All News (2011 - ...)

The 2022 Gruber Cosmology Prize recognizes Frank Eisenhauer of the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics for the revolutionary design of instruments that collected seemingly irrefutable evidence for the existence of a black hole at the center of our Galaxy. The citation honors the “unprecedented and exquisite” precision of his instrumentation. more

When stars like our Sun use up all their fuel, they shrink to form white dwarfs. Sometimes such dead stars flare back to life in a super-hot explosion, called a “nova”, and produce a fireball of X-ray radiation. Using the eROSITA telescope on the SRG space observatory, a research team led by Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg (FAU) has now been able to observe such an explosion of X-ray light for the very first time. more

With a sophisticated combination of human and artificial intelligence, astronomers uncovered 1701 new asteroid trails in archival data of the Hubble Space Telescope spanning the past 20 years. While about one third could be identified and attributed to known objects, more than 1000 trails probably correspond to previously unknown asteroids. These unidentified asteroids are faint and likely smaller than asteroids detected in ground-based surveys. They could give the astronomers valuable clues about conditions in the early solar system, when the planets were formed. more

MPE scientist Natascha Förster Schreiber wins ERC Advanced Grant more

Astronomers at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics have found evidence that just before star formation, in the central region of a pre-stellar cloud, practically all heavy molecules freeze out on top of dust grains. The ALMA observations of the L1544 cloud in the constellation Taurus showed not only a central concentration of dust grains, but also revealed that molecules containing nitrogen as well those containing carbon, oxygen and all elements heavier than helium, are stored in thick icy mantles around the dust grains. These icy mantles are rich in water and organic molecules, precursors of pre-biotic molecules. The abundances are similar to those observed in leftover objects from the formation of our Solar System. more

Using a combination of observed stars and a realistic model of the Milky Way, scientists at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics have found a new structure in our home galaxy. Just outside the Galactic bar, they found an inner ring of metal rich stars, which are younger than the stars in the bar. The ages of the ring stars can be used to estimate that the bar must have formed at least 7 billion years ago.  The existence of this ring makes it likely that star formation from inflowing gas played an important role at these early epochs. more

The European Astronomical Society awards the 2022 Fritz Zwicky Prize for Astrophysics & Cosmology to Prof. Ewine F. van Dishoeck (Leiden University, the Netherlands and Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics). The Fritz Zwicky Prize for Astrophysics & Cosmology honours scientists who have obtained fundamental and outstanding results related to astrophysics and/or cosmology. more

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Today, the Royal Astronomical Society announced that the 2022 Jackson-Gwilt Medal is awarded to Frank Eisenhauer, senior staff scientist at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics. In the Infrared group there, Frank Eisenhauer has pioneered instrumentation for adaptive optics, integral-field spectroscopy, and optical/infrared interferometry. In particular, he has led the development of two instruments that have been crucial to the discovery and characterization of the supermassive black hole at the centre of our Galaxy: SINFONI and, most recently, GRAVITY. more

Great honour for Frank Eisenhauer: the General Assembly of the Académie des sciences, the Paris Academy of Sciences, has elected Frank Eisenhauer, scientist in the infrared group at MPE, as a foreign member. If the corona situation permits at this time, the official admission is to take place on 14 June 2022 in a formal ceremony in Paris. more

GRAVITY zooms in on stars around the supermassive black hole at the heart of our Milky Way more

The International Max Planck Research School on Astrophysics is celebrating its 20th birthday these days more