Jean-Louis Steinberg

Jean-Louis Steinberg (1922–2016) was one of the main pioneers of radio astronomy in France. In 1953 he was a co-founder of the project to create the Station de Radioastronomie de Nançay (which opened in 1956).

Biography Jean-Louis Steinberg had a 3 years older brother, a 13 years younger brother, and a sister who died shortly after birth. In World War I, their father was wounded at the Battle of Verdun and awarded the Croix de Guerre. Until he was 14 years old, J.-L. Steinberg attended the École alsacienne. In 1937 he began studying at the Lycée Saint-Louis. After passing a qualifying examination, he enrolled at Sorbonne University. There in 1941 he joined the French Communist Party and the Resistance. In 1943 his younger brother was taken in as a lodger by a farming family in Normandy. In 1944 J.-L. Steinberg graduated with a doctorate in engineering from the ENS Paris college of Sorbonne University. In June 1944, he, his parents, and his older brother were all rounded up because of their Jewish ethnicity. On July 4th, the family arrived in Auschwitz-Birkenau. Of the 4 family members, J.-L. Steinberg was the only survivor seven months later. J.-L. Steinberg's younger brother was never deported to a concentration camp and also survived. J.-L. Steinberg married Madeleine White in 1946. They adopted his younger brother and had a son, Alain, in 1948. which was officially inaugurated in May 1965 by Charles de Gaulle J.-L. Steinberg, Jean-François Denisse, Jean-Claude Pecker, Jan Oort, Anders Reiz, and Stuart Pottasch played important roles in the founding of the journal. Steinberg was a co-editor-in-chief from 1969 to 1973, when he resigned in favor of Jean Heidmann (1923–2000).

Jean-Louis Steinberg wrote a 12-page, English-language autobiography, published in 2001, and coauthored several papers on French radio astronomy published in the Journal of Astronomical History and Heritage from 2007 to 2011. In November 2017 a workshop was held as a memorial to him, and, on the Paris Observatory's Meudon campus, a building was named after him. The asteroid 13499 Steinberg is named in his honour.

Selected publications Articles

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