ESO is the foremost intergovernmental astronomy organisation in Europe and the world's most productive astronomical observatory. It operates three sites in Chile — La Silla, Paranal and Chajnantor — on behalf of its fourteen member states. It builds ALMA together with international partners, and designs the European Extremely Large Telescope.
ESO, the European Southern Observatory, builds and operates a suite of the world's most advanced ground-based astronomical telescopes.
Latest News Stories
Watching a Cannibal Galaxy Dine
A new technique using near-infrared images, obtained with ESO.s 3.58-metre New Technology Telescope (NTT), allows astronomers to see through the opaque dust lanes of the giant cannibal galaxy Centaurus A, unveiling its "last meal" in unprecedented detail - a smaller spiral galaxy, currently twisted and warped. This amazing image also shows thousands of star clusters, strewn like glittering gems, churning inside Centaurus A.
Announcements
- ALMA "first fringes" at Chajnantor (16/11/2009)
- The ESO web site is now available in twelve languages (18/9/2009)
Latest ESOcasts
ESOcast 11 — 32 New Exoplanets Found
ESOcast 10 — GigaGalaxy Zoom: The Sky, from the Eye to the Telescope
ESOcast 9 — Celestial Tango Makes for a Gorgeous Nebula
ESOcast 10 — GigaGalaxy Zoom: The Sky, from the Eye to the Telescope
ESOcast 9 — Celestial Tango Makes for a Gorgeous Nebula
Picture of the Week
The Moon in Conjunction with Venus and Jupiter
