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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  • Winter School 2023 group at OT. Credit: Daniel López
    Photomontage
    Closing of the IAC Winter School 2023
    The XXXIV Canary Islands Winter School of Astrophysics closed last Thursday, November 16, with the visit to the facilities of the Obervatorio del Teide. For two weeks, 54 graduate students from 15 countries attended the IACTEC building to learn about the latest developments in the field of galaxy evolution and the Local Group. Currently, astrophysics field is receiving a big amount of data available for research due to the Gaia Mission and several spectroscopic surveys from Earth in which the IAC has a large participation. The organization highlights the great enthusiasm, the good atmosphere
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  • Inauguración de Cosmolab 2023-2027
    Photomontage
    Official inauguration of the educational project CosmoLab 2023-2027
    The official inauguration of the CosmoLab 2023-2027 project, an educational project to create an astronomical community in the schools of the island of Tenerife, took place last Friday 17th at the Observatorio del Teide (OT). The inauguration was attended by the Island Councillor for Innovation of the Cabildo de Tenerife, Juan José Martínez, the director of the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC), Rafael Rebolo, and directors and STEAM representatives from the four teaching centres on the island of Tenerife. They all enjoyed a tour of the facilities, an astronomical observation with
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  • Artist's impression of a protocluster of galaxies in the early Universe
    Press release
    Astronomers find the key for detecting the largest structures in the early universe
    An international research team, led from the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) and the University of La Laguna (ULL) together with a group of Italian universities, has confirmed a new method for finding protoclusters of galaxies, the largest structures in the early universe. These progenitors of present-day clusters of galaxies played an essential role in the evolution of the universe, but are not easy to find. This study shows that a specific type of galaxies, those which emit radiation at submillimetre wavelengths, are very good indicators of the presence of distant protoclusters
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  • Las tres imágenes que obtiene la aplicación PINRELL se combinan en una sola. Crédito: IACTEC.
    Press release
    IACTEC and the prompt detection of a diabetic foot
    The technology which is used in astrophysics research is useful not only in space; many of the sophisticated techniques can be put to very good use in the field of medicine. On this basis in IACTEC there is a team of Medical Technology (TECMED) who develop combinations of the methods of Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning used in astrophysics for the diagnosis of pathologies. To celebrate the International Day of Diabetes the team stresses the magnitude of the problema in the Islands. Some experts call diabetes one of the worst “silent pandemics”. Spain is the second country in the
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  • Research news
    On the magnetic nature of quiet-Sun chromospheric grains
    CaII Kgrains, i.e., intermittent, short-lived (about 1 minute), periodic (2-4 minutes), pointlike chromospheric brightenings, are considered to be the manifestations of acoustic waves propagating upward from the solar surface and developing into shocks in the chromosphere. After the simulations of Carlsson and Stein, we know that hot shocked gas moving upward interacting with the downflowing chromospheric gas (falling down after having been displaced upward by a previous shock) nicely reproduces the spectral features of the CaII K profiles observed in such grains, i.e., a narrowband emission
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  • Villa de La Orotava Science Fair Awards
    Photomontage
    Carmen del Puerto receives the outreach award at the Villa de La Orotava Science Fair
    Yesterday, in the Noble Hall of the Town Hall of the municipality of La Orotava (Tenerife), took place the award ceremony of the Villa de La Orotava Science Fair Awards, a recognition to people and institutions that are committed to outreach and scientific research. In this first edition, the award in the outreach category went to the journalist and writer Carmen del Puerto, who has been in charge of communications at the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) for more than three decades. She was joined by the parasitologist Basilio Valladares (Research Award) and the physicist and
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