Tom Marsh (astronomer)

Thomas Richard Marsh (1961–2022) was a British astronomer and astrophysicist. His research topics included the accretion and evolution of binary star systems.^[1] He was awarded the Herschel Medal in 2018 for his development of doppler tomography which he used to study compact binary stars.^[2][3]

Tom Marsh
Marsh in 2010
Born	Thomas Richard Marsh 1961 (1961) Old Windsor, England, UK
Died	2022 (aged 60–61) Atacama Desert, Chile
Alma mater	St Paul's School, London Queens' College, Cambridge
Employers	Royal Observatory, Greenwich Space Telescope Science Institute University of Oxford University of Southampton University of Warwick

International and public engagement

Marsh worked to bring astronomy to less affluent countries and maintained a strong link with Thailand. This enabled astronomers there to use his high-speed cameras and be part of these international endeavours. He also worked with amateur astronomers, and one of his high-profile papers resulted from an initial observation by an amateur astronomer that he followed up.^[4]

He went missing on 16 September 2022 while hiking during an observing visit to La Silla Observatory in Chile, and his body was found in the Atacama Desert on 10 November 2022.^[5][6]

See also

• List of solved missing person cases