Science Users Information

These pages are aimed at ESO community astronomers and contain all the information required in order to prepare, execute, process and exploit observations with ESO facilities. They also provide information on the scientific activities taking place at ESO. Details can be accessed via the navigation menu.


ESO Science Announcements

"MMC2025: Multi-phase, Multi-temperature, and Complex. How Feedback Shapes the Nature of the CGM, Halo Gas, and Galaxies from Galaxy Groups to Clusters", Olbia (Italy), 6-10 October 2025

Published: 15 Apr 2025

Multi-phase, Multi-temperature, and Complex (MMC2025) will be an exciting workshop exploring how feedback mechanisms -particularly AGN and stellar feedback - shape galaxy and large-scale structure evolution. Despite progress, key challenges remain in understanding the relation between gas content and star formation of galaxies in low-mass halos and the properties of the circum-galactic medium (CGM). This event will bring together experts to discuss the latest observations and simulations, highlighting the multi-phase nature of the CGM, its interaction with feedback processes, and insights from X-ray, SZ, IFU, radio, and submillimeter data. Don’t miss this opportunity to bridge theory and observation in the quest to understand cosmic structure formation. Deadline for abstract submission: 30 April 2025.

ESO Period 116 Proposal Submission Statistics

Published: 11 Apr 2025

ESO received 913 valid proposals for observations in Period 116 (1 October 2025 - 30 April 2026, with a duration of 7 months). The deadline for proposal submission was 20 March 2025. On the VLT, the most demanded ESO instrument was MUSE with a request of 3034.5 hours (i.e. 379.3 nights of an average duration of 8 hours), followed by ESPRESSO with 2594.8 hours, and XSHOOTER with 2221.2 hours. HARPS/NIRPS on the ESO 3.6-metre telescope was the most demanded instrument at La Silla, with a combined request of 3277 hours. The plot above shows the number pf ESO Proposals/PIs since Period 62. The fluctuations in the recent years are due to Large Programmes being offered only in even periods since P106. The peak in P106 is due to the extension of the proposal submission deadline during the pandemic.

Farewell to Bruno Leibundgut

Published: 11 Apr 2025

After more than 31 years of work at ESO, Bruno Leibundgut will retire at the end of April 2025. Given the strong engagement between Bruno and the astronomical community, this will not only be a change for himself, but also for the ESO and the community.

ESO Community Workshop "Planetary Formation and Exoplanets in the ELT Era", ESO Garching, 17 - 21 November 2025: Registration and Abstract Submission Open

Published: 03 Apr 2025

Registration and abstract submission for the ESO workshop "Planetary Formation and Exoplanets in the ELT era”, to be held at ESO Garching, 17-21 November 2025, is now open. The workshop will discuss the understanding of how giant and rocky planets form and evolve, their internal structure and that of their atmosphere, in the context of the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT).

The First Astropy User Survey is now Open

Published: 02 Apr 2025

The Astropy Project is running its first user survey! With over 50,000 users, 280,000 lines of code written by more than 450 contributors, and over 13,000 unique citations across its three papers, the Astropy Collaboration is made possible by hundreds of volunteer contributors worldwide. For more than a decade, ESO researchers have contributed direct and indirect development efforts to the core astropy package and critical packages in the Astropy ecosystem such as astroquery, advancing software tools for astronomy from the visible and infrared to the sub-mm. The first user survey is now being run to better understand how Astropy and its community of scientific software is being used, how it can be improved, and how it can best continue to support global astronomy and scientific research endeavors. Please take 15 minutes to give your input before 15 May and help us shape the future of astropy.

The Messenger

The Messenger 193 is now available. Highlights include:

  • Bonaldi, A., Zwaan, M. et al.: SKAO, SKA Precursors/pathfinders and ESO Facilities
  • Breen, S., Schödel, R. et al.: ESO–SKAO Coordinated Surveys: the Galaxy
  • Prandoni, I., Sargent, M. et al.: An ESO–SKAO Synergistic Approach to Galaxy Formation and Evolution Studies
  • Santos, M., Camera, S. et al.: Cosmology with ESO–SKAO Synergies
  • Mesinger, A., Ciardi, B. et al.: ESO–SKAO Synergies for the Epoch of Reionisation and Cosmic Dawn
  • Patat, F., Leibundgut, B. et al.: Yearly Call and Fast Track Channel at ESO

The ESO Science Newsletter

The February 2025 issue is now available.

The ESO Science Newsletter, mailed approximately once per month, presents the most recent announcements. Subscription is controlled through the Manage Profile link on the User Portal. Back issues (2013-) are archived.


Citing ESO data in research papers

Researchers are kindly asked to indicate the identifiers (programme IDs or Data DOIs) of the (new or archival) observations they used in their papers as explained in ESO’s data citation policy. This enables the telbib curators to cross-link research output to make data Findabie, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable as suggested by the FAIR Principles.  


Pitch Your Research to ESO COMM

Are you an author on an upcoming scientific study based on ESO data that could be relevant to journalists or the wider public? Or are you a Principal Investigator on ESO observations with potential to become stunning images? If so, please consider sending to ESO your paper and/or a preview of the image(s) obtained with ESO telescopes.