Pipeline processed HARPS echelle data are now available as Science Data Products via the Phase 3 spectral query form. The data consist of 1D spectra in the ESO/SDP format and the tar files containing unaltered output of the HARPS pipeline (DRS v. 3.5), as previously available.

ESO Workshop, Vitacura, Santiago, Chile, 23–27 March 2015

Angular and spectral resolutions are fundamental limitations to our understanding of the properties of galaxies in the nearby and distant Universe. The advent of state-of-the-art facilities with high angular and spectral resolution capabilities coupled with high sensitivity, such as ALMA, allows the interstellar medium and star formation properties of galaxies at intermediate redshift to be probed in unprecedented detail, along with their counterparts in the local Universe.

The proposal submission for ESO Period 95 (1 April – 30 September 2015) closed on 01 October 2014. 931 proposals were received, including 17 Large Programme and 50 Target of Opportunity (ToO) proposals, for a total of 2428 nights.

The Multi-Object Optical and Near-infrared Spectrograph (MOONS) is a red and near-infrared (0.64 – 1.8 μm), medium (R=4000) and high (R=20000) resolution, multi-object spectrograph with 1024 fibres, planned for installation at the  VLT Nasmyth focus in 2018. The agreement to build MOONS was recently signed between ESO and the MOONS Consortium, composed of institutes from the ESO Member States and led by the UK STFC. See the public announcement for details.

New data products from the VISTA Survey of the Magellanic system Public Survey (VMC) are now available via the dedicated Phase 3 query interface. The current release is based on the observations of five new VMC survey tiles (three in the LMC and two in the SMC), as well as on improved reduction of two tiles released earlier.

ESO Workshop, ESO Headquarters, Garching, Germany, 23–27 February 2015

Stellar halos are ubiquitous in luminous galaxies, but their low surface brightness hampers detailed study in distant galaxies. With the advent of large cameras and surveys, several late- and early-type galaxies have revealed similar low luminosity extended structures. These halos have complex morphologies with multiple stellar components, kinematics and substructures indicating the merger history. The halo morphologies resemble the density maps from cosmological simulations of galaxy formation in a hierarchical Universe.

The HAWK-I Ultra Deep Survey and GOODS Survey (HUGS) is an near-infrared imaging survey executed with HAWK-I (PI: A. Fontana); an overview can be found here. HUGS covers two CANDELS extragalactic fields: a sub-area of the UKIDSS Ultra-Deep Survey (UDS) and GOODS-South. HUGS delivers the deepest, highest quality images ever collected in the K-band: to Ks=27.3 (1σ) in UDS and to Ks=27.8 in GOODS-South. Deep Y-band images in the UDS field have also been acquired.

If you wish to conduct a PhD in astronomy-astrophysics within one of the largest centres of astrophysical research in the world, which covers every subject from planets, stars, and galaxies to cosmology, you should seriously consider applying to the IMPRS studentship programme in Munich.

The Science Verification (SV) for the Spectro-Polarimetric High-contrast Exoplanet REsearch instrument (SPHERE) will take place on the nights of 1–11 December 2014. All community astronomers are kindly invited to participate in this opportunity to obtain early science with SPHERE and thus to demonstrate the scientific capabilities of this extreme adaptive optics instrument.

The Science Verification (SV) for MUSE consisted of two observing runs (20–29 June and 18–24 August 2014). Forty four programmes were fully completed and another three received partial data. All data are publicly available through the MUSE SV webpage.
Additional to the previous announcement, data from all three MUSE commissioning runs (February, April – May and 25 July – 03 August 2014) are now available for download together with calibration files.