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.

  • Recreation of the landscape of the exoplanet Barnard b orbiting its star / Gabriel Pérez (IAC)
    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
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  •  Simulation illustrating the distribution of dark matter particles expected in a low-mass galaxy if the dark matter did not collide (in orange, concentrated towards the center) versus the observed dark matter (in blue, far more dispersed) / Gabriel Pérez (IAC)
    The existence of dark matter is likely one of the most perplexing problems facing the scientific community, and unraveling its nature has become one of the primary goals of modern physics. In simple terms, we do not know what dark matter is made of, despite accounting for 85% of all the matter in the Universe. A study led by the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias concludes that dark matter does not behave as described by the dominant paradigm, which states that dark matter particles only interact with each other and with ordinary matter through gravity. The IAC study reveals that dark
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  • La presidenta del Cabildo de Tenerife, Rosa Dávila, entrega el título de Hija Predilecta a Adriana Lorenzo-Cáceres / Foto: Juanjo Velázquez (Cabildo de Tenerife)
    La investigadora del Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias, Adriana de Lorenzo-Cáceres Rodríguez, recibió este jueves 19 de septiembre el título de Hija Predilecta de la isla de Tenerife de manos de la presidenta del Cabildo insular, Rosa Dávila Mamely en un acto en el Auditorio del Tenerife donde la institución insular rindió homenaje a destacadas entidades y personalidades que han contribuido de manera excepcional al desarrollo y bienestar de la sociedad tinerfeña En el caso de Adriana de Lorenzo-Cáceres Rodríguez, el reconocimiento tiene lugar "por su labor en la Astrofísica y la defensa
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  • La secretaria general de investigación del Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades, Eva Ortega Paíno, ha presidido esta la reunión del Consejo Rector / Inés Bonet
    La secretaria general de investigación del Ministerio de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades, Eva Ortega Paíno, ha presidido esta mañana la reunión del Consejo Rector del Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) donde se ha propuesto por unanimidad a la astrofísica Eva Villaver Sobrino como subdirectora del centro. Esta decisión es inmediatamente trasladada a la Subsecretaría de Ciencia, Innovación y Universidades, para proponer que se adjudique en estos términos la correspondiente convocatoria de libre designación del puesto de Subdirectora del IAC. Además de la secretaria general, a esta
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  • El telescopio de la red SONG en el Observatorio del Teide /  Uli Fehr
    This week, the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias is hosting the Second SONG Scientific Congress to conclude the first decade of high-level work of this international network devoted to the study of the interior of stars and the planetary systems that surround them. The meeting, which is taking place at the headquarters of IACTEC in La Laguna from 18 to 20 September, brings together more than 50 scientists from Europe, the United States, Australia and China to discuss the latest state-of-the-art techniques in time-resolved spectroscopy and stellar astrophysics. The Stellar Observations
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