The European Southern Observatory (ESO) has signed an agreement with an international consortium of institutions, including the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC), the Instituto de Astrofísica de Andalucía (IAA) and the Centro de Astrobiología de Madrid (CSIC-INTA), for the design and construction of ANDES, the ArmazoNes high Dispersion Echelle Spectrograph. The instrument will be installed on ESO’s Extremely Large Telescope (ELT). It will be used to search for signs of life in exoplanets and look for the very first stars, as well as to test variations of the fundamental constants of

The Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) is strengthening its commitment to Equality and, to coincide with the commemoration of March 8th, International Women’s Day, is presenting its IV Plan for Equality. This document covers the active work within the IAC to support Equality and Fairness in the working and institutional environment, and proposes specific measures to ensure that both of these aims are achieved. The IAC has pioneered the introduction of policies of Equality in the field of science in Spain. Even before the approval of the Organic Law 3/2007 for the effective equality

ESA’s Hera mission for planetary defense performed a flyby of Mars, as part of its gravitational assistance manoeuvre to shorten its journey to the binary asteroid system Didymos. During the flyby, the spacecraft came around 5000 km from the surface of Mars, having also the opportunity to obtain images of its two moons, Deimos (during the approach) and Phobos (when departing Mars). Julia de León, Javier Licandro, and George Prodan, researchers at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias, participate in this mission, successfully launched from Cape Cañaveral, Florida (USA) on October 7, 2024