The "ESO in the 2020s" Working Group thanks the user community for having taken part in the ESO Community Poll Shaping ESO 2020+ Together. The poll was launched on 19 December 2014 and closed in mid January. A total of 2534 responses were received from professional astronomers, including tenured and tenure-track researchers, post-docs and graduate students. Preliminary results were presented at the workshop ESO in the 2020s (ESO-Garching, 19-22 January). The complete set of results will be made public in the coming months.
Following successful re-commissioning of the VISIR instrument in January 2015, Phase 2 observation preparation for successful Period 95 Service Mode users will open at the end of January. The deadline for VISIR Phase 2 submission is Monday, 2 March 2015, 12:00 CET. PIs and/or their Phase 2 delegates should follow the guidelines for Phase 2 preparation. The Phase 2 deadline for all other instruments is 5 February 2015.
After the NACO instrument was decommissioned from Nasmyth B of UT4 in August 2013 to provide space for MUSE, the instrument was re-mounted on UT1 at Nasmyth A in September 2014, in place of CRIRES, which is being upgraded. Since problems with the CONICA detector's wire connections could not be recovered during recommissioning, it was decided to replace the CONICA detector with the old ISAAC long wavelength detector, which is also sensitive from 1 to 5 μm and has very similar features and noise properties. During 4–12 January 2015, engineers and astronomers were able to re-commission NACO and return it to operations. The adaptive optics performance is nominal and all offered modes for Periods 94 and 95 have been tested and validated on-sky.
The last steps of the long process of evaluation of proposals for the ESO Public Spectroscopic Surveys have been completed, and two surveys have been approved with the VIMOS instrument on the VLT. These are VANDELS – A deep VIMOS survey of the CANDELS UDS and CDFS fields (PIs Ross McLure [Edinburgh] and Laura Pentericci [INAF-Rome]) and LEGA-C – The Large Early Galaxy Astrophysics Census survey (PI: Arjen van der Wel [MPIA]) in the COSMOS field.
The 95th Observing Programmes Committee met on 18–20 November 2014. A total of 1094.1 (10-hour equivalent) nights of visitor and service mode observations were allocated on the VLT, VISTA, VST, the 3.6-metre, NTT and APEX telescopes.
On the VLT the balance between visitor and service mode in Period 95 was 35.4% and 53.2% (+ 11.4% fillers). New and ongoing Large Programmes on the VLT occupy 17.4% of the allocation, while the equivalent numbers on the 3.6-metre and NTT are 49.3% and 32.5% respectively. A 19.7 night allocation to the two Public Spectroscopic Surveys with VIMOS was made (see separate announcement).
The VISTA Magellanic Survey (VMC) – one of the six public surveys current at the Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy (VISTA) – aims at determining the spatially resolved star formation history and 3D geometry of the Magellanic system. The VMC survey is designed to reach stars below the oldest main-sequence turn-off and the multi-epoch strategy enables determination of accurate Ks mean magnitudes for variable stars. This release contains five new images for VMC tiles, two re-processed tiles and band-merged and multi-epoch photometric catalogues, as well as catalogues of known Cepheid stars and eclipsing binaries.
Stellar halos are ubiquitous in luminous galaxies, but their low surface brightness hampers detailed study in distant galaxies. Recent surveys have however revealed low luminosity extended structures in a variety of galaxies. This workshop aims to bring together theorists and observers to discuss the results from ground- and space-based surveys of stellar halos in disk and elliptical galaxies, as well as from simulations. The properties of the Milky Way halo will also be discussed as representative of those of a halo around a spiral galaxy. More details can be found on the workshop web page.
Ground and Space Observatories: A Joint Venture to Planetary Science ESO – ESA Workshop, ESO Vitacura, Santiago, Chile, 2–5 March 2015
Exploration of the Solar System and subsequent discoveries are made with planetary missions and ground-based observatories. These two means are complementary and are sometimes strategically linked. During this workshop, the synergies between these two paths will be explored, with the aim to foster collaboration between both communities. The workshop will showcase the current and future capabilities of ALMA for planetary science, encouraging planetary scientists to use this facility. See the workshop announcement for more details.
Angular and spectral resolutions are fundamental limitations to our understanding of the properties of galaxies in the nearby and distant Universe. Current facilities allow the ISM and star formation to be probed in unprecedented detail from the local Universe to intermediate redshift. The aim of this workshop is to further this understanding at high spatial and spectral resolution. Synergies between current and future facilities, particularly with ALMA, and between the extragalactic and Galactic communities, will be encouraged. Further information can be found on the workshop webpage.
The ESO ALMA Regional Centre (ARC) will organise another Community Days workshop in order to optimally prepare the European astronomical community for ALMA Cycle 3, whose call is due to be released in March 2015. The 2015 Community Days will focus on the practical aspects of proposal preparation as well as hands-on tutorials for the ALMA Observing Tool and the Simulators. These will enable novice and advanced users alike to create observing projects making full use of ALMA's scientific capabilities in Cycle 3. Further information can be found here; registration deadline is 27 March 2015.
Satellite galaxies, streams and the star cluster – dwarf galaxy interface are inter-related. Galactic satellites and streams should be regarded together – satellites result from low-mass substructures while tidal streams trace the disruption of these substructures by the host's gravitational potential. Both contribute to the assembly of the host galaxy and provide a unique opportunity to test and improve our understanding of structure formation at small and large scales. This workshop aims to bring together experts from both fields to explore the bigger picture. More details can be found on the workshop webpage; registration has closed.
Despite the huge difference in spatial resolution, Herschel sources provide ideal targets for ALMA follow-up. The workshop will focus on ALMA/Herschel scientific synergies and archival research with both archives. Mutual awareness of Herschel and ALMA data archive contents will be promoted with: science cases, covering a broad range of astrophysical topics; the exploration and visualization of Herschel and ALMA data products; and assistance to users in the preparation of Cycle 3 ALMA proposals based on existing Herschel data. For more details please refer to the workshop webpage; the deadline for oral presentations is 15 March 2015, and 31 March 2015 for participants.
Spitzer, Herschel and Planck have enabled important steps forward in our understanding of the distribution and properties of dust and star formation in nearby and distant galaxies. In the near future ALMA will open a new era of studies of resolved high-redshift populations. This meeting will be the opportunity to exchange new findings from the communities studying the properties of nearby and distant galaxies. More details can be found on the workshop webpage; the deadline for abstract submission is 26 January 2015.
This workshop will explore some of the first science that will emerge from the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) in the next decade. The primary spectroscopic capability of E-ELT at first light will be provided by the HARMONI instrument, a visible and near-infrared integral field spectrograph.The meeting will bring together experts spanning a wide range of observational fields, from exo-planets to cosmology, to plan for future observations with HARMONI. Registration is open on workshop webpage and the abstract deadline is 27 February 2015.
Mass loss from cool Asymptotic Giant Branch and Red Supergiant stars inputs large amounts of material to the ISM and is an important process for understanding stellar lifecycles and galactic ecology. Significant advances in observations (e.g. VLTI and ALMA), and theory, provide an opportunity to revisit outstanding questions of late stellar evolution, such as the role of mass loss, magnetic fields and binarity. The meeting aims to bring together observers and theorists from the low and high mass stellar communities to explore the commonalities of evolved star mass loss. Further information can be obtained from the conference website or by email. The deadline for abstract submission is 6 April 2015.
The conference will cover both theory and observations of the large-scale structure of the Universe to discuss recent progress and future directions. Measuring the distribution of matter in the Universe as a function of time and space is a powerful probe of cosmology, both for gravity on scales much greater than the conventional tests of General Relativity and the origin of cosmic acceleration. Observations of the large-scale structure of the Universe, from a new generation of surveys are pushing the survey volume and redshifts, demanding improved theoretical understanding. More details can be found on the conference webpage. The registration deadline is 1 May 2015.
