The Institute of Astrophysics of the National Academy of Sciences of Tajikistan has reported the death of astronomer Svitlana Herasymenko. She is known for the discovery of comet 67P together with Klym Churiumov. It was explored by the Rosetta spacecraft in 2014-2016.
Famous Ukrainian scientist died
On April 8, 2025, the Institute of Astrophysics of the National Academy of Sciences of Tajikistan reported the death of the outstanding astronomer Svitlana Ivanivna Herasymenko at the 80th year of life. She became world-famous for the comet she discovered with Klym Churiumov, a scientist from Kyiv.
Svitlana Herasymenko was born in Baryshevka near Kyiv into a family of Ukrainian teachers. She graduated from Kyiv National University and entered graduate school in astronomy. Since in the late 1960s Ukrainian astronomers did not have a sensitive enough instrument at their disposal, in 1969 they traveled with Klym Churiumov to the Alma-Ata Observatory in Kazakhstan.
Scientists were interested in the short-period comet 32P/Comas Sola. However, later, when the astronomers had already returned to Kyiv, a very different “tail star” was discovered on one of the plates. It was named 67P/Churiumov–Herasymenko.
Svitlana Herasymenko’s stardom
At first, 67P/Churiumov–Herasymenk didn’t get much attention from astronomers. It was just another short-period comet, many of which were known. Svitlana Herasymenko became a candidate of technical sciences. In 1973, she received an invitation to work at the Academy of Sciences of Tajikistan and accepted it. She worked there for the rest of her life.
Klym Chuiumov and Svitlana Herasymenko’s stardom came in 2003. Then it became known that the Rosetta spacecraft would not fly to the comet Wirtanen, and its new target would become 67P/Churiumov–Herasymenko.
In 2004, Churiumov and Herasymenko were guests of honor at the Rosetta launch from the Kourou Cosmodrome in French Guiana. In 2014-2016, this spacecraft carried out many studies of the comet they discovered, thanks to which we now know a lot not only about it, but also about the “dirty icebergs of space” in general.
In addition to the comet, an asteroid, which was discovered by Ukrainian astronomer Mykola Chernykh in 1982, was named after Svitlana Herasymenko. In 2017, the scientist received the State Prize of the Republic of Tajikistan in the field of science for her discoveries.
According to www.facebook.com
