Announcements

4 August 2010: A report on the latest progress in the design of the European Southern Observatory’s European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT), to be built on Cerro Armazones in the Chilean Atacama Desert, was one of the highlights of the Second International Seminar on Light Pollution held on 2–4 August at the Atacama Desert Museum in Antofagasta, Chile. The European Southern Observatory (ESO), in collaboration with the Chilean National Commission for Environment, Chilean universities and the Office for the Protection of the Quality of the Skies in the North of Chile, organised this event, supported by the Ruinas de Huanchaca Foundation, Antofagasta Municipality and the Chilean Astronomy Society, to promote the protection of dark skies as a scientific heritage. Experts from Europe, Brazil, Argentina and the USA discussed the benefits of improving the efficiency of urban lightning to reduce light pollution, and the resulting positive impact on the environment, energy consumption, economy and ...

20 July 2010: Three astronomers have been awarded the Viktor Ambartsumian International Prize 2010 for their outstanding contributions in the field of planetary systems and their host stars, in which observations with ESO telescopes have played a major role. The 2010 winners of the Prize are Professor Michel Mayor from the University of Geneva and two of his team members, Dr Garik Israelian from the Astrophysical Institute of Canary Islands (IAC) and Dr Nuno Santos from the Centro de Astrofísica da Universidade do Porto (CAUP), nominated by the Swiss Academy of Sciences. The Viktor Ambartsumian International Prize was established by the President of Armenia in 2009 and is one of the most important awards in astronomy/astrophysics and related sciences. It is awarded to outstanding scientists from any country and nationality who make significant contributions to science. The Prize totals US$ 500 000 and will be awarded once every two years, starting in 2010. ...

7 July 2010: On 6 July 2010 the Chilean President Sebastián Piñera received the ESO Director General, Tim de Zeeuw, at the Palacio La Moneda, in Santiago, to discuss the selection of Cerro Armazones in Chile, as the home of the future 42-m European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT). The Chilean Minister of Foreign Affairs, Alfredo Moreno, Ambassador Gabriel Rodríguez from the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the ESO Representative in Chile, Massimo Tarenghi, also attended. On the previous day, the Minister of National Assets, Catalina Parot, invited the ESO Director General for a lunch to discuss the implementation of the offer made by the Chilean Government to transfer to ESO a substantial tract of land contiguous to ESO’s Paranal property, containing Armazones, in order to ensure the continued protection of the site against all adverse influences, in particular light pollution and mining activities. Cerro Armazones is an isolated mountain at 3060 metres altitude ...

6 July 2010: An international collaboration of astronomers has recently commissioned a new observing mode for the NACO adaptive optics instrument attached to ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) on Paranal. The new capability counteracts the effects of diffraction of light very close to a bright star, enabling astronomers to see very faint nearby objects. The prime example of the kind of objects that can be searched for with the new VLT observing mode, called the Apodising Phase Plate (APP), are Jupiter-like gas giant planets that could be lurking around Sun-like stars in our galaxy. The new mode enables astronomers to search for planets closer to the star than has been previously possible. As a demonstration of the power of the APP technique, a team led by Matthew Kenworthy, Sascha Quanz, and Michael Meyer have confirmed the recent detection of the giant exoplanet around the star Beta Pictoris (eso1024; led by A.-M. Lagrange, Grenoble), ...

30 June 2010: A breathtaking 3D light show in Linz, Austria gives audiences a virtual tour of the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT), before construction work has even begun in Chile. Lucky viewers can gain a sneak preview of what astronomers can hope to see once the planned observatory is up and running in 2018. The E-ELT will be the world’s biggest optical telescope and will peer deeper into the depths of space than any before it. Audience members at Ars Electronica, a “museum of the future” that focuses on the interplay of technology and art, are even suspended just above the telescope’s colossal 42-metre primary mirror. In reality, this viewpoint will be impossible without risking grave damage to the fragile reflective surface. They are also told of the amazing power of the E-ELT to see smaller and fainter objects than ever before, and how its revolutionary potential could be as great as ...

30 June 2010: ESO has just published issue 140 of its quarterly journal, The Messenger. This issue features a range of articles including: A roundup of proposed instruments for the planned E-ELT; An in-depth look at the FORS instruments on the VLT on the occasion of their double 10th anniversary; Updates on new advances in adaptive optics; How astronomers are using the CRIRES spectrograph on the VLT to search for exoplanets orbiting very low-mass stars and brown dwarfs; and Wolf-Rayet stars and the search for the origins of gamma ray bursts. The issue also details how ESO staff in Chile helped with humanitarian aid in the aftermath of February’s earthquake.

28 June 2010: During the summer, in the UK, an exhibition including two innovative videos is showcasing inspirational plans to build the largest visible-light telescope in the world — the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT). “Designing a Giant Eye on the Sky” is an exhibit at the Royal Society’s Summer Science Exhibition, part of See Further: The Festival of Science + Arts at the Southbank Centre in London. The exhibit features an innovative dance video “Get the Hex”. The film project involves students from The Royal High School in Edinburgh working with filmmaker and dance choreographer team Craig and Joanne Thomson to create a piece representing the science behind the mirror in the giant telescope. Tom Bacciarelli, who teaches at The Royal High School, says: “In the film, 60 of our students dance with silver hexagonal umbrellas to portray the giant mirror, Earth-like planets and galaxies. I hope other schools will be inspired ...

25 June 2010: ESO astronomers and engineers are attending and presenting results at the international SPIE Astronomical Telescopes and Instrumentation symposium in San Diego, California, USA, from 27 June to 2 July, at the Town and Country Resort and Convention Center. ESO will also present its projects in a sold-out exhibition, in which more than 70 companies are taking part. The meeting, with more than 2000 expected participants, is the most prestigious gathering of astronomical instrumentation experts in the world. Roberto Gilmozzi, Principal Investigator for the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) project at ESO, will give a plenary talk on goals for the next generation of Extremely Large Telescopes, ranging from the quest for Earth-like exoplanets to the detailed study of the first objects in the Universe. Mark Casali, Head of ESO’s Instrumentation Division, is one of the symposium co-chairs. Thanks to great technological developments, the latest astronomical telescopes and instruments are giving ...

24 June 2010: Garching, 24 June 2010 — In a Statement of Intent signed today at the offices of the European Southern Observatory (ESO) in Garching, Germany, the European Commission (EC) and the members of EIROforum, including ESO, formalise their desire to maintain and further develop their cooperation, for the benefit of European science. In signing this statement, Máire Geoghegan-Quinn, European Commissioner for Research, Innovation and Science and Iain Mattaj, Chairman of EIROforum and Director General of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL), as well as the Directors General or equivalent of the other EIROforum members, agree to cooperate to further European research in general, and the European Research Area in particular. “As leaders in our fields of scientific research we play an active role, every day, in turning the European Research Area into a reality. At EIROforum we therefore have considerable experience and expertise, which we will strive to make available to ...

17 June 2010: A Press Kit about the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) is now available for download in PDF format, in English- and Spanish-language versions. The kit gives a concise but comprehensive overview of the background, current status, and future of what will be the world’s biggest eye on the sky.

10 June 2010: For the first time, astronomers have been able to directly follow the motion of an exoplanet as it moves from one side of its host star to the other. The planet has the smallest orbit so far of all directly imaged exoplanets, lying almost as close to its parent star as Saturn is to the Sun. Scientists believe that it may have formed in a similar way to the giant planets in the Solar System. Because the star is so young, this discovery proves that gas giant planets can form within discs in only a few million years, a short time in cosmic terms. Together with the press release describing this discovery made with ESO’s Very Large Telescope, ESO has issued a new video podcast, ESOcast 18, entitled “Exoplanet Caught on the Move”, with our host, Dr J. The ESOCast provides a nice explanation of the discovery and its importance, ...

21 April 2010: The European Astronomical Society [1] announces that this year’s winner of its Tycho Brahe Prize is the British optical engineer Dr Raymond Wilson. The Tycho Brahe Prize is awarded annually in recognition of the development or exploitation of European instruments, or major discoveries based largely on such instruments. It carries a monetary reward of 6000 euros and is sponsored by the Klaus–Tschira foundation, based in Heidelberg, Germany. The prize will be awarded to Dr Wilson during the European Week of Astronomy and Space Science (JENAM2010) [2] that will take place in Lisbon, Portugal, from 6–10 September 2010.Dr Wilson has made contributions of the utmost importance to the technology of astronomical telescopes during the last two decades of the 20th century. His profound theoretical and practical knowledge of optics and his vision for achieving optical perfection led him to the concept of active optics, which revolutionised the world of large telescopes: ...

9 March 2010: Supported by the ESO Chile Solidarity Group, a “solidarity mission” involving ESO and Gemini South Observatory employees has been actively and successfully helping the people in Pelluhue area, on the coast of the Maule region in Chile. The region was one of the most affected by the magnitude 8.8 earthquake that struck the country on 27 February 2010.On 2 March 2010, three vehicles loaded with food, medicine, clothes, hygiene and essential items departed from the ESO offices in Vitacura, Santiago. The goods were distributed to victims of the earthquake both on the Maule coast and in nearby rural areas. The group not only distributed supplies, but also built a temporary rainproof shelter for an elderly couple living in the rural area of Salto de Pelluhue, whose house was devastated by the earthquake. The group came back after a week of traveling and helping on 8 March 2010.In the next days, ...

4 March 2010: ESO Council delegates met in Committee on 2–3 March 2010 and discussed the process for adoption of a baseline reference site for the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT). This will enable the successful conclusion of the detailed design of the telescope with the goal of preparing a proposal for construction in due course.ESO Council received a report with the main conclusions from the E-ELT Site Selection Advisory Committee. These conclusions confirm that all sites examined in the final short list (Armazones, Ventarrones, Tolonchar and Vizcachas in Chile, and La Palma in Spain) have very good conditions for astronomical observing, each one with its particular strengths. The technical report concludes that Cerro Armazones, near Paranal, stands out as the clearly preferred site, because it has the best balance of sky quality across all aspects and it can be operated in an integrated fashion with the existing ESO Paranal Observatory.The ESO Council ...

4 January 2010: The year 2009 was celebrated as the International Year of Astronomy and has proved to be exceptional both for astronomy and for ESO. At Paranal, ESO’s flagship observatory, the Visible and Infrared Survey Telescope for Astronomy (VISTA) started work at the end of 2009. Its first stunning images have been released and promise plenty of superb achievements for the year to come (ESO eso0949). Also at Paranal, ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT), the world’s most advanced ground-based observatory, was further enhanced. The VLT welcomed the first of its second generation instruments, X-shooter, which is able to record the entire visible-light spectrum of a celestial object in a single shot (ESO eso0920). One of X-shooter’s targets will be gamma-ray bursts, the most powerful explosions taking place in the Universe. The VLT has allowed astronomers to determine the distance of a gamma-ray burst that emitted light only about 600 million years after ...

14 December 2009: Thanks to ever larger telescopes, such as ESO’s Very Large Telescope, and ever more sensitive instruments, our astronomical knowledge continues to progress at an incredible pace, answering many questions, but also raising exciting new ones. The 42-metre European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT), presently being planned by ESO, will be able to investigate these secrets and answer some of the most prominent open questions. ESO has prepared a brochure presenting the science that can be done with the E-ELT, and entitled “An Expanded View of the Universe”. The 52-page brochure seeks to give a flavour of the kind of fundamental questions that the E-ELT may finally answer. However, just as Galileo was astounded to find mountains on the Moon and moons orbiting Jupiter, the most exciting discoveries are probably those that we have not yet even imagined. This document was prepared by the E-ELT Science Office with the help of the ...

19 October 2009: On Monday 19 October 2009, astronomers will report at the international ESO/CAUP exoplanet conference in Porto, Portugal, on a significant discovery in the field of exoplanets, obtained with the High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher, better known as HARPS, the spectrograph for ESO's 3.6-metre telescope. ESO will host a media teleconference on Monday 19 October 2009, at 13:45 pm CEST, to be streamed online. The teleconference participants are: Stéphane Udry, Geneva Observatory, Switzerland Xavier Bonfils, LAOG, Grenoble, France Nuno Santos, University of Porto, Portugal To participate in the teleconference, reporters must get accredited by contacting Henri Boffin by email (hboffin@eso.org). Reporters will need to have access to a computer, with a recent version of Adobe's Macromedia Flash Player installed and an Internet connection with a minimum bandwidth requirement of 56 kB/s. Further information will be provided to the accredited reporters. Graphics and supporting information will be shown during the teleconference, ...

16 April 2009: ESO to announce major exoplanet finding and provide update on the E-ELT — 21 Apr. 2009