European
Southern
Observatory
ESO Science Newsletter July 2025
08 Jul 2025

This newsletter is a summary of recent ESO Science Announcement items. Follow the links or visit ESO Science Announcements to read more.



Science Announcements


Expanding Horizons: Call for White Papers Launched

07 Jul 2025:

What science questions will astronomy need to answer in the 2040s? Submit your White Papers by 15 December 2025. Under its Expanding Horizons initiative, ESO has initiated the process of selecting its next transformational facility, to start operations in the 2040s. This process is overseen by a Senior Science Committee (SSC), whose current focus is to identify the key scientific challenges that will face astronomy in the 2040s. Understanding what these science challenges are will ensure that science will be a driving factor in later identifying the facility. 

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ESO Period 116: Deadline

05 Jul 2025:

With the release of the La Silla Paranal telescope schedule, the Phase 2 preparation for runs scheduled in Service Mode begins. The deadline for the submission of the Phase 2 material for Period 116 is Thursday, 7 August 2025.  

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Deployment of the Yearly Cycle in ESO Period 117

04 Jul 2025:

As announced in the Newsletter June 2024 and discussed in more detail in the Messenger n. 193, ESO has been planning to move the Call for Proposals to a Yearly Cycle in the course of 2025. The plan has been discussed and consolidated with the Scientific Technical Committee and the Users Committee. Following an intense preparatory phase and after the positive outcome of an internal readiness review, the Director General has approved the move to the Yearly Cycle in P117, for observations starting in May 2026. More details will be provided in the Call for Proposals to be released in mid August.

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GRAVITY+ Adaptive Optics with Laser Guide Stars Science Verification on VLTI-UT

04 Jul 2025:

ESO is pleased to announce the Science Verification (SV) for GRAVITY+ Adaptive Optics with Laser Guide Stars on VLTI-UT. The upgraded GRAVITY+ Adaptive Optics (GPAO) offer improved sensitivity and/or performance for the VLTI instruments GRAVITY and MATISSE. For example, under the best atmospheric turbulence conditions, the GRAVITY spectrograph can reach K=19.5 with a fringe tracking source K<13 and a tip-tilt star GRP<17, offering unique opportunities of observations of new classes of astrophysical objects.

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“VLT Beyond 2030” ESO Conference, 26-30 Jan 2026, Garching bei München

02 Jul 2025:

ESO is organising a conference, dubbed “VLT beyond 2030”, in Garching near Munich (Germany) on 26-30 January 2026. ESO aims to maintain the VLT and VLTI at the science forefront of astrophysical research in the ELT era. The development of the facilities follows planning that is discussed with the ESO governing bodies to derive the best synergies amongst the facilities. As part of this process, the “VLT beyond 2030” January 2026 meeting will review science topics, emerging technologies and expanding parameter spaces relevant for the VLT/I in the next decade and beyond. 

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4MOST Arrives in Paranal

02 Jul 2025:

Nearly all 4MOST components have now arrived at the Paranal Observatory. Meanwhile, the VISTA telescope has been successfully recommissioned following the modifications required to accommodate 4MOST. The reintegration of the various components—such as the spectrographs and fiber positioner—has now begun, with installation on the telescope scheduled over the coming months. Commissioning will continue through the end of the year, with the five-year survey expected to begin in the first half of 2026.

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ESO's Tutorial YouTube Channel: New Content Available

18 Jun 2025:

The ESO user support YouTube channel has been refreshed with new and updated video tutorials. These guides help users prepare their Phase 2 material efficiently, as well as navigate and query the ESO Science Archive.

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Release of Pipeline Processed CRIRES+ Spectra

09 Jun 2025:

The release of pipeline processed CRIRES+ spectra provides access to reduced scientific data obtained with the cryogenic high-resolution spectrograph CRIRES+, an upgrade of the original instrument CRIRES, which was available till July 2014. CRIRES+ is in operation at the ESO VLT since October 2021. This instrument is a cross-dispersed infrared echelle specrograph with increased wavelength range covered simultaneously by a factor of ten in respect to the old CRIRES. In addition, CRIRES+ is equipped with a new detector focal plane array composed of three Hawaii 2RG detectors with a 5.3 μm cut-off wavelength, a new spectropolarimetric unit was added, and the calibration system was enhanced.

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Upcoming ESO or ESO-related workshops
 

There is no science without communication and no successful scientists without good writing and presentation skills. You can do the best science that exists, if you don’t write papers about it – papers that get cited! – and if you don’t give presentations that impress people, your science will likely be ignored. Moreover, if you do not write convincing proposals that appeal to non-specialists, you won’t get observing time, nor the coveted post-doc position and certainly not the very competitive but needed grants to fund your research. Finally, as a scientist, it is your duty and privilege to communicate your science to the general public, policy makers and the media, and like all the rest, this is something that needs to be learned.
The one week-long course will allow you to learn how to get your message across in the various supports you need to use as a scientist. At the end of the week, you will be able to write more easily convincing papers and give stunning presentations. You will also learn how to deal with various publics.

 

Understanding the mechanisms—AGN and stellar feedback—that drive the expulsion and redistribution of baryons in collapsed structures remains a cornerstone of our paradigm for galaxy formation and evolution. These processes are simultaneously the greatest strength and the most significant challenge for theoretical models. While current models can successfully reproduce key observables, such as the evolution of the galaxy stellar mass function and the hot gas content of massive clusters, they diverge considerably in their predictions.

 

Library and Information Services in Astronomy (LISA) is a series of scientific meetings for librarians, traditional archivists, data specialists, bibliographers, archive scientists, publishers, documentalists, and scientists that aims to provide a platform to discuss the state of the art for information maintenance, retrieval, metrics, preservation, and information systems such as ADS/SciX, Zenodo, ORCID, and DataCite. Topics such as open access publishing, e.g., PlanS and S2O; open science; machine learning applications in relation to the literature; and how artificial intelligence is influencing our profession are expected to feature prominently at LISA 10, Research Equity and Access in the Age of AI.

 

Understanding how giant and rocky planets form and evolve, their internal structure and that of their atmosphere, represents one of the major challenges of modern astronomy, which is directly linked to the ultimate search for life by 2040. At the Horizon 2028-2030, the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) will shine its first light on the sky. The high angular resolution and the great collecting capacity associated with the extreme sensitivity of the instruments will allow unprecedented observations of the regions of planetary formation and exoplanetary systems. In this perspective, the ESO community has developed a key expertise on the study of the initial conditions of planetary formation, the search for exoplanets, the atmospheric characterisation of giant and rocky exoplanets, and the search for biomarkers. This community includes various international laboratories and scientists who are also heavily involved at a technical and scientific level in the construction, scientific preparation and operation of the ELT instruments, and who have the opportunity to play a key role in ensuring a global return and shared success in the exploitation of the ELT.

 

The fifth edition of the "Why Galaxies Care About AGB Stars" conference series will bring together researchers working on Asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars, stellar populations, and galaxy evolution to foster collaboration and advance our understanding of the role of AGB stars in the Universe. This workshop will be a unique opportunity to discuss the latest observational and theoretical developments, featuring among others recent results from high-resolution imaging, spectroscopic studies, and advanced simulations. Topics will range from AGB stellar physics and dust formation to their impact on unresolved stellar populations and galaxy evolution. In addition, we will brainstorm the role and potential breakthroughs of AGB star research in the E-ELT and beyond era, ensuring that future observational and theoretical efforts align with the next generation of astronomical facilities.

 

Active galactic nuclei (AGN) are among the most dynamic and powerful sources in the universe, powered by supermassive black holes (SMBHs) through mass accretion. The accretion rate influences many AGN properties, with high accretion rates playing a key role in growing black holes and launching outflows that may shape the host galaxy's growth. Highly accreting AGN, particularly at low redshift, offer a benchmark to understand the rapid growth of the first SMBHs in the early Universe, which remains a mystery to be solved. Significant theoretical and observational advancements have been made in understanding fast-accreting systems, thanks to long-running observatories like VLT, ALMA, JVLA, Chandra, XMM, HST, and NuSTAR, as well as the recently launched JWST, Euclid, and IXPE. With the first light of the ELT on the horizon and the recent results from JWST on the growth of SMBH at high redshift, now is the ideal time to convene and share insights on highly accreting SMBHs. The workshop will gather astronomers to summarize the field’s current status, bridging the accretion history from the early to the local Universe, and explore the mechanisms driving their growth and impact on the Universe.