Science Users Information

These pages are aimed at ESO community astronomers and contain all the information required in order to prepare, execute, process and exploit observations with ESO facilities. They also provide information on the scientific activities taking place at ESO. Details can be accessed via the navigation menu.


ESO Science Announcements

"VLT Beyond 2030": Extended Deadline

Published: 15 Sep 2025

ESO is extending the deadline for abstract submission for the conference "VLT beyond 2030" to 26 September 2025. The meeting will take place in Garching near Munich (Germany) and virtually on 26-30 January 2026.

ALMA Cycle 12 Proposal Statistics

Published: 09 Sep 2025

Statistics of proposal submission for Cycle 12 have been released. Europe continues to be the region with the highest oversubscription rate (7.8 for time on the 12m array). The median time requested on the 12m array per proposal increased to its highest ever: 15.1 hrs. A detailed report is available

Registration is now Open for European ALMA School 2026

Published: 09 Sep 2025

ESO is delighted to announce that the 2026 European ALMA school will be hosted by the Allegro ARC node in Leiden, the Netherlands, from 26 to 30 January 2026. Whether you are an intermediate user or have never seen ALMA data before, this is the event for you - and a great opportunity to meet fellow ALMA users from Europe and beyond. The school will cover a broad range of topics related to ALMA: basics of interferometry, data calibration, synthesis imaging, working with the ALMA archive, advanced data analysis techniques, and future ALMA developments.

The EXO-ELT 2025 Workshop Programme is Now Live

Published: 03 Sep 2025

Explore the full schedule and session details of the conference Planetary formation and Exoplanets in the ELT Era (EXO-ELT) at the Programme webpage. Don't miss your chance to register -the deadline is 24 September 2025. Register soon and join the discussions shaping the future of exoplanet science! The workshop will take place in Garching bei München between 17 and 21 November 2025.

Release of "The MUSE View of the Sculptor" Programme

Published: 22 Aug 2025

This data release presents a wide-field MUSE mosaic of the nearby starburst galaxy NGC 253 (the Sculptor Galaxy), covering its entire star-forming disc. The mosaic combines 103 individual MUSE pointings in Wide Field Mode, spanning 20 × 5 arcmin² and totaling approximately 25 hours of on-source exposure. Most of the observations (101 pointings) were obtained without adaptive optics (AO) using short exposures (~850 s), while the two central nuclear pointings were observed with AO and longer integrations (~2000 s).

The Messenger

The Messenger 194 is now available. Highlights include:

  • Doyon, R., Bouchy, F. et al.: NIRPS Joins HARPS: Setting New Standards at Infrared Wavelengths
  • Nazari, P., Jerabkova, T. et al.: Artificial Intelligence Usage by ESO Telescope Users
  • De Breuck, C., Díaz Trigo, M.: The Promises and Challenges of the ALMA Wideband Sensitivity Upgrade

The ESO Science Newsletter

The August 2025 issue is now available.

The ESO Science Newsletter, mailed approximately once per month, presents the most recent announcements. Subscription is controlled through the Manage Profile link on the User Portal. Back issues (2013-) are archived.


Citing ESO data in research papers

Researchers are kindly asked to indicate the identifiers (programme IDs or Data DOIs) of the (new or archival) observations they used in their papers as explained in ESO’s data citation policy. This enables the telbib curators to cross-link research output to make data Findabie, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable as suggested by the FAIR Principles.  


Pitch Your Research to ESO COMM

Are you an author on an upcoming scientific study based on ESO data that could be relevant to journalists or the wider public? Or are you a Principal Investigator on ESO observations with potential to become stunning images? If so, please consider sending to ESO your paper and/or a preview of the image(s) obtained with ESO telescopes.