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EAS News
Record breaking EAS 2021 as the start of a safe and successful summer
A word from the President
Our annual meeting is approaching fast, 28 June to 2 July, but before that, on 11 June, the Society is hosting a presentation and discussion of the latest ASTRONET Roadmap (see later). These exercises, coordinated by funding agencies across Europe, have proved to be influential in the past and there is every reason to believe that this report will set the agenda for future large scale research investments in astronomy. I'd encourage everyone to attend and to participate actively. You can register here.
EAS News
EAS 2021 Virtual in Leiden, 28 June - 2 July 2021
More than 2000 registered participants
EAS News
Preparation of future EAS Annual Meetings ongoing
MoU with Valencia signed for EAS 2022
The EAS has received four letters of intent to host the EAS Annual Meetings 2023 and 2024. The EAS has contacted the potential hosting teams. The final decision on the host of the EAS Annual Meeting 2023 will be taken by the EAS Council in October 2022. EAS News
EAS's commitment to development, sustainability, inclusion and welfare
Special Sessions and Lunch Sessions at EAS 2021
We invite all EAS members to register for the EAS 2021 Annual Meeting and to participate in the following sessions dedicated to development, sustainability, inclusion and welfare:
EAS News
WE Heraeus-EAS Young Researchers in Astronomy (HERA) workshops
A new EAS workshop series designed for young scientists
In 2022 the EAS will organize a first pilot workshop. If successful, we will start the series with a call for two further workshops, covering the period 2023-2025. The aim will, as far as possible, be to host workshops in centres across the regions of Europe.
EAS News
ČAS: a new EAS Organisational Member
Česká Astronomická Společnost: the Czech Astronomical Society
Shortly after the foundation of the ČAS, a handful of enthusiasts decided to build a public observatory in Prague. After the establishment of Czechoslovakia in 1918, the fulfilment of this dream was facilitated by the fact that one of the founders of the new state, Slovak politician and diplomat, and general of the French army, Dr. Milan Rastislav Štefánik, was an astronomer by his original profession, for several years working at the Meudon Observatory. The Štefánik Observatory on the Petřín hill in Prague was officially opened in 1928 and became the site of the ČAS. The observatory, among its public activities, always played an important role in the training of young generation of astronomers, and the same was true also at several other public observatories founded in Czechoslovakia after the WW II. Many current Czech professional astronomers, members of ČAS, grew-up at those observatories. Since 1920, the Society published its own journal Říše hvězd (Realm of Stars), bringing news on astronomy not only in the country but from all around the world. Branches of the ČAS were established in larger towns and big cities all over Czechoslovakia.
Historic cupola at the Ondřejov observatory, the official site of the Czech Astronomical Society. (Credit: Wikimedia Commons) The activities and overall visibility of the ČAS were greatly enhanced after 1989 when it revived its international contacts and also became an Affiliated Society of the EAS. ČAS recently became an Organisational Member of the EAS. The Society co-organized the EWASS conference in Prague in 2017 when the Society celebrated its 100th anniversary. Today ČAS is closely linked to Czech professional institutions, namely the Astronomical Institute of the Czech Academy of Sciences (the official site of the ČAS is at the Ondřejov Observatory near Prague) and to Czech universities teaching astronomy and astrophysics. On the other hand, many ČAS members work at public observatories or are closely cooperating with them. Professional astronomy in the Czech Republic is governed by the Czech National Committee for Astronomy, the section of ČAS that coordinates its activities towards the IAU or EAS. The Society also largely profits from the fact that our country became a member state of ESO (since 2007) and of ESA (since 2008). The Czech Republic is thus involved in large European projects such as ESO's observatories (VLT, ALMA, E-ELT), the European Solar Telescope (EST) to be built on Canary Islands, the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA), and key ESA's current and forthcoming space missions like Solar Orbiter, JUICE, Athena, and LISA. Prof. Petr Heinzel President of the ČAS http://www.astro.cz http://www.asu.cas.cz EAS News
Defining a science vision and infrastructure roadmap for European Astronomy
ASTRONET Roadmap webinar hosted by EAS, 11 June 2021
ASTRONET is a consortium of European research funding bodies and national representatives purposed with developing a new science vision and roadmap, taking forward the pioneering and influential reports last updated around 2015. It includes as associates and observers ESA, ESO and the SKA and has close links to APPEC and the EAS.
Contributed News
The OPTICON-RadioNet Pilot
A new initiative under the EU's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme
OPTICON and RadioNet have not only transformed the way European astronomers work together but also enabled key discoveries in recent years including imaging the environment of the black hole in M87 and the multi-wavelength follow-up of the neutron star merger GW170817. Building on that success, the European Commission (EC) invited OPTICON and RadioNet to join forces and bid for a new type of contract, alongside similar initiatives in atmospheric science and nano-technology, as "Pilot" programmes for Horizon Europe to show how EC support can open up access and realise these collaborative gains on an even larger thematic scale.
The OPTICON-RadioNet Pilot logo. The ORP will develop a strategic vision to enable European astronomers to make the best use of current and new facilities over the next decades. It will engage the community across a wide range of stakeholders including funding agencies, international organisations, infrastructures and users. It will consider a range of options to access infrastructures at all scales and how the EC can help to widen this access further still. At the practical level, the ORP will develop new tools to enable astronomers throughout our community to use the telescopes which they need to accomplish their science goals, including new proposal tools, improved support systems and data processing frameworks designed to allow scientists to use and coordinate observations from multiple facilities across the electromagnetic spectrum. Cross-domain training schools will help to train the next generation of multi-wavelength astronomers. Finally, the ORP will investigate and improve instrument performance, including adaptive optics research, and ensure effective dissemination of these results to the entire community via workshops and schools. Further details of these activities will feature in future EAS newsletters.
Optical and radio telescopes participating to the ORP programme. Access to Europe's largest and most powerful radio telescopes and arrays, from sub-mm to metre wavelengths will be offered via a converging proposal process, with the ultimate aim that the same mechanism can be used to apply to all ORP facilities. These facilities include large single dishes (Effelsberg, SRT , 30m Pico Veleta and APEX) and powerful arrays at all wavelengths: the European VLBI Network, LOFAR, e-MERLIN, and NOEMA. Archive access will be enabled for the WSRT survey system Apertif, (ALTA) and the LOFAR Long Term Archive (LTA) through the virtual access process. The European ALMA users will be supported at all stages from conception of a scientific objective to publication of the results through transnational access to the European ARC network (ARC), including the visits at ARCs. Time domain astronomy will benefit from virtual access to a large and growing suite of small and medium sized optical, infrared and potentially radio facilities combined with new tools to identify, prioritise and co-ordinate observations of transients and sources meriting long time monitoring. A key tool for this will be a Target Observation Manager which is an interface for viewing and sharing photometric and spectroscopic data of time-domain targets. A dedicated activity will offer transnational access to the CANARY adaptive optics testbed at the 4.2m William Herschel Telescope providing both telescope time and technical support to AO experiments needing on-sky testing to show proof of concepts for new ideas. Optical interferometry will be supported by both new tools for access to and data reduction for instruments such as the GRAVITY and Hi-5/Viking instruments at the VLTI. This will be complimented by training schools and a network of VLTI expertise centres modelled on the ALMA regional nodes. ORP will also address the increasing threat to both optical and radio astronomy from new mega-constellations of low-orbit satellites designed to provide ubiquitous internet coverage. The work will include quantification and mitigation of the impact as well as policy issues in both the optical and radio domains. You can learn more about the ORP by visiting its website or attending the session to take place at the virtual EAS Annual Meeting in June. This project is funded under the European Union's Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under grant agreement No 101004719. The ORP Team
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