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3 unusual facts about Tom Gehrels


Michèle Moons

Her name has been given to the main-belt asteroid 7805 Moons, discovered in 1960 by Cornelis Johannes van Houten, Ingrid van Houten-Groeneveld and Tom Gehrels at Palomar Observatory.

Tom Gehrels

Gehrels was requested by the Journal Nature to write a review on a book regarding Wernher von Braun, in which he quotes inmates of concentration camp Dora.

He was Principal Investigator for the Imaging Photopolarimeter experiment on the Pioneer 10 and Pioneer 11 first flybys of Jupiter and Saturn in the 1970s.


10252 Heidigraf

It was discovered on March 26 1971 by Dutch astronomers Cornelis Johannes van Houten and Ingrid van Houten-Groeneveld on Palomar Schmidt plates taken by Tom Gehrels.

Cornelis Johannes van Houten

In a jointly-credited trio with Tom Gehrels and Ingrid, and occasionally including fellow astronomer Bernhard Schmidt, he was an extremely prolific discoverer of many thousands of asteroids.


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