He joined the ESA in 1980, where he headed the Hipparcos astrometric project as Project Scientist from 1981 till 1997. After the satellite failed to reach its target geostationary orbit, he also took over the mission management, the project eventually recovering all and more of its original scientific objectives.[1]
In 1993, together with Lennart Lindegren, he jointly proposed a more ambitious astrometric mission to take advantage of technological advances such as CCDs (unavailable for Hipparcos) and large lightweight mirrors.[2] In 1995, Perryman was named study scientist for the new mission concept, named Gaia. The mission was approved by ESA's Science Programme Committee in 2000 and Perryman appointed project scientist. He led the Gaia project till the Critical Design Review in 2008, establishing the payload concept, technical feasibility, operational and data analysis principles, its organisation structure, and coordinating its scientific case, leading to its successful launch in 2013.[3]
The main belt asteroid 10969 Perryman has been named in recognition of his contributions to astrometry.[6]
In 1999 Perryman was awarded the Academy Medal by the Royal Netherlands Academy of Arts and Sciences.[7] In 2011 he was awarded the Tycho Brahe Prize of the European Astronomical Society for his crucial role in the fostering of high precision, global stellar astrometry from space, in particular the development of the Hipparcos mission.[8] In 2022 he received the Shaw Prize in Astronomy jointly with Lennart Lindegren.[9]
