Spanish Minister of Science and Innovation, Diana Morant, visited last Wednesday the Centre for Astrophysics’ facilities in La Palma (CALP) to know the impact of the volcanic eruption on the personnel and on the operation of the facilities at the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory (Garafía, La Palma). During her visit, she held a meeting with IAC Director Rafael Rebolo, which was also attended by the Director of the Gran Telescopio Canarias (GTC), Romano Corradi, and the ORM Site Manager, Juan Carlos Pérez Arencibia. Accompanying the Minister were the General Secretary of Research, Raquel

One of the most interesting questions for astrophysicists for the past few decades is how and when did the first galaxies form. One of the possible answers to “how” is that star formation in the first galaxies took place at a steady rate, building up a system with increasing mass. Another possibility is that the formation was more violent and discontinuous, with intense bursts of star formation, on short timescales, triggered by events such as galaxy mergers and strong concentrations of gas.

The first Vice-president and minister for Economic Affairs and Digital Transformation, Nadia Calviño, announced yesterday in La Palma her support for the project to improve the fibre optic connectivity of the island, with a planned investment of around 40 million euros from the European Union’s Recovery Plan. The Vice-president of the Government Nadia Calviño, said “We are working to improve the fibre optic connectivity of La Palma, by investing a part of the European funds. It is a matter of reinforcing the role of the Canaries as one of the hubs of intercontinental connectivity and our aim

The International Scientific Committee (CCI) of the Observatories of the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) has held recently its annual autumn meeting in La Palma and wants to express its solidarity with the people of La Palma during these trying times. The CCI is the international board of the institutions present at the observatories in the Canary Islands. For all the national and international research institutions and universities that are represented in this Committee, and especially those who have telescopes and other scientific installations at the Observatorio del Roque de

In 2015 and 2019 an international team (USA, Japan and Europe) carried out two unprecedented suborbital space experiments called CLASP and CLASP2, which were motivated by theoretical investigations carried out at the IAC. After the success of such missions, the team has just launched CLASP2.1 from the NASA facility in White Sands Missile Range (New Mexico, USA). The aim is to map the solar magnetic field throughout the chromosphere of an active region. To this end, CLASP2.1 has successfully measured the intensity and polarization of the solar ultraviolet radiation emitted by magnesium and

Newly formed stars have protoplanetary discs around them. A fraction of the material in the disc condenses into planet-forming chunks, and the rest finally falls into the star. Because of their common origin, researchers have assumed that the composition of these chunks and that of the rocky planets with low masses should be similar to that of their host stars. However, until now the Solar System was the only available reference for the astronomers.