French astrophysicist André Brahic, one of the discoverers of Neptune's rings, died in Paris Sunday at the age of 73, reports RFI.
An expert on the solar system, in 1984 he launched a programme which led to the discovery, with US astronomer William Hubbard, of the rings around the gaseous planet Neptune.
Brahic used the French national motto Liberté, Fraternité and Egalité to name three arcs belonging to Neptune's outermost ring.
A fourth ring was found by one of his colleagues later.
Born into a working-class family in Nazi-occupied Paris in 1942, Brahic was initiated into astrophysics after the war by Evry Schatzman, considered the father of the discipline in France.
In the 1980s Brahic became a specialist in exploring our solar system with the help of the Nasa Voyager and later US-Europe Cassini unmanned missions, which continue to this day.