Vassilis Charmandaris - Biography#

Vassilis Charmandaris is Professor of Observational Astrophysics at the Dept. of Physics of the Univ. of Crete (since 2005) and Chairman of the Board of Directors of Foundation for Research and Technology – Hellas (FORTH) (since 2025) in Greece. He obtained his BSc from the Univ. of Thessaloniki and his PhD from Iowa State University (USA) in 1995. He was postdoctoral fellow at CEA/Saclay (France), a Marie Curie fellow at the Observatoire de Paris (France), and a research associate at the Astronomy Department of Cornell University (USA), where he worked on the development of the Infrared Spectrograph of the Spitzer Space Telescope.

He has served in leadership positions in Greece, as the Director of IAASARS at the National Observatory of Athens (2013-2018), founding Director of the Institute of Astrophysics, FORTH (2019-2025), Director of Skinakas Observatory (2019-2025) and President of the Hellenic Astronomical Society (2020-2024).

Professor Charmandaris is an internationally recognized expert in the field of galaxy evolution, and in particular in developing observational techniques, empirical diagnostics and spectral energy distribution modeling methods to characterize the power source of the nuclear regions of galaxies. Over the past 30 years as member of international teams or with his group at the University of Crete and FORTH he has been addressing questions related to gas accretion and outflows in galaxies using mostly space infrared observatories (ISO, Spitzer, Herschel and JWST), as well as data from mm/sub-mm ground-based facilities (IRAM, ALMA).

The impact of his scientific work can be quantified by various bibliographic indices (over 260 refereed papers, over 28,000 citations, h-index=80, according to Google Scholar), securing competitive funding and being awarded precious observing time in space facilities, as well as from invitations to give talks at academic institutions or conferences. A complete publication list is available at: https://www.physics.uoc.gr/~vassilis/publications.html

Moreover, his scientific maturity is recognized among his peers in Europe, since he has been invited or elected as an expert in various top-level science and scientific policy committees. These include the Astronomy Working Group (AWG) and the Space Science Advisory Committee (SSAC) of ESA, the Scientific Council of INSU/CNRS and the Advisory committees of Observatoire de Paris and IRFU/CEA in France. He is the national representative to the Board of Directors of the Journal Astronomy & Astrophysics and served as Vice-Chair during 2021-2024. Prof. Charmandaris has been awarded the title of “Chevalier dans l’Ordre des Palmes Académiques”, by the French Republic in 2024, the Public Service Award of the University of Crete in 2023, and the 2026 Lodewijk Woltjer Lecture by the European Astronomical Society. He has been expert evaluator of numerous EC panels including ERC grants in the area of Universe Sciences (PE9).