guiding lights & mentors

Riccardo Giovanelli
(b) 1946, (d) 2022

Former Professor Emeritus of Astronomy at Cornell University. Founding father
of what we now call the CCAT Project/CCAT Observatory. Began working on this
concept in the 1990s. Later led the project as its Director. Coined the term
“Let’s Build This Sucker.” A link to his obituary is here.

Richard Hills
(b) 1945, (d) 2022

Former Professor Emeritus of Radio Astronomy at the University of Cambridge.
He refined the telescope’s mirror curvature formula and led a team that solved
the highly complex problems associated with near field holography. This work,
which is still being carried on by others, was vital to the Fred Young Telescope’s
very precise mirror alignment because both the M1 and M2 mirrors are so large
and flat that alignment to less than 10.7 um RMS (at 300 um) would have been
almost impossible without his direct contributions. A link to his obituary here.