ASTRONOMER

Riccardo Giacconi

1931 - 2018

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Riccardo Giacconi ( jə-KOH-nee, Italian: [rikˈkardo dʒakˈkoːni]; October 6, 1931 – December 9, 2018) was an Italian-American Nobel Prize-winning astrophysicist who laid down the foundations of X-ray astronomy. He was a professor at the Johns Hopkins University. Read more on Wikipedia

His biography is available in different languages on Wikipedia. Riccardo Giacconi is the 30th most popular astronomer (up from 50th in 2019), the 525th most popular biography from Italy (up from 836th in 2019) and the 5th most popular Italian Astronomer.

Riccardo Giacconi is most famous for discovering the cosmic microwave background radiation, which is the oldest form of light in the universe.

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Among ASTRONOMERS

Among astronomers, Riccardo Giacconi ranks 30 out of 644. Before him are Abd al-Rahman al-Sufi, Jocelyn Bell Burnell, Charles Messier, Giuseppe Piazzi, Neil deGrasse Tyson, and Roger Joseph Boscovich. After him are Charles Greeley Abbot, Giovanni Schiaparelli, Heinrich Louis d'Arrest, Johann Palisa, Johann Gottfried Galle, and Sosigenes of Alexandria.

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Contemporaries

Among people born in 1931, Riccardo Giacconi ranks 15. Before him are Chun Doo-hwan, Isabel Martínez de Perón, Mário Zagallo, Robert Duvall, Irvin D. Yalom, and Raymond Kopa. After him are Philip Kotler, Leslie Caron, Roger Penrose, Anita Ekberg, Desmond Tutu, and Thomas Bernhard. Among people deceased in 2018, Riccardo Giacconi ranks 20. Before him are Joe Jackson, John Young, John Sulston, Peter Grünberg, Amos Oz, and Isao Takahata. After him are John McCain, Stephen Hillenburg, Jean-Louis Tauran, Philip Roth, France Gall, and Jens Christian Skou.

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In Italy

Among people born in Italy, Riccardo Giacconi ranks 525 out of 5,161. Before him are Zeuxis (-500), Octavia the Younger (-69), Pope Valentine (780), Gaius Maecenas (-68), Arturo Toscanini (1867), and Pope Miltiades (250). After him are John Cabot (1450), Joanna I of Naples (1326), Aurelia Cotta (-120), Alphonsus Liguori (1696), Roberto Rossellini (1906), and Giovanni Schiaparelli (1835).

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Among ASTRONOMERS In Italy

Among astronomers born in Italy, Riccardo Giacconi ranks 5. Before him are Galileo Galilei (1564), Giordano Bruno (1548), Giovanni Domenico Cassini (1625), and Giuseppe Piazzi (1746). After him are Giovanni Schiaparelli (1835), Paolo dal Pozzo Toscanelli (1397), Annibale de Gasparis (1819), Angelo Secchi (1818), Giovanni Battista Riccioli (1598), Girolamo Fracastoro (1476), and Luigi Ferdinando Marsili (1658).

Italian born Astronomers

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