A life in the service of the Sun
Isabelle Bualé joined the Paris Observatory in 1985, as part of the team in charge of solar observations. These observations are part of a tradition in Meudon that is unique in the world, going back 117 years : daily and uninterrupted monitoring of the Sun since 1908.
She started with the first spectroheliograph designed by Lucien d’Azambuja, a wooden instrument operating with gears and silver photographic plates. In 1989, with the help of Mr Olivieri, she modernised the spectroheliograph by introducing optimised optics for each wavelength observed and replacing the gears with motors, while keeping the photographic plates. In September 2002, the year she took over as head of the solar observing team, the spectroheliograph became fully digital, providing monochromatic images of the solar photosphere and chromosphere of world-renowned quality. A new digital version was launched in 2017.
At the same time, it also operated the heliograph, an instrument used to track the Sun throughout the day and observe solar flares with high temporal resolution, until it was shut down in 2004.
Essential archiving work
In the age of photographic plates, working in the photo laboratory was an essential part of Isabelle Bualé’s job : she developed film plans and made paper prints for researchers around the world.
Today, she is responsible for the Paris Observatory’s precious collection of solar images, an archive that is unique in the world. For more than twenty years, she has been working on the complete digitisation of this exceptional collection, which covers eleven cycles of solar activity since observations began at Meudon. All this data is now accessible to everyone via the BASS2000 solar database.
This collection includes 90,000 plates and film plans, as well as thousands of digital images, heliograph films and various digital media.
A passion for popularising science
Isabelle Bualé is in charge of courses for secondary school students. Every year she accompanies more than fifty trainees and organises the schedules of almost one hundred young people at LIRA. Since 1995, she has made it a point of honour to offer them an enriching immersion experience, enabling them to meet researchers, engineers and technicians.
Her expertise has also led her to design materials for the Observatory’s exhibitions and to play an active role in popular science events for the general public and schoolchildren, such as open days and the Fête de la Science.
