The Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) is joining the Earth Hour, a global movement that, once a year, reminds us that nature is the planet’s life support and highlights the environmental emergency that requires collective action.

Astronomers have used telescopes around the world, includingthe Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC or Grantecan) at the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory on La Palma, to study the asteroid 1998 KY26, revealing it to be almost three times smaller and spinning much faster than previously thought. The asteroid is the 2031 target for Japan’s Hayabusa2 extended mission. The new observations offer key information for the mission’s operations at the asteroid. “We found that the reality of the object is completely different from what it was previously described as,” says astronomer Toni Santana-Ros, a

The Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) and the University of La Laguna (ULL) have collaborated in the research that reveals the structure of 74 exocomet belts, it means, belts with minor bodies outside our solar system, around stars close to us. Astrophysicists led by a team from Trinity College Dublin , with the Universidad de La Laguna (ULL) and Instituto de Aastrofísica de Canarias (IAC) collaboration- have for the first time imaged a large number of exocomet belts around nearby stars, and the tiny pebbles within them. The crystal-clear images show light being emitted from these