Recognition
Awards, films and press
Medals, documentary appearances, press releases and published recollections of the work.
Awards
- 1994NASA Public Service MedalFor contributions to the optical correction of the Hubble Space Telescope and to the development of WFPC2.
- 1992NASA Public Service MedalFor understanding and characterizing the optical performance of the Hubble Space Telescope.
- 1991AURA annual award
Documentaries
- 2000
- 2015Hubble's Cosmic JourneyDocumentary, 45 min. Appears in “Telescope in Crisis” on diagnosing and correcting Hubble's optics, and in “Remarkable Images” on the first post-repair images.
- 1998Hubble: Secrets from SpaceTV film produced by Mark Brice. Credited as Self (Professor Chris Burrows).
Radio, television and print
- —The Diane Rehm Show (WAMU / NPR)Radio interview. Date to confirm.
- —CNBCTelevision interview. Date to confirm.
- —Hardball with Chris Matthews (CNBC)Television appearance. Date to confirm.
- —CNNTelevision interview. Date to confirm.
- —BBCTelevision/radio appearance. Date to confirm.
- 1998The Marc Steiner Show (WJHU Baltimore) × STScI web simulcastTwo-hour live radio and internet simulcast touring the universe, with Steven Squyres (Cornell), Mark Voit (STScI) and Jim O'Leary (Maryland Science Center).
- —The Sydney Morning HeraldFront-page cover. Date to confirm.
Press releases
- 1996Disk around star may be warped by unseen planetNASA/STScI and ESA release on the Beta Pictoris warp, presented at the AAS meeting. Image credit: Chris Burrows (STScI/ESA), J. Krist, WFPC2 IDT, NASA.
- 1994
- 2000HH 30 time-lapse: a young star's dynamic disk and jetsHubble release of the HH 30 movie. Credit: A. Watson, K. Stapelfeldt, J. Krist, C. Burrows.
- 1990STScI Newsletter: Update on HST's imaging performanceInitial assessment of the spherical aberration's effect on the instruments, sent to observers.
Invited talks
- —Cornell UniversityInvited talk. Date and title to confirm.
- —Princeton UniversityInvited talk. Date and title to confirm.
- —Johns Hopkins Applied Physics LaboratoryInvited talk. Date and title to confirm.
Conferences
- 2005AAS Division for Planetary SciencesEclipse concept and technology-readiness results (co-author).
- 2003AAS Division for Planetary Sciences #35Eclipse mission concept (co-author).
- 1998
- 1997IAU SymposiumHST imaging of the disks and jets of Taurus young stellar objects (with Stapelfeldt and Krist).
- 1996IAU Colloquium 163, Accretion Phenomena and Related OutflowsWFPC2 studies of the disk and jet of HH 30.
- 1996AAS 187, San AntonioPresented the Hubble discovery of the warp in the β Pictoris disk (17 Jan 1996).
- 1991SPIE 1494, Space Astronomical Telescopes and Instruments, OrlandoHubble Space Telescope optics: problems and solutions.
- 1989Next Generation Space Telescope workshop, STScILocal organising committee; co-editor of the proceedings; paper on requirements for diffraction-limited optics.
- 1988OSA Space Optics for Astrophysics and Earth and Planetary Remote SensingAn entry-level interferometer for space (with Bely, Roddier and Weigelt).
Identified from proceedings and abstracts. Further SPIE meetings in 1989–2006 and AAS meetings in 1994–2003 appear on the Publications page.
In the histories
- 1990Space Telescope History Project: interview with Robert W. SmithOral history recorded with historian Robert Smith, transcribed and edited by Chris into a summary of about 40 pages; filed with the Smithsonian’s Space Telescope History Project records and drawn on in Smith’s The Space Telescope (Cambridge University Press, 1989; updated paperback 1993). Not listed in the online finding aid; copy being traced.
- 1994Eric J. Chaisson, The Hubble WarsChaisson’s account of Hubble’s launch, the aberration and the recovery (HarperCollins, 1994); it covers the diagnosis period at STScI.
- 2017HST Operational History Project: Christopher BurrowsOral history interview by Chris Gainor, Edmonds, 15 February 2017. Provisional transcript; drawn on in Gainor's NASA history Not Yet Imagined (2020).
- 2015Spherical Aberration: From Disaster to GloryPanel with Holland Ford at the Hubble 25th Anniversary, Johns Hopkins University, 23 April 2015.
- 2015NASA Hubble Oral History: Ray VillardSTScI's news director recalls that Chris recognised spherical aberration in the first released image of May 1990, and warned him the day before NASA announced the flaw.
- 1991A Strategy for Recovery: Report of the HST Strategy PanelPanel member on the Aug–Oct 1990 study (eds. R. A. Brown and H. C. Ford) that recommended the recovery path, including COSTAR.
- 2016NASA Hubble Space Telescope Oral History: Robert A. BrownBrown recalls that Chris was the first to know the problem was spherical aberration, and credits his diagnosis as the basis for the confidence in COSTAR.