Zdeněk Kopal (; 4 April 1914 – 23 June 1993) was a Czechoslovak

astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. Astronomers observe astronomical objects, such as stars, planets, natural satellite, moons, comets and galaxy, galax ...

who mainly worked in England. Kopal was born and grew up in

Litomyšl Litomyšl (; ) is a town in Svitavy District in the Pardubice Region of the Czech Republic. It has about 10,000 inhabitants. It is a former bishopric and Latin Catholic titular see. Litomyšl is known for the château-type castle complex of the Lit ...

(

Czechoslovakia Czechoslovakia ( ; Czech language, Czech and , ''Česko-Slovensko'') was a landlocked country in Central Europe, created in 1918, when it declared its independence from Austria-Hungary. In 1938, after the Munich Agreement, the Sudetenland beca ...

, now

Czech Republic The Czech Republic, also known as Czechia, and historically known as Bohemia, is a landlocked country in Central Europe. The country is bordered by Austria to the south, Germany to the west, Poland to the northeast, and Slovakia to the south ...

). In his early astronomical career, he studied

variable star A variable star is a star whose brightness as seen from Earth (its apparent magnitude) changes systematically with time. This variation may be caused by a change in emitted light or by something partly blocking the light, so variable stars are ...

s and in particular close

eclipsing binary A binary star or binary star system is a Star system, system of two stars that are gravity, gravitationally bound to and in orbit around each other. Binary stars in the night sky that are seen as a single object to the naked eye are often resolved ...

stars. He attended

Cambridge University The University of Cambridge is a Public university, public collegiate university, collegiate research university in Cambridge, England. Founded in 1209, the University of Cambridge is the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, wo ...

in 1938 and later that year he went to

Harvard College Observatory The Harvard College Observatory (HCO) is an institution managing a complex of buildings and multiple instruments used for astronomical research by the Harvard University Department of Astronomy. It is located in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United St ...

. After the war he became head of the astronomy department at the

University of Manchester The University of Manchester is a public university, public research university in Manchester, England. The main campus is south of Manchester city centre, Manchester City Centre on Wilmslow Road, Oxford Road. The University of Manchester is c ...

. He later assisted

NASA The National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA ) is an independent agencies of the United States government, independent agency of the federal government of the United States, US federal government responsible for the United States ...

with the

Apollo program The Apollo program, also known as Project Apollo, was the United States human spaceflight program led by NASA, which Moon landing, landed the first humans on the Moon in 1969. Apollo followed Project Mercury that put the first Americans in sp ...

as an external expert. He was editor-in-chief of the journal ''

Astrophysics and Space Science ''Astrophysics and Space Science'' is a bimonthly peer-reviewed scientific journal covering astronomy, astrophysics, and space science and astrophysical aspects of astrobiology. It was established in 1968 and is published by Springer Science+Busin ...

'' since its foundation in 1968 until his death in 1993. The

asteroid An asteroid is a minor planet—an object larger than a meteoroid that is neither a planet nor an identified comet—that orbits within the Solar System#Inner Solar System, inner Solar System or is co-orbital with Jupiter (Trojan asteroids). As ...

2628 Kopal was named in his honor.

Monographs

* Zdeněk Kopal: ''An introduction to the study of eclipsing variables.'' Harvard University Press, Cambridge (MA) 1946. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''Close binary systems.'' Chapman & Hall, London 1959. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''The moon. Our nearest celestial neighbour.'' Chapman & Hall, London 1960. * Zdeněk Kopal, Josef Klepešta, Thomas W. Rackham: ''Photographic atlas of the moon.'' Academic Press, New York 1965. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''Telescopes in space.'' Hart Publishers Co., New York 1970. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''A new photographic atlas of the moon.'' Hale, London 1971. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''Physics and astronomy of the moon.'' Academic Press, New York 1971. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''Man and his universe.'' William Morrow, New York 1972. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''Zpráva o vesmíru.'' Mladá fronta, Praha 1976. * Zdeněk Kopal
''Dynamics of close binary systems.''
Reidel, Dordrecht 1978. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''Language of stars – a discourse on the theory of the light changes eclipsing variables.'' Reidel, Dordrecht 1979. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''The realm of the terrestrial planets.'' John Wiley, New York 1979. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''Of stars and men: Reminiscences of an astronomer.'' Adam Hilger, Bristol 1986
2012 pbk reprint
* Zdeněk Kopal: ''Vesmírní sousedé naší planety.'' Academia, Praha 1987. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''The Roche problem. The Roche problem and its significance for double-star astronomy.'' Kluwer, Dordrecht 1989. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''Mathematical theory of stellar eclipses.'' Kluwer, Dordrecht 1990. * Zdeněk Kopal: ''O hvězdách a lidech.'' Mladá fronta, Praha 1991.

References

External links

Zdeněk Kopal on the website of the town Litomyšl

Zdeněk Kopal Papers
at the

University of Manchester Library The University of Manchester Library is the library system and information service of the University of Manchester. The main library is on the Oxford Road campus of the university, with its entrance on Burlington Street. There are also ten other ...

. {{DEFAULTSORT:Kopal, Zdenek 1914 births 1993 deaths Czechoslovak astronomers Czechoslovak expatriates in the United Kingdom Harvard College Observatory people