A team of cosmologists from the Institute of Astrophysics of Andalusia (IAA-CSIC) and the Institute of Astrophysics of the Canary Islands (IAC) has obtained the most accurate census to date of the dark matter halos of the Universe. The work is based on the development of a new model, called GPS+, capable of predicting how many dark matter halos exist at each stage of cosmic history. In the universe, there are enormous invisible structures surrounding galaxies and galaxy clusters. These are dark matter halos, concentrations of matter that do not emit light and cannot be directly observed, but

The Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias is designing and developing, as ordered by the Spanish company Thales Alenia Space , the adaptive optics which will be a parto f the ground station for the GARBO project, the first Spanish geostationary system for distributing quantum keys by satellite. This is a decisive step in the field of secure quantum communication on a large scale, and will strengthn the position of Spain, and of Europe at the Forefront of this technology. Within the framework of the project the IAC will lead the development of the adaptive optics systems, and will participate

The European Patent Office (EPO) has granted the IAC a patent on an invention developed within IACTEC-Space . This technology improves the quality of images obtained by high-performance cameras under the demanding conditions found in space. The effectiveness of this technology has already been tested on three space missions, applying it to the DRAGO (Demonstrator for Remote Analysis of Ground Observations) cameras, developed at the IAC for Earth observation from space. Carlos Colodro, electronics engineer at IACTEC-Space and the main person responsible for this development, comments that