This data release presents the first public data products (DR1) from Looking into the faintEst WIth MUSE (LEWIS), an ESO Large Programme investigating extreme low-surface-brightness galaxies in the Hydra I cluster using the Multi Unit Spectroscopic Explorer (MUSE) on the ESO Very Large Telescope. The observations were obtained in service mode between December 2021 and March 2025 under ESO programme 108.222P, P.I. E. Iodice.

The ESO Public Survey project VMC, ESO program 179.B-2003, PI M. R. Cioni, targets the Magellanic Cloud system in three filters: Y, J and Ks. The main goals are the determination of the spatially resolved star formation history and study the three-dimensional geometry of the system. The sensitivity of the data is designed to reach sources below the oldest main-sequence turn off point of the stellar population and the multi-epochs to measure accurate Ks mean magnitudes for pulsating variable stars, e.g. RR Lyrae stars and Cepheids. This last data release is based on the complete observations for the VMC survey and data from twelve additional programmes, which add multi-epoch observations to the VMC footprint.

Dear colleagues,

After 63 years since its establishment on the basis of international cooperation, ESO is now de facto evolving "from world-class to world-leading", in light of the huge progress within its strategy for the 2020s. Let me share with you some achievements and challenges that developed during 2025.

After the great success of the program in the last seven editions, ESO is delighted to announce that the call for applications for the 8th ESO Summer Research Programme is now open. This fully funded program is available to students in STEM fields who have not yet started a Ph.D. program and have completed at least two years of their degree.

The stellar 'Initial Mass Function' (IMF) is a fundamental observable and a crucial component for the understanding of a vast range of astrophysical processes. It is suspected to have its roots in the mass distribution of dense molecular cloud cores resulting from molecular cloud fragmentation, but what shapes this 'Core Mass Function' (CMF) and how core masses really relate to stellar masses, remains unclear. This ESO workshop will summarize and discuss recent observational and theoretical progress on these questions and explore ways forward with ongoing progress in instrumentation (e.g., ALMA upgrade, ELT(s)).