The Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences has decided to award the Nobel Prize in Physics for 2013 to: François Englert (Université Libre de Bruxelles, Brussels, Belgium), Peter W. Higgs (University of Edinburgh, UK), for the theoretical discovery of a mechanism that contributes to our understanding of the origin of mass of subatomic particles, and which recently was confirmed through the discovery of the predicted fundamental particle by ATLAS and CMS experiments at CERN's Large Hadron Collider.

Barcelona, 04.09.2013 Next Saturday, September the 7th, the stratospheric probe SonCube will be launched for the second time around from MónNatura Pirineus (Les Planes de Son, Pallars Sobirà), propelled by a helium balloon and carrying several cameras, as well as experiments designed by high school students.

This time over, the centres taking part in the project include the Institut d’Estudis Espacials de Catalunya, the Universitat de Barcelona and the Fundació Catalunya – La Pedrera, which have organized the contest “SonCube: experimenta a la frontera de l’espai”, thanks to which the winning students Marta Puig and Ada Fontrodona, and their teacher Gerard Farràs (Escola Arrels, Solsona) have had the opportunity to design and and build the main experiment aboard SonCube, which will assess and measure the presence of different gases in the stratosphere.

The project of this low-cost probe was begun in 2012 by a group of space-sciences enthusiasts. SonCube's first rise into the stratosphere took place on August the 11th of that same year, and the probe rose to well over 30000 meters of altitude, yielding
spectacular images and demonstrating the interesting educational applications of the project.

For SonCube's second voyage, the cost of the contest-winning experiment, as well as that of the new instruments fitted into the probe and the material necessary for the launching, have been financed through a very successful micro-sponsorship program, which managed to put together a 50% more than the expected quantity.

Weather permitting, SonCube's launch will take place on Saturday September the 7th at around 11 am and this will be the first time we will be able to witness its adventure towards space real-time online (www.soncube.com). This is the first time a probe of its characteristics will broadcast the images, as well as its position and the data collected by the sensors onboard. The event is also open to the public at MónNatura Pirineus, from where SonCube's launch and subsequent flight towards the space's frontier can be witnessed.

An analysis of data from the LHCb experiment at the CERN particle-physics lab suggests that the B-meson could decay in a way not predicted by the Standard Model of particle physics, according to theoretical physicists in Spain and France. The researchers believe that the deviation from the Standard Model has been measured with a confidence of 4.5σ – which is approaching the gold standard of 5σ required for a discovery in particle physics.
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El consorcio del Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA, http://www.cta-observatory.org/) celebra la primera reunión del grupo de trabajo Central Calibration Facilities (CCF), desde que se creó el mes de mayo de 2013. Durante la reunión se tratarán tres aspectos de los cuales el grupo de trabajo CCF es responsable: la calibración de las cámeras de los telescopios, la calibración entre telescopios y la calibración atmosférica. Unos 25 participantes discutirán sobre los posibles diseños y los prototipos del sistema de calibración, y se acordarán las directrices comunes y los requerimientos de los sistemas en cuanto a precisión y futuras actualizaciones. Ésta es la primera de una serie de reuniones del grupo de trabajo CCF, que se celebrarán cada 6 meses de ahora en adelante.