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Press Releases

eso0530 — Science Release

A Cosmic Baby-Boom — Large Population of Galaxies Found in the Young Universe with ESO's VLT

22 September 2005: The Universe was a more fertile place soon after it was formed than has previously been suspected. A team of French and Italian astronomers [1] made indeed the surprising discovery of a large and unknown population of distant galaxies observed when the Universe was only 10 to 30% its present age.

eso0529 — Science Release

Black Hole in Search of a Home — Astronomers Discover Bright Quasar Without Massive Host Galaxy

14 September 2005: An international team of astronomers [1] used two of the most powerful astronomical facilities available, the ESO Very Large Telescope (VLT) at Cerro Paranal and the Hubble Space Telescope (HST), to conduct a detailed study of 20 low redshift quasars. For 19 of them, they found, as expected, that these super massive black holes are surrounded by a host galaxy. But when they studied the bright quasar HE0450-2958, located some 5 billion light-years away, they couldn't find evidence for an encircling galaxy. This, the astronomers suggest, may indicate a rare case of collision between a seemingly normal spiral galaxy and a much more exotic object harbouring a very massive black hole.

eso0528 — Science Release

Star Death Beacon at the Edge of the Universe — Astronomers Find Farthest Known Gamma-Ray Burst with ESO VLT

12 September 2005: An Italian team of astronomers has observed the afterglow of a Gamma-Ray Burst that is the farthest known ever. With a measured redshift of 6.3, the light from this very remote astronomical source has taken 12,700 million years to reach us. It is thus seen when the Universe was less than 900 million years old, or less than 7 percent its present age.

eso0527 — Photo Release

Celestial Blast in Bleak Reticulum

24 August 2005: The southern Reticulum constellation [1] certainly isn't a big hit for amateur astronomers. This tiny, bleak and diamond-shaped constellation, not far on the sky from the Large Magellanic Cloud, is often overlooked. But recently, astronomers had a closer look at a galaxy situated inside it. And more precisely at an exploding star hosted by the spiral galaxy NGC 1559 [2].

eso0526 — Science Release

Rubble-Pile Minor Planet Sylvia and Her Twins — VLT NACO Instrument Helps Discover First Triple Asteroid

11 August 2005: One of the thousands of minor planets orbiting the Sun has been found to have its own mini planetary system. Astronomer Franck Marchis (University of California, Berkeley, USA) and his colleagues at the Observatoire de Paris (France) [1] have discovered the first triple asteroid system - two small asteroids orbiting a larger one known since 1866 as 87 Sylvia [2].

eso0525 — Photo Release

Midsummer's Dream Galaxies — Images of Two Magnificent Spiral Galaxies from ESO Data Archive

10 August 2005: How does the Galaxy in which we live look like?

It is almost certain that we will never be able to send a probe out of our Milky Way to take a snapshot, in the same way as the first satellites could do to give us striking images of planet Earth. But astronomers do not need this to imagine what our bigger home resembles. And they have a pretty good idea of it.

eso0524 — Science Release

Moving Closer to the Grand Spiral — VLT Enables Most Accurate Distance Measurement to Spiral Galaxy NGC 300

1 August 2005: An international team of astronomers from Chile, Europe and North America [1] is announcing the most accurate distance yet measured to a galaxy beyond our Milky Way's close neighbours. The distance was determined using the brightness variation of a type of stars known as "Cepheid variables".

eso0523 — Science Release

Comet Tempel 1 Went Back to Sleep — Astronomers Having Used ESO Telescopes Start Analysing Unique Dataset on the Comet Following the Deep Impact Mission

14 July 2005: Ten days after part of the Deep Impact spacecraft plunged onto Comet Tempel 1 with the aim to create a crater and expose pristine material from beneath the surface, astronomers are back in the ESO Offices in Santiago, after more than a week of observing at the ESO La Silla Paranal Observatory. In this unprecedented observing campaign - among the most ambitious ever conducted by a single observatory - the astronomers have collected a large amount of invaluable data on this comet.

eso0522 — Organisation Release

New Sub-Millimetre Light in the Desert — APEX telescope Sees First Light at Chajnantor

14 July 2005: The Atacama Pathfinder Experiment (APEX) project has just passed another major milestone by successfully commissioning its new technology 12-m telescope, located on the 5100m high Chajnantor plateau in the Atacama Desert (Chile). The APEX telescope, designed to work at sub-millimetre wavelengths, in the 0.2 to 1.5 mm range, has just performed its first scientific observations. This new front-line facility will provide access to the "Cold Universe" with unprecedented sensitivity and image quality.

eso0521 — Photo Release

Einstein Ring in Distant Universe — Astronomers Using the VLT Discover Bright Cosmic Mirage Far Away

30 June 2005: Using ESO's Very Large Telescope, Rémi Cabanac and his European colleagues have discovered an amazing cosmic mirage, known to scientists as an Einstein Ring. This cosmic mirage, dubbed FOR J0332-3557, is seen towards the southern constellation Fornax (the Furnace), and is remarkable on at least two counts. First, it is a bright, almost complete Einstein ring. Second, it is the farthest ever found.

eso0520 — Organisation Release

Ultra-fast Movies of the Sky — Astronomers Commission New High-Speed Camera on the Very Large Telescope

9 June 2005: British scientists have opened a new window on the Universe with the recent commissioning of the Visitor Instrument ULTRACAM on the European Southern Observatory's (ESO) Very Large Telescope (VLT) in Chile.

eso0519 — Organisation Release

ESO Receives Computerworld Honors Program 21st Century Achievement Award in Science Category

7 June 2005: In a ceremony held in Washington, D.C. (USA) on June 6, 2005, ESO, the European Organisation for Astronomical Research in the southern Hemisphere, received the coveted 21st Century Achievement Award from the Computerworld Honors Program for its visionary use of information technology in the Science category. Sybase, a main database server vendor and member of the Chairmen's Committee, nominated ESO's Data Flow System in recognition of its contributions to the global information technology revolution and its positive impact on society.

eso0518 — Science Release

Preparing for the Impact — ESO Telescopes Take Snapshot of Comet 9P/Tempel 1 in Readiness for Major Observation Campaign

30 May 2005: On July 4, 2005, the NASA Deep Impact spacecraft will visit Comet 9P/Tempel 1. It will launch a 360 kg impactor that should produce a crater on the surface of the comet and a plume of gas and dust.

eso0517 — Organisation Release

Dutch Minister of Science Visits ESO Facilities in Chile

16 May 2005: Mrs. Maria van der Hoeven, the Dutch Minister of Education, Culture and Science, who travelled to the Republic of Chile, arrived at the ESO Paranal Observatory on Friday afternoon, May 13, 2005.

eso0516 — Organisation Release

Catherine Cesarsky Elected Foreign Associate of the US National Academy of Sciences

30 April 2005: Today, at the Annual Meeting of the US National Academy of Sciences, ESO's Director General, Dr. Catherine Cesarsky, is officially inducted into this highly prestigious society.

eso0515 — Science Release

Yes, it is the Image of an Exoplanet — Astronomers Confirm the First Image of a Planet Outside of Our Solar System

30 April 2005: An international team of astronomers reports today confirmation of the discovery of a giant planet, approximately five times the mass of Jupiter, that is gravitationally bound to a young brown dwarf. This puts an end to a year long discussion on the nature of this object, which started with the detection of a red object close to the brown dwarf.

eso0514 — Organisation Release

Thousand Papers and Counting — ESO's Very Large Telescope Passes the 1000 Refereed Publications Mark

27 April 2005: The ESO Very Large Telescope (VLT) has just passed an impressive milestone with the publication of the 1,000th peer-reviewed scientific article based on data from the world's largest and most advanced optical and near-infrared telescope.

eso0513 — Photo Release

The Blob, the Very Rare Massive Star and the Two Populations — Striking Image of Nebula N214C taken with ESO's NTT at La Silla

22 April 2005: The nebula N214 [1] is a large region of gas and dust located in a remote part of our neighbouring galaxy, the Large Magellanic Cloud. N214 is a quite remarkable site where massive stars are forming. In particular, its main component, N214C (also named NGC 2103 or DEM 293), is of special interest since it hosts a very rare massive star, known as Sk-71 51 [2] and belonging to a peculiar class with only a dozen known members in the whole sky. N214C thus provides an excellent opportunity for studying the formation site of such stars.

eso0512 — Organisation Release

"Towards a Europe of Knowledge and Innovation", the EIROforum paper on science policy — European science "heavyweights" offer their help in the development of the knowledge-based economy

20 April 2005: Brussels, April 20, 2005 - Today Europe's seven major intergovernmental research organisations, working together in the EIROforum partnership, presented their comprehensive paper on science policy, "Towards a Europe of Knowledge and Innovation", in the presence of the European Commissioner for Science and Research, Mr. Janez Potocnik and the Luxembourg Minister for Culture, Higher Education, Employment and Research, Mr. François Biltgen. Luxembourg currently holds the presidency of the European Union.

eso0511 — Science Release

Is this a Brown Dwarf or an Exoplanet? — New Young Sub-stellar Companion Imaged with the VLT

7 April 2005: Since the discovery in 1995 of the first planet orbiting a normal star other than the Sun, there are now more than 150 candidates of these so-called exoplanets known. Most of them are detected by indirect methods, based either on variations of the radial velocity or the dimming of the star as the planet passes in front of it.

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