Latest ASTRON Stories
The second of three images of ESO's GigaGalaxy Zoom project has just been released online. It is a new and wonderful 340-million-pixel vista of the central parts of our home galaxy as seen from ESO's Paranal Observatory with an amateur telescope. This 34 by 20-degree wide image provides us with a view as experienced by amateur astronomers around the world. However, its incredible beauty and appeal owe much to the quality of the observing site and the skills of Stéphane Guisard, the...
PERTH, Australia, Sept. 17 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- IBM (NYSE: IBM) today announced it will partner with Western Australia's International Centre for Radio Astronomy Research (ICRAR) on the technology needed to manage the vast amounts of data produced by the Square Kilometre Array (SKA) telescope project. When constructed, the SKA telescope will be one of the world's largest scientific instruments. (Logo: http://www.newscom.com/cgi-bin/prnh/20090416/IBMLOGO ) This extremely powerful...
Thanks to a unique "ballistic study" that combines data from ESO's Very Large Telescope and NASA's Chandra X-ray Observatory, astronomers have now solved a long-standing mystery of the Milky Way's particle accelerators. They show in a paper published today on Science Express that cosmic rays from our galaxy are very efficiently accelerated in the remnants of exploded stars.During the Apollo flights astronauts reported seeing odd flashes of light, visible even with their eyes closed. We have...
The next generation of instruments for ground-based telescopes took a leap forward with the development of a new ultra-fast camera that can take 1500 finely exposed images per second even when observing extremely faint objects. The first 240x240 pixel images with the world's fastest high precision faint light camera were obtained through a collaborative effort between ESO and three French laboratories from the French Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique/Institut National des Sciences...
Europe's billion dollar Herschel space observatory has accomplished a huge milestone by opening the hatch that has been sheltering its susceptible instruments from contamination.This allowed the light gathered by Herschel's massive mirror to flood the chilled instrument chamber, or cryostat, for the very first time.The observatory's goal is to learn how stars and galaxies are created, and how they develop. The command to release two pyrotechnic bolts attached to the hatch was the biggest...
ESO's Very Large Telescope "” Europe's flagship facility for ground-based astronomy "” has been equipped with the first of its second generation instruments: X-shooter. It can record the entire spectrum of a celestial object in one shot "” from the ultraviolet to the near-infrared "” with high sensitivity. This unique new instrument will be particularly useful for the study of distant exploding objects called gamma-ray bursts."X-shooter offers a capability that is unique among...
Scientists and engineers working on the world's largest ground-based astronomical project, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA), have achieved another milestone "” the successful linking of two ALMA astronomical antennas, synchronized with a precision of one millionth of a millionth of a second "” to observe the planet Mars. ALMA is under construction by an international partnership in the Chilean Andes.On 30 April, the team observed the first "interferometric fringes"...
Astronomers with the e-Merlin system of telescopes have seen "˜first light' as they look forward to being able to see further and more clearly than ever before."The new optical fiber network, together with new electronics at each telescope and a powerful new "˜correlator' which combines the signals at Jodrell Bank, will make the telescope one of the most powerful of its type in the world," said Professor Simon Garrington, Director of e-Merlin."The e-Merlin fiber network will carry as much...
Astronomers around the world are taking part in a marathon in celebration of the 400th anniversary of Galileo's first use of a telescope in 1609.Organized by the International Astronomical Union (IAU) the "100 Hours of Astronomy" event is expected to bring a large audience to events across the globe as well as a massive online audience of participants. "It is a sense of discovery and awe that astronomers wish to share with our fellow citizens all over the world," said IAU...
On 3 April, ESA astronomers will take part in "˜Around the world in 80 telescopes', a unique live webcast which will be part of the "˜100 Hours of Astronomy' cornerstone project for the International Year of Astronomy 2009. Viewers will have a peek into ESA's XMM-Newton and Integral satellite control rooms in Spain.The General Assembly of the United Nations has declared 2009 as the 'International Year of Astronomy' (IYA 2009). This global program was initiated by the International...
Latest ASTRON Reference Libraries
Radio Astronomy -- Radio astronomy is the study of celestial phenomena through measurement of the characteristics of radio waves emitted by physical processes occurring in space. Radio waves are much longer than light waves. In order to receive good signals, radio astronomy requires large antennas. Radio astronomy is a relatively new field of astronomical research. The earliest investigations into extraterrestrial sources of radio waves were by Karl Guthe Jansky, an engineer with Bell...
Space Telescope Science Institute -- STScI mission statement: We bring the cosmos to Earth We carry out this vision by empowering the astronomy community to produce new scientific discoveries and by bringing the benefits of this research to the public. We make the best astronomical facilities productive for the largest number of scientists, and we promote new missions with the greatest potential for unlocking the secrets of the universe. We have done this with HST, and we will do...
National Radio Astronomy Observatory -- The National Radio Astronomy Observatory (NRAO) is a research facility of the U.S. National Science Foundation. They provide state-of-the-art radio telescope facilities for use by the scientific community. They conceive, design, build, operate and maintain radio telescopes used by scientists from around the world. Scientists use their facilities to study virtually all types of astronomical objects known, from planets and comets in our own Solar...
European Southern Observatory -- ESO, the European Southern Observatory, was created in 1962 to: "establish and operate an astronomical observatory in the southern hemisphere, equipped with powerful instruments, with the aim of furthering and organising collaboration in astronomy". ESO is supported by Belgium, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Portugal, Sweden, Switzerland and United Kingdom. Other countries have expressed interest to become a member as well. ESO...
