News

This section includes scientific and technological news from the IAC and its Observatories, as well as press releases on scientific and technological results, astronomical events, educational projects, outreach activities and institutional events.

  • The M31 Galaxy, more commonly known as the Andromeda Galaxy, is a spiral galaxy situated some 2- 2.5 million light years from us in the direction of the constellation of Andromeda. Credits: Adam Evans/wikipedia.
    The discovery of metal-rich planetary nebulae in the outer regions of the Andromeda Galaxy, using data from the GTC, gives evidence of a possible encounter between galaxies
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  • Figure caption: Left : (FUV − NUV) versus (NUV − [3.6]) color-color diagram. Morphological types are represented by color (see legend). We define the blue and red sequence by dividing the plot into two regions and fitting a least-squares 1-D polynomial (a
    We obtained GALEX FUV, NUV, and Spitzer/IRAC 3.6 µm photometry for >2000 galaxies, available for 90% of the S4G sample. We find a very tight "GALEX Blue Sequence (GBS)" in the (FUV − NUV) versus (NUV − [3.6]) color-color diagram which is populated by irregular and spiral galaxies, and is mainly driven by changes in the formation timescale (τ ) and a degeneracy between τ and dust reddening. The tightness of the GBS provides an unprecedented way of identifying starforming galaxies and objects that are just evolving to (or from) what we call the "GALEX Green Valley (GGV)". At the red end of the
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  • Caption: Artist illustration of the central core of the planetary nebula Henize 2-428. Stars are not to scale. Credit: Gabriel Pérez, SMM (IAC).
    The planetary nebula (PN) stage is the ultimate fate of stars with mass 1 to 8 solar masses (M⊙). The origin of their complex morphologies is poorly understood, although several mechanisms involving binary interaction have been proposed. In close binary systems, the orbital separation is short enough for the primary star to overfill its Roche lobe as it expands during the Asymptotic Giant Branch (AGB) phase. The excess material ends up forming a common-envelope (CE) surrounding both stars. Drag forces would then result in the envelope being ejected into a bipolar PN whose equator is
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  • Figure caption. Left panel: Image of the planet at 100 AU from the dwarf star VHS 1256.This false colour image has been put together from images in the Y J and K bands takenwith the VISTA telescope of the European Southern Observatory, in the VISTA Hemisp
    In a search for common proper motion companions using the VISTA Hemisphere Survey (VHS) and the 2MASS catalogs we have identi fied a very red (J-Ks = 2.47 mag) late-L dwarf companion of a previously unrecognized M dwarf VHSJ125601.92-125723.9 (hereafter VHS1256-1257), located at a projected angular separation of 8.06"+/-0.03". In this work we present a suite of astrometric, photometric, and spectroscopic observations of this new pair in an effort to confirm the companionship and characterize the components. From low-resolution (R_130-600) optical and near-infrared spectroscopy we classi fied
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