The International Astronomical Union (IAU) has just awarded nine prizes for the best thesis achievements in 9 fields of astronomy. Etienne Savalle, who prepared his thesis under the supervision of Peter Wolf in the Theory and metrology group of SYRTE, was rewarded in the category Fundamental Astronomy.

This is the occasion to come back on a particularly successful thesis.

For many years physicists search for a theory to unify the standard model (a theory of matter) and general relativity, a metric theory. Many efforts are being made to unify these two theories which are considered as incompatible. An example of the inconsistency between these two theories is dark matter: necessary mass to describe astronomical observations in general relativity, dark matter cannot be explained within the Standard Model, a theory of matter.

Etienne Savalle took part during his thesis to two projects participating to the same effort in the search of unifying the standard model and general relativity: test of the equivalence principle with the mission ACES-PHARAO and the search of the oscillation of the fundamental constants with the experiment DAMNED.

To read or read again his thesis : Archive available on HAL
To read the paper on ACES
To read the paper on dark matter

Credits: Léon Vidal, Etienne Savalle, APC (UP, CNRS, OP/PSL, CEA, CNES) et SYRTE (OP/PSL, CNRS, SU, LNE)