End of May, the Norwegian Academy of Science and Letters announced that Ewine van Dishoeck, External Scientific Member at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics, is honoured with the 2018 Kavli Prize in Astrophysics “for her combined contributions to observational, theoretical, and laboratory astrochemistry, elucidating the life cycle of interstellar clouds and the formation of stars and planets”. [more]

This cosmic event was also observed in visible light and provides an explanation for gamma-ray bursts [more]

Simultaneous detections of a short Gamma-Ray Burst by Fermi/GBM, INTEGRAL, and as gravitational wave by LIGO/Virgo, followed by MPG/GROND multi-wavelength observations heralds the start of a new era in astronomy [more]

Ten observatories in six European countries teamed up for recent observations of a stellar occultation by the dwarf planet Haumea, which surprisingly show a narrow and dense ring orbiting the dwarf planet. In addition, the astronomers at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics and more than 50 further institutions were able to constrain the size, shape and density of Haumea,which are closer to theoretical predictions than previous estimates but still puzzling. [more]

Ten observatories put their sight on the dwarf planet [more]

The National Academy of Sciences Leopoldina honors Joachim Trümper, Director Emeritus at the MPE, with the Cothenius Medal for his outstanding scientific lifetime achievement. The award will be presented to Joachim Trümper at the opening ceremony of the Annual General Meeting of the Leopoldina on Friday, 22 September 2017, in Halle (Saale). [more]

For many years of work on instrument development for the far infrared, the German Astronomical Society awards the newly instituted Prize for Instrument Development to Albrecht Poglitsch. In particular, Albrecht Poglitsch developed the PACS instrument for ESA’s Herschel space telescope, which led to many important discoveries in star formation and development as well as for distant galaxies and AGNs. [more]