The single star nearest to the Sun is called Barnard’s star. A team of researchers led by the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC), has recently detected a ‘sub-Earth’ orbiting it. This exoplanet, called Barnard b has at least half the mass of Venus and orbits rapidly around its star, so that its year lasts only a little over three Earth days. This new exoplanet is sixteen times nearer to Barnard’d star than Mercury is to the Sun, and has a surface temperature close to 125oC, so it does not have liquid water on its surface. This discovery, led by the IAC in collaboration with a number

The Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) in collaboration with the University of Geneva (Switzerland), the University of Osaka (Japan), and the University of Zhejiang (China) has made a key contribution to a more precise measurement of the expansion of the Universe. This is because they have made an improvement in the precision of the calculation of the scale of the universe in its early stages using the analisis of the distribution of gas in intergalactic space, measurements which reach back to epochs between 10,000 and 12,000 million years ago. This result comes from the análisis of

The project “ Habla con Ellas: Mujeres en Astronomía” (Talk to Them: Women in Astronomy) of the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) begins today its seventh edition in Spain as part of the celebrations of the International Day of Women and Girls in Science. Aimed at the Spanish educational community, it seeks to create new professional role models in science and technology, as well as to inspire new generations, especially girls, to follow in their footsteps. In this edition, the project will feature 36 female astrophysicists, engineers and technologists from the IAC, the Canary