The Vera C. Rubin Observatory, located in Chile, today released its first images of the universe, known in astronomy as an instrument's “first light”. This event marks the beginning of a project that will revolutionise our understanding of the universe over the next decade. Jointly funded by the US National Science Foundation (NSF) and the US Department of Energy (DOE), the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) is participating, as part of a consortium of Spanish institutions, in its scientific exploitation and contributing observation time from the Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC or

La Fundación CajaCanarias organiza la octava edición de su Foro Enciende el Cosmos, que este año volverá a contar con la participación de destacados científicos e investigadores de reconocido nivel nacional e internacional. Esta iniciativa de carácter divulgativo pretende expandir, desde la exploración científica, la comprensión del Universo en su conjunto, relacionando el pasado con el presente y con una clara búsqueda de respuestas de cara al futuro. El programa se divide en tres sesiones, a celebrar los días 13 de febrero, 20 de marzo y 10 de abril, en el Espacio Cultural CajaCanarias de

A study published today in Nature Astronomy , in which a researcher from the IAC has participated, outlines the discovery of an extremely rare type of binary system composed of two high mass white dwarfs. The two stars are so close together that they will eventually collide resulting in a supernova explosion which, due to its proximity to the Earth, will appear ten times brighter than the Moon. Type 1a supernovae are a class of cosmic explosion often used as "standard candles" to measure the expansion of the Universe. They occur when a white dwarf exceeds the Chandrasekhar mass - the limit