Fabrizio Bernardi (born 1972) is an Italian

astronomer An astronomer is a scientist in the field of astronomy who focuses their studies on a specific question or field outside the scope of Earth. They observe astronomical objects such as stars, planets, moons, comets and galaxies – in either ...

and

discoverer of minor planets This is a list of minor-planet discoverers credited by the Minor Planet Center with the discovery of one or several minor planets (such as near-Earth and main-belt asteroids, Jupiter trojans and distant objects). , the discovery of 612,011 nu ...

and

comet A comet is an icy, small Solar System body that, when passing close to the Sun, warms and begins to release gases, a process that is called outgassing. This produces a visible atmosphere or coma, and sometimes also a tail. These phenomena ...

s, best known for the co-discovery of the near-Earth and potentially hazardous asteroid

99942 Apophis 99942 Apophis is a near-Earth asteroid and potentially hazardous asteroid with a diameter of that caused a brief period of concern in December 2004 when initial observations indicated a probability up to 2.7% that it would hit Earth on April&nb ...

. He is a member of the

IAU The International Astronomical Union (IAU; french: link=yes, Union astronomique internationale, UAI) is a nongovernmental organisation with the objective of advancing astronomy in all aspects, including promoting astronomical research, outreach ...

, and credited by the Minor Planet Center with the discovery of 7 numbered minor planets during 2002–2005, including , another near-Earth object a member of the Amor group of asteroids, and , a

trans-Neptunian object A trans-Neptunian object (TNO), also written transneptunian object, is any minor planet in the Solar System that orbits the Sun at a greater average distance than Neptune, which has a semi-major axis of 30.1 astronomical units (au). Typically ...

. In 2002, he discovered the outer

main-belt The asteroid belt is a torus-shaped region in the Solar System, located roughly between the orbits of the planets Jupiter and Mars. It contains a great many solid, irregularly shaped bodies, of many sizes, but much smaller than planets, called ...

asteroid 65001 Teodorescu at Campo Imperatore station, Gran Sasso, Italy, and named it after his wife, the Romanian astronomer Ana Teodorescu. He was involved together with colleagues

Marco Micheli Marco Micheli (born 1983) is an Italian astronomer and a discoverer of minor planets. He is a researcher at the Centre for Earth Observation of ESAs Space Situational Awareness Programme in Italy. Career Micheli was born in Brescia, Italy, ...

and David Tholen, with observations of the Mars-crosser asteroid

2007 WD5 is an Apollo asteroid some in diameter and a Mars-crosser asteroid first observed on 20 November 2007, by Andrea Boattini of the Catalina Sky Survey. Early observations of caused excitement amongst the scientific community when it was estima ...

during his stay at the

University of Hawaii A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, th ...

observatory. While at the

Mauna Kea Observatories The Mauna Kea Observatories (MKO) are a group of independent astronomical research facilities and large telescope observatories that are located at the summit of Mauna Kea on the Big Island of Hawaiʻi, United States. The facilities are located ...

in Hawaii, he discovered 268P/Bernardi, a Jupiter family comet. The main-belt asteroid 27983 Bernardi, discovered by astronomers Andrea Boattini and Maura Tombelli at Cima Ekar, was named in his honor on 9 November 2003 ().

Publications

ACM2002 ''Proceedings'' – Berlin: The Campo Imperatore Near Earth Objects Survey (CINEOS): Andrea Boattini, Germano D’Abramo, Giovanni B. Valsecchi, Andrea Carusi, Andrea Di Paola, Fabrizio Bernardi, Robert Jedicke, Alan W. Harris, Elisabetta Dotto and Fiore De Luise, et al. In press. Discovery of the heavily obscured Supernova SN2002CV. ''Astronomy and Astrophysics, v.393, p.L21-L24'' ESO 2002
retrieved 13:18 11.10.11homepage
retrieved 13:03 11.10.11 ''Proceedings of the Planetologia Italiana Workshop'' – Bormio, Italy, 20–26 January 2001: CINEOS – Campo Imperatore Near Earth Objects Survey Expected background of asteroids and stars for the Wide Angle Camera of the Rosetta Mission Asteroid background for the Wide Angle Camera of the Rosetta Mission, Poster, Division for Planetary Sciences 2001, New Orleans, USA ESTEC Internal report, September 2000: ''Image simulation of the inner coma environment for the Wide Angle Camera of the OSIRIS experiment''

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Bernardi, Fabrizio 1972 births Discoverers of minor planets Discoverers of trans-Neptunian objects * 21st-century Italian astronomers Living people

Publications

See also

References