It is with a heavy heart and great sadness that NARIT says farewell to our much respected and beloved colleague, Prof. Thomas Marsh.

Prof TomNarit


Prof. Tom Marsh was the founding member of the Astronomy group at the University of Warwick, UK, and also one of the mainfigurea behind the state-of-the-art science instruments, ULTRACAM, ULTRASPEC, and HiPERCAM.
It was thanks to his effort, together with the team from Sheffield and UKATC, that NARIT was able to host the ULTRASPEC camera as visitor instrument at the Thai National Telescope in 2013, a collaboration which has continued until now with the instrument being profitably used by UK, Thai and international scientist.
We remember his first visit to the Thai telescope on Doi Inthanon and how he enjoyed his time and his walks at the National Park. After one of his walks with Prof. Vik Dhillon, he excitedly observed how the touch-me-not plant (ไมยราบ; Mimosa Pudica) will close its leaves when it is touched. Being a scientist at heart, Tom waited patiently and counted the time until the leaves re-opened.
During his many visits to Chiang Mai and Doi Inthanon, Prof. Tom Marsh also spent time to train NARIT staff and students about using ULTRASPEC, and to teach his field of expertise, namely white dwarfs and other evolved stars in binary systems. We are forever grateful to Prof. Tom Marsh for his contribution in advancing astronomical research in Thailand.