ESO Press Releases and Photos 2009
ESO 41/09 - Science Release:
Shedding Light on the Cosmic Skeleton
Astronomers have tracked down a gigantic, previously unknown assembly of galaxies located almost seven billion light-years away from us. The discovery, made possible by combining two of the most powerful ground-based telescopes in the world, is the first observation of such a prominent galaxy structure in the distant Universe, providing further insight into the cosmic web and how it formed.
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ESO 40/09 - Photo Release:
Opening up a Colourful Cosmic Jewel Box
The combination of images taken by three exceptional telescopes, the ESO Very Large Telescope on Cerro Paranal , the MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope at ESO.s La Silla observatory and the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, has allowed the stunning Jewel Box star cluster to be seen in a whole new light.
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ESO 39/09 - Science Release:
32 New Exoplanets Found
Today, at an international ESO/CAUP exoplanet conference in Porto, the team who built the High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher, better known as HARPS, the spectrograph for ESO's 3.6-metre telescope, reports on the incredible discovery of some 32 new exoplanets, cementing HARPS's position as the world's foremost exoplanet hunter. This result also increases the number of known low-mass planets by an impressive 30%. Over the past five years HARPS has spotted more than 75 of the roughly 400 or so exoplanets now known.
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ESO 38/09 - Photo Release:
The Milky Way's Tiny but Tough Galactic Neighbour
Today ESO announces the release of a stunning new image of one of our nearest galactic neighbours, Barnard's Galaxy, also known as NGC 6822. The galaxy contains regions of rich star formation and curious nebulae, such as the bubble clearly visible in the upper left of this remarkable vista. Astronomers classify NGC 6822 as an irregular dwarf galaxy because of its odd shape and relatively diminutive size by galactic standards. The strange shapes of these cosmic misfits help researchers understand how galaxies interact, evolve and occasionally "cannibalise" each other, leaving behind radiant, star-filled scraps.
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ESO 37/09 - Organisational Release:
The GalileoMobile starts its South American voyage
Today marks the beginning of the GalileoMobile Project, a two-month expedition to bring the wonder and excitement of astronomy to young people in Chile, Bolivia and Peru. Supported by ESO and partners, a group of astronomers and educators will travel through a region of the Andes Mountains aboard the GalileoMobile, offering astronomical activities, such as workshops for students and star parties for the general public. Professional filmmakers on the trip will produce a multilingual documentary capturing the thrill of discovery through science, culture and travel.
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ESO 36/09 - Photo Release:
The Trilogy is Complete - GigaGalaxy Zoom Phase 3
The third image of ESO's GigaGalaxy Zoom project has just been released online, completing this eye-opening dive into our galactic home in outstanding fashion. The latest image follows on from views, released over the last two weeks, of the sky as seen with the unaided eye and through an amateur telescope. This third instalment provides another breathtaking vista of an astronomical object, this time a 370-million-pixel view of the Lagoon Nebula of the quality and depth needed by professional astronomers in their quest to understand our Universe.
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ESO 35/09 - Organisational Release:
ALMA telescope reaches new heights
The ALMA (Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array) astronomical observatory has taken another step forward - and upwards. One of its state-of-the-art antennas was carried for the first time to the 5000m plateau of Chajnantor, in the Chilean Andes, on the back of a custom-built giant transporter. The antenna, which weighs about 100 tons and has a diameter of 12 metres, was transported up to the high-altitude Array Operations Site, where the extremely dry and rarefied air is ideal for ALMA.s observations of the Universe.
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ESO 34/09 - Photo Release:
Zooming to the centre of the Milky Way - GigaGalaxy Zoom phase 2
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.
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ESO 33/09 - Science Release:
First Solid Evidence for a Rocky Exoplanet
The longest set of HARPS measurements ever made has firmly established the nature of the smallest and fastest-orbiting exoplanet known, CoRoT-7b, revealing its mass as five times that of Earth's. Combined with CoRoT-7b's known radius, which is less than twice that of our terrestrial home, this tells us that the exoplanet's density is quite similar to the Earth's, suggesting a solid, rocky world. The extensive dataset also reveals the presence of another so-called super-Earth in this alien solar system.
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ESO 32/09 - Photo Release:
ESO unveils an amazing, interactive, 360-degree panoramic view of the entire night sky
The first of three images of ESO's GigaGalaxy Zoom project - a new magnificent 800-million-pixel panorama of the entire sky as seen from ESO's observing sites in Chile - has just been released online. The project allows stargazers to explore and experience the Universe as it is seen with the unaided eye from the darkest and best viewing locations in the world.
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ESO 31/09 - Photo Release:
NGC 4945: The Milky Way's not-so-distant Cousin
ESO has released a striking new image of a nearby galaxy that many astronomers think closely resembles our own Milky Way. Though the galaxy is seen edge-on, observations of NGC 4945 suggest that this hive of stars is a spiral galaxy much like our own, with swirling, luminous arms and a bar-shaped central region. These resemblances aside, NGC 4945 has a brighter centre that likely harbours a supermassive black hole, which is devouring reams of matter and blasting energy out into space.
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ESO 30/09 - Photo Release:
Trifid Triple Treat
Today ESO has released a new image of the Trifid Nebula, showing just why it is a firm favourite of astronomers, amateur and professional alike. This massive star factory is so named for the dark dust bands that trisect its glowing heart, and is a rare combination of three nebula types, revealing the fury of freshly formed stars and presaging more star birth.
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ESO 29/09 - Photo Release:
A Look into the Hellish Cradles of Suns and Solar Systems
New images released today by ESO delve into the heart of a cosmic cloud, called RCW 38, crowded with budding stars and planetary systems. There, young, titanic stars bombard fledgling suns and planets with powerful winds and blazing light, helped in their devastating task by short-lived, massive stars that explode as supernovae. In some cases, this energetic onslaught cooks away the matter that may eventually form new solar systems. Scientists think that our own Solar System emerged from such a dramatic environment.
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ESO 28/09 - Photo Release:
Double Engine for a Nebula
ESO has just released a stunning new image of a field of stars towards the constellation of Carina (the Keel). This striking view is ablaze with a flurry of stars of all colours and brightnesses, some of which are seen against a backdrop of clouds of dust and gas. One unusual star in the middle, HD 87643, has been extensively studied with several ESO telescopes, including the Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI). Surrounded by a complex, extended nebula that is the result of previous violent ejections, the star has been shown to have a companion. Interactions in this double system, surrounded by a dusty disc, may be the engine fuelling the starâs remarkable nebula.
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ESO 27/09 - Science Release:
Sharpest views of Betelgeuse reveal how supergiant stars lose mass
Using different state-of-the-art techniques on ESO's Very Large Telescope, two independent teams of astronomers have obtained the sharpest ever views of the supergiant star Betelgeuse. They show that the star has a vast plume of gas almost as large as our Solar System and a gigantic bubble boiling on its surface. These discoveries provide important clues to help explain how these mammoths shed material at such a tremendous rate.
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ESO 26/09 - Photo Release:
An Eagle of Cosmic Proportions
Today ESO has released a new and stunning image of the sky around the Eagle Nebula, a stellar nursery where infant star clusters carve out monster columns of dust and gas.
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ESO 25/09 - Photo Release:
New portrait of Omega Nebula's glistening watercolours
The Omega Nebula, a stellar nursery where infant stars illuminate and sculpt a vast pastel fantasy of dust and gas, is revealed in all its glory by a new ESO image.
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ESO 24/09 - Photo Release:
Astronomer's new guide to the galaxy: largest map of cold dust revealed
Astronomers have unveiled an unprecedented new atlas of the inner regions of the Milky Way, our home galaxy, peppered with thousands of previously undiscovered dense knots of cold cosmic dust - the potential birthplaces of new stars. Made using observations from the APEX telescope in Chile, this survey is the largest map of cold dust so far, and will prove an invaluable map for observations made with the forthcoming ALMA telescope, as well as the recently launched ESA Herschel space telescope.
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ESO 23/09 - Science Release:
Milky Way's super-efficient particle accelerators caught in the act
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.
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ESO 22/09 - Organisation Release:
World's fastest and most sensitive astronomical camera
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 under the smallest illumination. 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 de l'Univers (CNRS/INSU). Cameras such as this are key components of the next generation of adaptive optics instruments of Europe's ground-based astronomy flagship facility, the ESO Very Large Telescope (VLT).
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ESO 21/09 - Science Release:
Stellar family in crowded, violent neighbourhood proves to be surprisingly normal
Using ESO's Very Large Telescope, astronomers have obtained one of the sharpest views ever of the Arches Cluster - an extraordinary dense cluster of young stars near the supermassive black hole at the heart of the Milky Way. Despite the extreme conditions astronomers were surprised to find the same proportions of low- and high-mass young stars in the cluster as are found in more tranquil locations in our Milky Way.
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ESO 20/09 - Organisational Release:
Most Efficient Spectrograph to Shoot the Southern Skies
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.
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ESO 19/09 - Science Release:
Giant Galaxy Messier 87 finally sized up
Using ESO's Very Large Telescope, astronomers have succeeded in measuring the size of giant galaxy Messier 87 and were surprised to find that its outer parts have been stripped away by still unknown effects. The galaxy also appears to be on a collision course with another giant galaxy in this very dynamic cluster.
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ESO 18/09 - Organisational Release:
First two ALMA antennas successfully linked
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, synchronised 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.
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ESO 17/09 - Science Release:
The Most Distant Object Yet Discovered in the Universe
ESO's Very Large Telescope has shown that a faint gamma-ray burst detected last Thursday is the signature of the explosion of the earliest, most distant known object in the Universe (a redshift of 8.2). The explosion apparently took place more than 13 billion years ago, only about 600 million years after the Big Bang.
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ESO 16/09 - Science Release:
Solar wind tans young asteroids
A new study published in Nature this week reveals that asteroid surfaces age and redden much faster than previously thought - in less than a million years, the blink of an eye for an asteroid. This study has finally confirmed that the solar wind is the most likely cause of very rapid space weathering in asteroids. This fundamental result will help astronomers relate the appearance of an asteroid to its actual history and identify any after effects of a catastrophic impact with another asteroid.
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ESO 15/09 - Science Release:
Lightest exoplanet yet discovered
Well-known exoplanet researcher Michel Mayor today announced the discovery of the lightest exoplanet found so far. The planet, "e", in the famous system Gliese 581, is only about twice the mass of our Earth. The team also refined the orbit of the planet Gliese 581 d, first discovered in 2007, placing it well within the habitable zone, where liquid water oceans could exist. These amazing discoveries are the outcome of more than four years of observations using the most successful low-mass-exoplanet hunter in the world, the HARPS spectrograph attached to the 3.6-metre ESO telescope at La Silla, Chile.
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ESO 14/09 - Photo Release:
Two Galaxies for a Unique Event
To celebrate the 100 Hours of Astronomy, ESO is sharing two stunning images of unusual galaxies, both belonging to the Sculptor group of galaxies. The images, obtained at two of ESO.s observatories at La Silla and Paranal in Chile, illustrate the beauty of astronomy.
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ESO 13/09 - Organisation Release:
ESO takes the public on an astronomical journey "Around the World in 80 Telescopes"
A live 24-hour free public video webcast, "Around the World in 80 Telescopes", will take place from 3 April 09:00 UT/GMT to 4 April 09:00 UT/GMT, chasing day and night around the globe to let viewers "visit" some of the most advanced astronomical telescopes on and off the planet. The webcast, organised by ESO for the International Year of Astronomy 2009 (IYA2009), is the first time that so many large observatories have been linked together for a public event.
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ESO 12/09 - Organisation Release:
ESO's First Observatory Celebrates 40th Anniversary
ESO's La Silla Observatory, which is celebrating its 40th anniversary, and became the largest astronomical observatory of its time, leading Europe to the frontline of astronomical research, is still one of the most scientifically productive in ground-based astronomy.
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ESO 11/09 - Press Photo:
A Curious Pair of Galaxies
The ESO Very Large Telescope has taken the best image ever of a strange and chaotic duo of interwoven galaxies. The images also contain some surprises - interlopers both far and near.
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ESO 10/09 - Science Release:
Hubble and ESO's VLT provide unique 3D views of remote galaxies
Astronomers have obtained exceptional 3D views of distant galaxies, seen when the Universe was half its current age, by combining the twin strengths of the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope's acute eye, and the capacity of ESO's Very Large Telescope to probe the motions of gas in tiny objects. By looking at this unique "history book" of our Universe, at an epoch when the Sun and the Earth did not yet exist, scientists hope to solve the puzzle of how galaxies formed in the remote past.
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ESO 09/09 - Organisation Release:
New Inspiring Planetarium Show Introduces ALMA to the Public
As part of a wide range of education and public outreach activities for the International Year of Astronomy 2009 (IYA2009), ESO, together with the Association of French Language Planetariums (APLF), has produced a 30-minute planetarium show, In Search of our Cosmic Origins. It is centred on the global ground-based astronomical Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) project and represents a unique chance for planetariums to be associated with the IYA2009.
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ESO 08/09 - Science Release:
The lower atmosphere of Pluto revealed
Using ESO's Very Large Telescope, astronomers have gained valuable new insights about the atmosphere of the dwarf planet Pluto. The scientists found unexpectedly large amounts of methane in the atmosphere, and also discovered that the atmosphere is hotter than the surface by about 40 degrees, although it still only reaches a frigid minus 180 degrees Celsius. These properties of Pluto's atmosphere may be due to the presence of pure methane patches or of a methane-rich layer covering the dwarf planet's surface.
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ESO 07/09 - Press Photo:
Into the Eye of the Helix
A deep new image of the magnificent Helix planetary nebula has been obtained using the Wide Field Imager at ESO's La Silla Observatory. The image shows a rich background of distant galaxies, usually not seen in other images of this object.
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ESO 06/09 - Organisational Release:
Hundred metre virtual telescope captures unique detailed colour image
A team of French astronomers has captured one of the sharpest colour images ever made. They observed the star T Leporis, which appears, on the sky, as small as a two-storey house on the Moon [1]. The image was taken with ESO's Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI), emulating a virtual telescope about 100 metres across and reveals a spherical molecular shell around an aged star.
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ESO 05/09 - Photo Release:
Strong Winds over the Keel
The latest ESO image reveals amazing detail in the intricate structures of one of the largest and brightest nebulae in the sky, the Carina Nebula (NGC 3372), where strong winds and powerful radiation from an armada of massive stars are creating havoc in the large cloud of dust and gas from which the stars were born.
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ESO 04/09 - Science Release:
Powerful New Technique to Measure Asteroids' Sizes and Shapes
A team of French and Italian astronomers have devised a new method for measuring the size and shape of asteroids that are too small or too far away for traditional techniques, increasing the number of asteroids that can be measured by a factor of several hundred. This method takes advantage of the unique capabilities of ESO's Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI).
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ESO 03/09 - Press Photo:
Black hole outflows from Centaurus A detected with APEX
Astronomers have a new insight into the active galaxy Centaurus A (NGC 5128), as the jets and lobes emanating from the central black hole have been imaged at submillimetre wavelengths for the first time. The new data, from the Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) telescope in Chile, which is operated by ESO, have been combined with visible and X-ray wavelengths to produce this striking new image.
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ESO 02/09 - Science Release:
Frantic activity revealed in dusty stellar factories
Thanks to the Very Large Telescope's acute and powerful near-infrared eye, astronomers have uncovered a host of new young, massive and dusty stellar nurseries in nearby galaxy NGC 253. The centre of this galaxy appears to harbour a twin of our own Milky Way's supermassive black hole.
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ESO 01/09 - Organisational Release:
ESO Highlights in 2008
As is now the tradition, the European Southern Observatory looks back at the exciting moments of last year.
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