French astronomer and a discoverer of minor planets. Some sources give his middle name as Athanase.
In his early career, he and Guillaume Bigourdan were assistants of Félix Tisserand at Toulouse Observatory. Later, he was the first director of the Nice Observatory in Nice, France from 1884 until his death. He made observations of Mars and attempted to determine the rotation period of Venus. He also calculated perturbations in the orbit of 4 Vesta.In the literature, he is sometimes referred to as Henri Perrotin and sometimes as Joseph Perrotin (this is indeed one and the same person). He is also referenced in H.G Well's novel "The War of The Worlds" as "Perrotin of Nice". His 6 asteroid discoveries are credited by the Minor Planet Center to "J. Perrotin".He won the Prix Lalande in 1875 and 1883. The Martian crater Perrotin and the inner main-belt asteroid 1515 Perrotin were named in his honor.
Félix-Victor Mauvais (or Victor Mauvais; March 7, 1809 – March 22, 1854) was a French politician and astronomer. He was born in the small village of Maîche in the department of Doubs and died in Paris.
In 1836 he went to the Observatoire de Paris as a student astronomer. He worked at the Bureau des Longitudes from 1843 to 1854, working on meteorology. He was elected to the Académie des Sciences in 1843. He won the Lalande Prize in 1843 for the discovery of comet C/1843 J1. He also discovered comets C/1844 N1 and C/1847 N1.
In politics, he served as a leftist member of the National Assembly from 1848 to 1849.
On March 2, 1854, the Observatory and the Bureau des Longitudes were separated, which obliged Mauvais to leave this institution. Very affected by this, he fell ill and committed suicide a few weeks later.
Paul-Auguste-Ernest Laugier (22 December 1812, in Paris – 5 April 1872) was a French astronomer, one of two French astronomers referred to as M. Laugier.
Maurice Théodore Adolphe Hamy (31 October 1861, Boulogne-sur-Mer – 9 April 1936, Paris) was a French astronomer.
He obtained in 1887 a doctorate from the Faculté des sciences de Paris with dissertation Étude sur la figure des corps célestes. In the 1890s he applied his method of interference fringes to an analysis of errors made in astronomical observations using meridian circles. He used his interference method to confirm Barnard's measurement of the apparent diameter of Venus. Hamy participated in the creation of l'Institut d'optique théorique et appliquée (SupOptique).
He won the prix Lalande in 1895. Filling the empty chair created by the death of Jules Janssen, Hamy was elected in 1908 a member of l'Académie des sciences and then in 1928 its president. He was also elected a member of the Bureau des longitudes.
He is a nephew of Ernest Hamy.
François Gonnessiat (May 22, 1856 (Nurieux-Volognat)–October 18, 1934) was a French astronomer, observer of comets and discoverer of two minor planets.He worked at the Observatory of Lyon. In 1889 he won the Lalande Prize for astronomy from the French Academy of Sciences; 1901 became director of the Quito (Ecuador) Observatory for the purpose of making geodetic measurements. He became a well known and respected member of the academic scene of the city, where a street is named after him. From 1908 to 1931, he was director of the Algiers Observatory where one of his colleagues was Benjamin Jekhovsky. He was also director of the Quito Astronomical Observatory.The asteroid 1177 Gonnessia was named in his memory (H 109).
Jean-Félix Adolphe Gambart (12 May 1800 – 23 July 1836) was a French astronomer.He was born in Sète in Hérault department, the son of a sea captain. His intelligence was noticed at a young age by Alexis Bouvard, who persuaded him to join the astronomy profession. In 1819 he joined the Marseilles Observatory and became the director in 1822.
During his career he recorded a number of observations of the satellites of Jupiter, and discovered a total of 13 comets. In 1832 he observed the transit of Mercury across the Sun, noting that the planet appeared deformed as it approached the edge.
He suffered from tuberculosis, and in 1836 died from cholera in Paris, aged 36.
The crater Gambart on the moon is named after him. He was also awarded the medal of the London Astronomy Society for his calculation of a cometary orbit.