Press Releases - April 2006

26 April 2006 - ESA
Discover European space with a stroll around the "International Space Village" at ILA2006
From Tuesday 16 to Sunday 21 May 2006, ESA will participate in the ILA2006 International Air Show in Berlin, together with the Deutsches Zentrum für Luft- und Raumfahrt, DLR (German Aerospace Centre) and the German Space Industries Association, BDLI.

25 April 2006 - ESO
The Comet With a Broken Heart
On the night of April 23 to 24, ESO's Very Large Telescope observed fragment B of the comet Schwassmann-Wachmann 3 that had split a few days earlier. To their great surprise, the ESO astronomers discovered that the piece just ejected by fragment B was splitting again! Five other mini-comets are also visible on the image. The comet seems thus doomed to disintegrate but the question remains in how much time.

25 April 2006 - EMBL
A brighter future for Europe's favourite molecular biology software package
EMBOSS, the European Molecular Biology Open Software Suite, has received a vital funding boost from the UK Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council [BBSRC] that will guarantee its continued maintenance under an open source license for the next three years. This ends two years of uncertainty over the future of the project.

24 April 2006 - ESA
European Columbus laboratory for the International Space Station ready for delivery
The Columbus laboratory is Europe's cornerstone contribution to the International Space Station. Final integration has been successfully completed in Bremen. Columbus will be shipped to Cape Canaveral at the end of May, from where it will be flown on a Space Shuttle to the ISS in the second half of 2007.

19 April 2006 - ESA
MetOp satellite shipped to Baikonur on 18 April
The first MetOp meteorological satellite arrived yesterday at its launch site, the Baikonur Cosmodrome in Kazakhstan, following shipment from the industrial prime contractor, EADS Astrium in Toulouse, on board an Antonov-124 transport plane.

14 April 2006 - ESO
The Great Easter Egg Hunt: The Void's Incredible Richness
An image made of about 300 million pixels is being released by ESO, based on more than 64 hours of observations with the Wide-Field Camera on the 2.2m telescope at La Silla (Chile). The image covers an 'empty' region of the sky five times the size of the full moon, opening an exceptionally clear view towards the most distant part of our universe. It reveals objects that are 100 million times fainter than what the unaided eye can see.

11 April 2006 - ESA
Europe Scores New Planetary Success: Venus Express Enters Orbit around the Hothouse Planet
This morning, at the end of a 153-day and 400-million km cruise into the inner solar system beginning with its launch on 9 November 2005, ESA's Venus Express space probe fired its main engine at 09:17 CEST for a 50-minute burn, which brought it into orbit around Venus. With this firing, the probe reduced its relative velocity toward the planet from 29,000 to about 25,000 km/h and was captured by its gravity field. This orbit insertion manoeuvre was a complete success.

10 April 2006 - EMBL
Getting to the heart of cardiovascular diseases
Today three research organisations announce the merging of their expertise to fight cardiovascular diseases, which are among the most common health problems and causes of death in the world. The Magdi Yacoub Institute [MYI] at the UK's Harefield Heart Science Centre, Imperial College London, and a unit of the European Molecular Biology Laboratory [EMBL] near Rome will work together to connect discoveries in basic research to new therapies and treatments.

7 April 2006 - ESO
Cosmic Spider is Good Mother
Hanging above the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) - one of our closest galaxies - in what some describe as a frightening sight, the Tarantula nebula is worth looking at in detail. Also designated 30 Doradus or NGC 2070, the nebula owes its name to the arrangement of its brightest patches of nebulosity that somewhat resemble the legs of a spider. This name, of the biggest spiders on Earth, is also very fitting in view of the gigantic proportions of the celestial nebula - it measures nearly 1,000 light years across!

7 April 2006 - ESA
ESA's Venus Express to reach final destination
It was on 9 November last year that ESA's Venus Express spacecraft lifted off from the desert of Kazakhstan onboard a Soyuz-Fregat rocket. Now, after having travelled 400 million kilometres in only about five months, the spacecraft is about to reach its final destination. The rendezvous is due to take place on 11 April.

5 April 2006 - EMBL
With joint forces against Malaria
Today the network of excellence for Biology and Pathology of the Malaria Parasite [BioMalPar], will bring together the world's elite in the field of Malaria research at the European Molecular Biology Laboratory [EMBL] in Heidelberg. At the second annual BioMalPar conference, some of the most eminent experts address the hot questions around Malaria and present their newest research findings.

1 April 2006 - EFDA
ITER Project Leader named
At a meeting in Tokyo on the 1st of April, the chief ITER negotiators from the seven international parties (European Union, India, Japan, Korea, China, the Russian Federation and the USA), identified the top management team that will manage this major international fusion energy research project.