In place of cancelation: A space-based laser-frequency comb for absolute cross-calibration of EPRV spectrographs

Francesco Pepe is a professor at the University of Geneva and the current director of its Astronomy Department. He studied physics at the Swiss Federal Institute of Technology in Zurich and specialised in the construction of instrumentation for astronomy during his doctorate at the same institution. It was through a scientific collaboration with the Geneva Observatory (Astronomy Department of the University of Geneva) that Francesco Pepe arrived in Geneva in 1998, where he was immediately “enrolled" by Michel Mayor to lead the construction of a new generation high precision spectrograph (HARPS) for the search for exoplanets with masses similar to our Earth. Since then, he has actively contributed to subsequent discoveries and the development of new instruments (HARPS-x, PRIMA, ESPRESSO) and techniques that are used nowadays not only for detection but also for the study of the composition and the atmosphere of extra-solar planets.