10 Years of GRAVITY at VLTI

April, 2027 TBD

The adaptive optics assisted GRAVITY instrument marks its 10-year anniversary of science operations at the VLTI in late 2026.
Over the past decade, GRAVITY has pushed optical long baseline interferometry to new frontiers. With its internal fringe tracker, dual-field capabilities, and unique metrology system, GRAVITY has pushed the limits of many areas of astronomy from exoplanets to AGN.

‘10 years of GRAVITY at VLTI’ will be a celebration of a decade of science with this unique instrument. The conference will cover all topics that can be covered with the GRAVITG instrument, including but not limited to:

• Galactic Center Science
• Stellar Physics
• Exoplanets
• Star and Planet formation
• Active Galactic Nuclei
• Past and Future technical advances

These sciences benefited from a series of technological advancements, including improved dual –field capabilities, a new extreme adaptive optics module, and the new laser guide star facility. The timing of this conference will allow for the presentation of the first year of science with the new LGS-AO system at VLTI, which entered operation in early 2026. This conference will conclude with a session on the future of GRAVITY at the VLTI. GRAVITY+ is not yet complete; over the next years several improvements will push the instrument even further. Improvements to the astrometric performance and a new higher resolution GRISM will enable new science yet again.

In addition to the conference, we also plan to host a mini workshop for 2 days, the week before. This workshop will be aimed at students and early career postdocs in the local Chilean community. The aim will be in introduce GRAVITY and the VLTI to those unfamiliar with the concepts. The workshop will be dominated by hands on sessions with real GRAVITY data.
 

And more to be confirmed.

E-mail: GRAVITY10 [at] eso.org

This workshop will take place at Santiago, Chile.

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