The 2023 Olivier Chesneau prize is awarded to Iva Laginja on her PhD work "Contrast based tolerancing of space telescopes for exoEarth imaging", successfully defended in December 2021 at Paris Observatory. This thesis, carried out between the National Office of Aerospace Studies and Research (ONERA), the Laboratory of Astrophysics of Marseille (LAM) and the Space Telescope Science Institute (STScI) impressed the Chesneau prize jury with its great introduction, giving a broad panorama of exoplanet detection prospects and techniques, a solid theoretical study of segments alignment tolerancing on large space-based telescopes, and an application and adaptation of this theoretical framework to both a laboratory testbench and the JWST, validating on real datasets the developed principles. This PhD work led to 3 first-author refereed publications, a significant number.  

ESO’s prestigious postdoctoral fellowship programme in both Garching (Germany) and Santiago (Chile) offers outstanding early-career scientists the opportunity to further develop their independent research programmes. From exoplanets to cosmology, observational, theoretical and fundamental astrophysics, these are all areas where ESO Fellows can benefit from a highly dynamic scientific environment, at some of the most advanced ground-based telescopes in the world. Do watch ESOCast 165 to hear what previous ESO fellows have to say about the fellowship programme or watch the virtual tour to ESO’s premises from 2020 or 2021 where young scientists could ask questions about the fellowship programme.

The ESO research studentship programme provides an outstanding opportunity for PhD students to experience the exciting scientific environment at one of the world's leading observatories. ESO's studentship positions are open to students enrolled in a university PhD programme in astronomy or related fields. Students accepted into the programme work on their doctoral project under the formal supervision of their home university supervisor, but they come to ESO to work and study under the co-supervision of an ESO staff astronomer for a period of up to two years.

The European ARC Network invites users to an online training on Introduction to Data Combination on September 21^st, 11:00 CET. In this training, participants will be introduced to the combination of ALMA interferometric and single-dish ("total power") data with CASA.

ePESSTO+ the advanced Public ESO Spectroscopic Survey of Transient Objects (PI: Inserra, ESO program IDs 1103.D-0328 and 106.216C) started in April 2019 and it is currently ongoing at the New Technology Telescope using the instruments EFOSC2 and SOFI. It is the second extension of the PESSTO survey (PI: Smartt). ePESSTO+ targets supernovae and optical transients brighter than 20 mag for classification and selected science targets for detailed follow-up. It uses standard EFOSC2 setups with resolutions of 13-17Å between 3680-10320Å, SOFI spectroscopy for brighter science targets, with the blue and red (rarely) grisms (resolutions 23Å - 33Å), and SOFI imaging with broadband JHKs filters. This first release includes spectra and images collected in the first 2.5 years of ePESSTO+ operations, from April 2019 to October 2021.

With the release of the La Silla Paranal telescope schedule, the Phase 2 preparation for runs scheduled in Service Mode begins. The deadline for the submission of the Phase 2 material for Period 112 is Friday, 4 August 2023. 

The 112^th Observing Programmes Committee (OPC) met online during May 2023. Based on the committee's recommendations to the ESO Director General, a total of 956 (8-hour equivalent) nights of (Designated) Visitor Mode and Service Mode observations were allocated on the VLT/VLTI, the 3.6-metre, and NTT telescopes. The submission deadline for Phase 2 Service Mode observations is 4 August 2023; see the separate announcement for further details.

Utilizing the UVES and GIRAFFE instruments, this comprehensive survey has encompassed all major components of the Milky Way, systematically studying 114,916 stars. The observed robust samples have enabled detailed observations of bulge, thick and thin disks, halo components, and open star clusters of various ages and Galactocentric distances.

The Offices for Science are are very pleased to present the 2023 ESO Fellows. Here is an introduction to the Fellows due to start in Garching and Chile later this year.

This is the 6th edition of the Real Time Control Workshop series that follows the the previos ones. The real-time control (RTC) system is a crucial component for any astronomical adaptive optics (AO) system. The computational, and  data transfer demands placed on the next generation RTCs for future extremely large telescopes (ELTs) are enormous, and even current systems require skill to implement. The main workshop goal is to gather international AO RTC specialists in order to share and exchange experience regarding the design and implementation of these systems. Such shared experience can be used to improve the design of new and proposed AO systems, increasing their performance and usability. As such, the workshop is aimed at real-time control specialists, instrument scientists and adaptive optics engineers.  Although the workshop is focused principally on astronomical AO, attendence of participants from non-astronomical areas is welcome and indeed encouraged to allow cross-discipline discussions to take place.