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.

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  • Press conference after the meeting of the Governing Council.
    Press release
    The Governing Council of the IAC gives firm support to the building of the TMT on La Palma
    This was stated by the acting Minister for Science, Innovation, and the Universities, Pedro Duque who chaired the annual meeting of the Governing Council of the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC), held today at its La Laguna headquarters. Among the other matters dealt with was the state of the negotiations about large telescopes, and the draft budget for 2020 was approved which, if implemented, will be larger for the first time than the budget of the Institute prior to the economic crisis in 2018.
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  • Folleto GTC 10 aniversario
    Press release
    10 years of the GTC: Amazing science with an astonishing telescope
    The Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC) is celebrating the tenth anniversary of its inauguration in the Roque de Los Muchachos Observatory. During the past decade the largest optical and infrared telescope in the world has carried out over 14,000 hours of observation and has produced scientific data in some 450 articles in the leading journals. Some of the key scientific highlights have been included in a special outreach leaflet recently published by the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias and the GTC.
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  • Round table of the summer school "Acercate al Cosmos"
    Press release
    Ending of the course for teachers “Get close to the Cosmos”
    For the fourth successive year the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias and the National Institute for Educational Technology and Teacher Training (INTEF), in collaboration with the International Menéndez Pelayo University (UIMP) has given teachers of secondary and pre-university education the opportunity to get to know the latest discoveries in astrophysics in a course given by professionals, thereby acquiring the tools for using them afterwards in the classroom.
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  • Fernando Moreno Insertis
    Press release
    A study of the whole Sun
    The European Research Council (ERC) has awarded one of its prestigious “ERC Synergy Grants” to a team led by Fernando Moreno Insertis, researcher at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) and Professor at the University of La Laguna (ULL) as a member of a consortium of five European institutions.
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  • Artist’s impression of a planetary fragment orbits the star SDSS J122859.93+104032.9, leaving a trail of gas in its wake. Credit: University of Warwick/Mark Garlick.
    Research news
    A planetesimal orbiting within the debris disc around a white dwarf star
    Numerous exoplanets have been detected around Sun-like stars. These stars end their lives as white dwarfs, which should inherit any surviving planetary systems. In fact, many white dwarf stars show signs of having accreted smaller bodies, implying that they may host planetary systems. A small number of these systems contain gaseous debris discs, visible through emission lines. Here, we report a stable 123.4-minute periodic variation in the strength and shape of the Ca II emission line profiles originating from the debris disc around the white dwarf SDSS J122859.93+104032.9. We used numerical
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