Gaia People

Stefan Jordan

ARI, Zentrum für Astronomie der Universität Heidelberg

Stefan Jordan has worked on the late stages of stellar evolution, particularly on white dwarfs and their magnetic fields, throughout most of his scientific career. He became involved in astrometry through the former German satellite project DIVA before he joined the Gaia group at ARI. Stefan works for the First Look of the Gaia mission which includes a one-day astrometric solution allowing to verify the satellite functioning on the microarcsecond level. This solution will provide a first calibration of the instruments, as well as good initial values for the full data analysis. Scientifically, his interest in Gaia covers several topics: parallaxes of white dwarfs, a check of the precision of model atmospheres with astrometric data, and gravitational microlensing events. He is also currently involved in a study to see how efficiently Gaia can detect variable white dwarfs.

Stefan is involved with the European Leadership in Space Astrometry (ELSA) programme as the Scientist in Charge for Astronomisches Rechen-Institut ARI/ZAH.

Stefan's homepage is here.

[Published: 28/03/2005 | Updated: 19/02/2007]