Linda May French is an American astronomer specializing in the physical properties of

asteroid An asteroid is a minor planet of the inner Solar System. Sizes and shapes of asteroids vary significantly, ranging from 1-meter rocks to a dwarf planet almost 1000 km in diameter; they are rocky, metallic or icy bodies with no atmosphere. ...

s and comets, including their shapes and surfaces. She is also interested in astronomy education and in the

history of astronomy Astronomy is the oldest of the natural sciences, dating back to antiquity, with its origins in the religious, mythological, cosmological, calendrical, and astrological beliefs and practices of prehistory: vestiges of these are still found in ...

, particularly focusing on the life of John Goodricke, an 18th-century deaf British amateur astronomer. She is a professor of physics at Illinois Wesleyan University.

Education and career

French is originally from Hagerstown, Indiana, and first made plans for becoming an astronomer at age five, after being given a children's book on astronomy. But as a student at Indiana University, she went through English and education majors before returning to astronomy after taking a junior-year general education course in the subject. She graduated from Indiana University in 1973, with an A.B. in astronomy and a minor in physics. She then went to Cornell University for graduate study in astronomy, where she worked as a teaching assistant for

Carl Sagan Carl Edward Sagan (; ; November 9, 1934December 20, 1996) was an American astronomer, planetary scientist, cosmologist, astrophysicist, astrobiologist, author, and science communicator. His best known scientific contribution is research on ext ...

, earned a master's degree in 1977, and completed her Ph.D. in 1980. After a one-year visiting assistant professorship at Bates College, she was a postdoctoral researcher and lecturer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology from 1982 to 1988, a researcher at the

Air Force Geophysics Laboratory The Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) is a scientific research organization operated by the United States Air Force Materiel Command dedicated to leading the discovery, development, and integration of aerospace warfighting technologies, p ...

Hanscom Air Force Base Hanscom Air Force Base (AFB) is a United States Air Force base located predominantly within Bedford, Massachusetts, with portions extending into the adjoining towns of Lincoln, Concord and Lexington. The facility is adjacent to Hanscom Field ...

in Massachusetts from 1988 to 1989, and a pre-secondary science teacher at The Park School in

Brookline, Massachusetts Brookline is a town in Norfolk County, Massachusetts, Norfolk County, Massachusetts, in the United States, and part of the Greater Boston, Boston metropolitan area. Brookline borders six of Boston's neighborhoods: Brighton, Boston, Brighton, A ...

from 1989 to 1992, before returning to academia as an associate professor of physics at Wheelock College in Boston in 1992. She moved to Illinois Wesleyan University in 2002, and was promoted to full professor in 2008. She was a program director at the National Science Foundation for a three-year term beginning circa 2017.

Recognition

Asteroid 3506 French was named after French in 1988. In 2016, Illinois Wesleyan University gave her their highest teaching award, the Kemp Foundation Award for Teaching Excellence. French was named a Legacy Fellow of the

American Astronomical Society The American Astronomical Society (AAS, sometimes spoken as "double-A-S") is an American society of professional astronomers and other interested individuals, headquartered in Washington, DC. The primary objective of the AAS is to promote the adv ...

in 2020.

References

External links

Home pageDr. Linda French: Don’t limit yourself
interview by Kelsi Singer, September 2015, ''Women in Planetary Science'' {{DEFAULTSORT:French, Linda Year of birth missing (living people) Living people American astronomers American women astronomers Indiana University alumni Cornell University alumni Wheelock College alumni Illinois Wesleyan University faculty Fellows of the American Astronomical Society