La estrella, que experimenta este tipo de explosiones cada cincuenta años, perdió en el último estallido una masa equivalente al 10% de la masa del Sol

Observing the nucleus of a comet is difficult, because comets are normally active near the sun which means that their nuclei are hidden by their comae. 124P/Mrkos is a low-activity comet observed at 1.9 UA of the sun. The spectra of comets give us information not only about their composition, but also about the initial composition of the solar system. In this case the spectrum is very similar to that of the D- and P-type asteroids that typically populate the external part of the asteroid belt.

Ref 1: X1822-3711 | Ref 2: GX339-4 Detecting companion stars in these systems has been impossible until now. Thanks to a new technique developed at the IAC, they can now be detected through fluorescent CII/NIII emissions produced by X ray irradiation.

Using the Surface Brightness Fluctuation technique (SBF), IAC researchers have succeeded in detecting galaxies beyond Hubble's photometric detection limit. These new detections are fundamental for obtaining accurate information about the number of weak galaxies. This number is vital for Cosmology and for the theory of galaxy formation and evolution.

Tests have been carried out for the first time on the hypothesis that the structure of interstellar dust around galactic bars is determined by the velocity field of the gas. The dust is found in regions delineated by high gas speed gradients, something which had been proposed but not observed. The gradients themselves seem to be related to intense star-forming regions.

The linear polarization produced by scattering processes in the spectral lines of the IR triplet of Ca II can be observed near the edge of the solar disk. The cause of this polarization was considered a true enigma until the year 2003, in which IAC researchers could carry out sophisticated calculations based on the quantum theory of the spectral line polarization. In this way, they could demonstrate that the physical origin of the enigmatic polarization is the presence of "atomic polarization" in the lower levels of such spectral lines, which produces dichroism (i.e., selective absorption of