Category: Instrumentation

Instrumentation

May 11, 2012

The New Space Telescope as an example of Euro-American cooperation

Just arrived from London from a one-day meeting of the MIRI consortium, I cannot avoid looking back with pride at our achievements, in this longer than 10 years challenge. The Mid-Infrared Instrument  (MIRI) is one of the four instruments which will ...

July 6, 2011

Observing Saturn

Amazing experience! With my student Jorge Lillo, I have been observing Saturn with the 2.2m telescope and Astralux, a lucky imaging camara capable of delivering images with resolution almost similar to those of the Hubble Space Telescope. If you do not beleive, ...

December 10, 2010

Renovation of the German-Spanish agreement for the future of Calar Alto

After many moths and a lot of work .... (and this is one of the reasons why I was not active writing posts, or in science) .... We have an agreement! Calar Alto Observatory (Almería, Southern Spain) will continue it scientific ...

September 1, 2009

The results of the effort…

If months ago (sorry for not being able to write more often: work, trips, vacations...) I wrote about writing proposals and the efort it implied, now I am collecting the benefits: the observing time. I applied and obtained a fair ...

June 4, 2009

Submitting proposals: is it worth the effort?

Astronomy, like any other science, works under the system of peer-review. It means that nothing is published in a prestigious journal without having the external examination of at least one specialist in the field, a person who is not connected ...

January 26, 2009

Heavenly music

The year 2009 is also for the community of astronomers from Mexico, Spain and Florida, since the Gran Telescopio Canarias, the GTC, will start its scientific operations in few weeks. Meanwhile, famous musicians visit the place and think about new ...