Press Releases
October 2009
29 October 2009 - ESO
Opening up a Colourful Cosmic Jewel Box
The combination of images taken by three exceptional telescopes, the ESO Very Large Telescope on Cerro Paranal , the MPG/ESO 2.2-metre telescope at ESO’s La Silla observatory and the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, has allowed the stunning Jewel Box star cluster to be seen in a whole new light.
21 October 2009 - ESRF
Obituary: Ruprecht Haensel (1935-2009), first Director General of the ESRF
It is with great sadness that the ESRF learnt that Ruprecht Haensel, first Director General of ESRF, passed away on 20 October after a long illness. Under his guidance, the ESRF, the first third generation synchrotron source in the world, came into operation. He led the institute from 1986, even before its official foundation, until the machine was running and the first beamlines were taking shape, in 1992.
19 October 2009 - ESO
32 New Exoplanets Found
Today, at an international ESO/CAUP exoplanet conference in Porto, the team who built the High Accuracy Radial Velocity Planet Searcher, better known as HARPS, the spectrograph for ESO's 3.6-metre telescope, reports on the incredible discovery of some 32 new exoplanets, cementing HARPS's position as the world’s foremost exoplanet hunter. This result also increases the number of known low-mass planets by an impressive 30%. Over the past five years HARPS has spotted more than 75 of the roughly 400 or so exoplanets now known.
14 October 2009 - ESO
The Milky Way's Tiny but Tough Galactic Neighbour
Today ESO announces the release of a stunning new image of one of our nearest galactic neighbours, Barnard's Galaxy, also known as NGC 6822. The galaxy contains regions of rich star formation and curious nebulae, such as the bubble clearly visible in the upper left of this remarkable vista. Astronomers classify NGC 6822 as an irregular dwarf galaxy because of its odd shape and relatively diminutive size by galactic standards. The strange shapes of these cosmic misfits help researchers understand how galaxies interact, evolve and occasionally "cannibalise" each other, leaving behind radiant, star-filled scraps.
8 October 2009 - ESRF
Two long-term users of the ESRF win the Nobel Prize in Chemistry
Ada Yonath, from the Weizmann Institute (Israel) and Venkatraman Ramakrishnan, of the MRC Laboratory of Molecular Biology in Cambridge (UK), both ESRF long-term users, have been awarded the Nobel Prize of Chemistry 2009. The award is given for the study of the structure and function of the ribosome, the protein factory in the cell. They will share the prize with Thomas Steitz, from Yale University (US).
7 October 2009 - ESRF
Bacterium helps formation of gold
Australian scientists have found that the bacterium Cupriavidus metallidurans catalyses the biomineralisation of gold by transforming toxic gold compounds to their metallic form using active cellular mechanism.
5 October 2009 - ESO
The GalileoMobile starts its South American voyage
Today marks the beginning of the GalileoMobile Project, a two-month expedition to bring the wonder and excitement of astronomy to young people in Chile, Bolivia and Peru. Supported by ESO and partners, a group of astronomers and educators will travel through a region of the Andes Mountains aboard the GalileoMobile, offering astronomical activities, such as workshops for students and star parties for the general public. Professional filmmakers on the trip will produce a multilingual documentary capturing the thrill of discovery through science, culture and travel.
1 October 2009 - EMBL
From foe to friend: mosquitoes that transmit malaria may help fight the disease
In a study published today in Science, researchers at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory (EMBL) in Heidelberg, Germany, and the Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (INSERM) in Strasbourg, France, discovered that variations in a single gene affect mosquitoes' ability to resist infection by the malaria parasite