ESA

The NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope has taken a picture of the barred spiral galaxy NGC 1073, which is found in the constellation of Cetus (The Sea Monster). Our own galaxy, the Milky Way, is a similar barred spiral, and the study of galaxies such as NGC 1073 helps astronomers learn more about our celestial home.

This conference will focus on the astrophysical sky seen by Planck and other observatories. The five-day meeting will include sessions on Galactic and extragalactic science from radio to sub-millimeter (diffuse emission, sources, galaxy clusters, cosmic infrared background, etc.), Solar System, as well as sessions on the next observational challenges and data analysis methods.

Astronomers studying the Vela pulsar wind nebula with ESA's INTEGRAL observatory have successfully resolved its morphology in the hard X-ray band, for the first time. This pulsar-powered nebula is the most extended individual source yet observed at these energies. The study exploited a special imaging technique to reveal a new component of the source that likely consists of highly energetic electrons that have escaped from the core of the nebula in the last few thousand years.

Sand dunes are common on Earth, Mars, Venus and - unexpectedly - on Saturn's giant moon, Titan. Now detailed analysis of radar observations gathered during the Cassini spacecraft's flybys of cloud-shrouded Titan is enabling scientists to understand the distribution, shape and dimension of its exotic dunes.

In 1995, the Hubble Space Telescope's 'Pillars of Creation' image of the Eagle Nebula became one of the most iconic images of the 20th century. Now, two of ESA's orbiting observatories have shed new light on this enigmatic star-forming region.

AnnouncementThe International Space Science Institute (ISSI) in Bern, Switzerland, invites proposals for establishing International Teams to conduct on its premises research activities in Space Sciences, based on the interdisciplinary analysis and evaluation of data from spacecraft and possible integration with ground data and theoretical models. For the purpose of this Call, Space Sciences include the Solar and Heliospheric Physics, Solar-Terrestrial Sciences, Space Plasma and Magnetospheric Physics, Planetary Sciences, Astrobiology, Cosmology, Astrophysics, Fundamental Physics, and Earth Sciences.

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The High Frequency Instrument on ESA's Planck mission has completed its survey of the remnant light from the Big Bang. The sensor ran out of coolant on Saturday as expected, ending its ability to detect this faint energy.

An EChO workshop is organized in Florence, Italy, on 31 January 2012. The scope of the meeting is to present the science and the instrument design of EChO (the Exoplanet Characterisation Observatory), a candidate mission within ESA's Cosmic Vision 2015-2025 plan, and discuss future steps.

This meeting focuses on issues related to the physics and discovery of astronomical transients. Rapid advances in detector technology, computer processing power and data storage are fostering a data-driven revolution in astrophysics. This is enabling surveys that probe ever-larger areas of the sky and ever-fainter sources, opening up a vast discovery space. These advances also add temporal information to what was previously a relatively static picture of the sky. In addition to aiding the discovery of whole new classes of variable astronomical phenomena, temporal information probes the fundamental physics of the underlying objects. Coupling these surveys with innovative exploration strategies and novel theoretical work will open new windows onto the Universe.

Using the NASA/ESA Hubble Space Telescope, astronomers have uncovered a cluster of galaxies in the initial stages of development, making it the most distant such grouping ever observed in the early Universe.

Astronomers exploiting six years worth of data from ESA's INTEGRAL mission have pinned down the individual processes contributing to the high-energy Galactic interstellar emission produced by cosmic-ray electrons. Deciphering each of the different physical mechanisms at play at hard X-ray and soft gamma-ray wavelengths represents a crucial step towards an increasingly detailed picture of the population of high-energy particles permeating the Milky Way.

This meeting brings together Earth, Solar System and exoplanet specialists to discuss recent results and the way ahead, and put our own climate in the wider context of the trials and tribulations of planetary atmospheres.

Astronomers have discovered a very slowly rotating X-ray pulsar still embedded in the remnant of the supernova that created it. This unusual object was detected on the outskirts of the Small Magellanic Cloud, a satellite galaxy of the Milky Way, using data from a number of telescopes, including ESA's XMM-Newton. A puzzling mismatch between the fairly young age of the supernova remnant and the slow rotation of the pulsar, which would normally indicate a much older object, raises interesting questions about the origin and evolution of pulsars.

This Call for declaration of Interest in Science Instrumentation (CISI) is open to the European science community for enabling assessment studies of the science instruments of the MarcoPolo-R mission. MarcoPolo-R, has been selected for assessment following the ESA Call for a Medium-size M3 mission opportunity in the Cosmic Vision (CV) 2015-2025 plan. The European science community is invited to propose dedicated studies on science instrumentation that would potentially be provided by the ESA Member States, should the mission be adopted. The Proposal submission deadline is 6 January 2012, at 14:00 CET.

Hubble's Wide Field Camera 3 has captured this image of a giant cloud of hydrogen gas illuminated by a bright young star. The image shows how violent the end stages of the star-formation process can be, with the young object shaking up its stellar nursery.

The BepiColombo Mercury Magnetospheric Orbiter Structural Model arrived at ESA's European Space Research and Technology Centre in the Netherlands on 7 November 2011, having been flown from Japan. In the coming weeks, the four components that make up the Mercury Composite Spacecraft will be prepared for integration into their launch configuration in preparation for an acoustic and mechanical test campaign.

This three day workshop on dark energy is held in New Delhi.