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The Institute of Cosmos Sciences and the Department of Quantum Physics and Astrophysics of the University of Barcelona will be represented by "Mission Gaia" and"Ultracold UB" workshops at "Saló de l'Ensenyament" (or "Learning Hall"), which will take place from the 22nd through the 26th of March at Montjuic.
These two workshops will be held at the UB stand, coordinated by UB Divulga (UB Reports) at Espai Ciència (the Science Space).
"Gaia Mission" workshop
This workshop will show various materials and activities related to mapping the sky and measuring stellar distances, and in particular those used in Gaia, a mission of the European Space Agency that has a relevant UB participation.
"Ultracold UB" Outreach on Quantum Mechanics and Ultracold Gases
Participants will be able to learn about some of the most relevant phenomena of quantum mechanics, modeled after current research in physics laboratories on ultracold gases. Quantum technologies will be of great importance in the near future incomputing and cryptography techniques and information handling. This makes it interesting for the general population to acquire a minimum familiarity with its most fascinating aspects. All the material in this workshop has been made in open code by university students of the Faculty of Physics of the University of Barcelona.
The workshop consists of computer simulations of several experiments in which the quantum properties of matter are revealed. For example, the simulation of the movement of a set of ultra-cold atoms trapped in a potential well (analogous with the movement of a pendulum), the simulation of the movement of a soliton of anatomic gas at 0 K, and the simulation of a quantum Newton pendulum. At the end of the workshop the participants will receive one of the simulations by e-mail.
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Gaia Mission and Ultracold UB at the Espai ciencia of the Sa
The ICCUB members Jordi Torra and Jordi Portell will participate in the conference 'Gaia: Three years studying the Galaxy', one of the conferences included in the series “Diálogos de Espacio” organized by the Basque firm SENERto celebrate the 50th anniversary of its Space division.
SENER
SENER
Sener is among the Spanish firms with a higher contribution to the Gaia Mission. In particular, SENER has participated in Gaia by developing the mission deployable sunshield and the positioning mechanism for the secondary mirrors of the telescopes linking the reflector mirror to the optical bench.
The Gaia Mission
The Gaia Mission by the European Space Agency (ESA) was launched in December 2013. Since then, it has repeatedly observed more than a billion stars and other celestial objects, listed in its first star catalog, which was published on 14 September 2016.
ICCUB researchers have a leading role at the highest technological, scientific and management levels of the Gaia Data Processing & Analysis Consortium (DPAC). They have responsibilities in the Simulations, Core Processing and Photometry units, and they manage the Data Processing Center of Barcelona.
Read more about:
- The event: http://www.pioneeringspace.sener/conference
- Sener contribution to Gaia: http://www.engineeringandconstruction.sener/press-releases/sener-outstanding-participation-gaia-mission
- Sener contribution to Gaia: http://icc.ub.edu/research/key_projects/gaia
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Jordi Torra and Jordi Portell will give a talk to celebrate
On 2nd March, students from secondary schools will be closer to Quantum Mechanics and Ultracold Gases. Bruno Julià, Ramón y Cajal researcher at the Institute of Cosmos Sciences and the Department of Quantum Physics and Astrophysics of the UB, has organised the workshop "Ultracold UB. Outreach on Quantum Mechanics and Ultracold Gases" which will represent the University of Barcelona at the Youth Mobile Festival.
YOMO, the Youth Mobile Festival, is an event of the Mobile World Congress devoted to Science and Technology for young people. It is organized with the collaboration of the Departament d'Ensenyament de la Generalitat de Catalunya.
The Workshop
Instructors: Bruno Julià (in charge); Muntsa Guilleumas, Artur Polls; and the students: María Arazo, Laura Moreno, Ivan Morera, & Alejandro Romero.
Age: Over 16
Place: stand #32 Fira de Montjuic
Participants will be able to learn about some of the most relevant phenomena of quantum mechanics, taking as an example the current research in physics laboratories of ultracold gases. Quantum technologies will be of great importance in the near future in both computing and cryptography techniques and information handling. This makes it essential that the whole population acquires a minimum familiarity with its most fascinating aspects. All the material of this workshop has been made in open code by university course students of the Faculty of Physics of the University of Barcelona.
The workshop consists of making simulations with computers of several experiments in which the quantum properties of matter are revealed. In particular, the simulation of the movement of a set of ultra-cold atoms trapped in a potential well (analogy with the movement of a pendulum), the simulation of the movement of a soliton in an atomic gas at temperature 0 K or the simulation of a quantum Newton pendulum. At the end of the simulation the participants will receive one of the simulations made by e-mail.
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A workshop on Quantum Mechanics represents UB at YOMO
To celebrate the "International Day of Women and Girls in Science", the supplement of the ARA newspaper published an article about the presence of researcher women in Astronomy, commented by Cesca Figueras, an ICCUB researcher and the president of the Spanish Astronomy Society.
In the article, Cesca Figueras point out "we are progressing very slowly with the famous scissor effect graphic, which shows how the student and graduate women are the majority but also how it is inverted when women occupy fixed positions or responsibility". Figueras also highlights the low female presence in the professorial chairs of the Spanish public universities, currently situated at 21%.
The text continues with a review of the book written by the North American journalist and scientist Dava Sobel 'The Crystal Universe', which talks about the women researchers of the Harvard Observatory. In addition, the article highlights the role of Assumpció Català in Catalan Science.
Image: Gaia researchers at UB / FRANCESC MELCION
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Cesca Figueras comments on the role of women in astronomy in
Composite Image of the last Penumbral Lunar Eclipse from friday night (10-11/02/2017) taken by Eduard Masana.
+Information about the Eclipse
+Information about the Eclipse
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Composite Image of the last Lunar Eclipse (10-11/02/2017)
The exhibitions "Telescopi Assumpció Català" and "Amb A d'AstrònomA" are exhibited these days in the Faculty of Mathematics and Computer Sciences of the University of Barcelona, and in the Faculty of Sciences of the Autonomous University of Barcelona, on the occasion of The celebration of the International Day of Girls and Women in Science.
Telescopi Assumpció Català
Amb A d'AstrònomA
Telescopi Assumpció Català
Amb A d'AstrònomA
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The Day of the Girl an Woman in Science celebrated by the ex
Some 200 astronomers, scientists, engineers and programmers from the Data Processing and Analysis Consortium (DPAC) of the Gaia mission, met in Sitges from 23 to 27 January 2017. During this meeting, experts from various units and centers had the opportunity to share their progress in the mission and the results obtained so far, including those obtained from the first publication of the data made just last September. Upcoming tasks of development and implementation were also discussed, especially for the next publication and beyond. The large attendance, the several parallel meetings, and the results shown at the meeting all attest to the excellent progress of the mission and the smooth functioning of the consortium.
Web of the meeting: http://icc.ub.edu/congress/dpac2017/
Picture's album: http://icc.ub.edu/congress/dpac2017/images/album/
Interview with the ICCUB researcher X. Luri recorded during the meeting, Miracel Radio (Sitges): http://icc.ub.edu/news/314
http://www.ub.edu/web/ub/ca/menu_eines/noticies/2017/fotonoticies/001.html
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DPAC meeting attests to the excellent progress of Gaia missi
ICCUB member and former director Domènec Espriu has taken office as the new vice rector of research at the University of Barcelona (UB). He is part of the governing team of the recently appointed rector of the UB, professor Joan Elias.
In the recent elections for the Rector’s Office which took place on November 28th and December 1st, Dr. Joan Elias, professor of Mathematics, was elected after having obtained 53,07% of the weighted vote. The new rector took office on December 19 and the following day various vice rectors were appointed, among them the ICCUB member and former director Domènec Espriu.
Domènec Espriu works on particle physics phenomenology. He obtained his doctoral PhD in 1982, and after several postdoctoral and professor positions at the University of Oxford, Harvard University, University of Valencia and CERN, he joined the particle physics group at the University of Barcelona, then lead by the late professor Pere Pascual.
Apart of his contributions to physics as university professor, Dr. Espriu has occupied several other positions. During 2000-2003 he was head of the ECM department at the UB, and during 2004-2007 he was in charge of the Spanish Funding Agency for Particle Physics, supporting, among other contributions, the construction and start-up of the Canfranc Underground Astrophysics Laboratory and the CPAN (National Center for Particle, Astroparticle and Nuclear Physics) project. He was also vice-chairman of the Astroparticle Physics European Coordination Committee during this period, and member of various other committees. Dr. Espriu also promoted the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (ICCUB), created in November 2006, and became its first director in 2007. During the period 2008-2012 he was the first chairman of the LHC computing scrutiny group by appointment of the CERN Director-General.
The governing team of professor Joan Elias has declared that one of their main objectives is to provide a significant boost to research at the UB. The UB is already the top-ranked Spanish University and the only Spanish University that is a member of the European League of Research Universities (LERU). The so-called UB-100 strategy advocated by the new Rector aims at placing the UB among the top 100 universities worldwide in the medium term.
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Domènec Espriu, new research vice rector of the UB
The Gaia UB group with the Joan Oró Telescope at Montsec has participated in the elaboration of the light curve of the microlensing event Gaia 16aye which is the image of the week of the ESA's Gaia page.
The lens of the Gaia16aye event, a little unusual because it was found towards the Galactic spiral arms, is likely to be a binary star system.
Gaia16aye is the perfect example of the importance of ground-based follow-up of Gaia Alerts, carried out by professionals but also by amateur astronomers, which can make a huge scientific impact
The Gaia Science Alerts project has already reported more than 1000 transient events, mainly dominated by supernovae and cataclysmic variables. In July and August 2016 the first microlensing events were detected. Microlensing happens when light rays from a distant star (we call this the source) are bent by the space-time curvature of an object (e.g. a star, a planet, or a black hole), lying exactly between the observer and the distant star. This hitherto unseen object is called the lens, and being closer to us, and moving faster across the sky, leads to a sometimes dramatic increase (and then decrease) in the brightness of the background source. These two Gaia events are a little unusual, because they were found towards the Galactic spiral arms, while most microlensing events are found in studies which concentrate on the central region (the Bulge) of the Milky Way.
The first microlensing event, called Gaia16aua, was identified independently by both Gaia and by the ground-based Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE). The second microlensing event, called Gaia16aye, might be even more exciting showing an interesting lightcurve as shown in the figure above.
Gaia16aye has been followed-up from the ground very intensively and more than 6000 data points were collected so far by a dedicated follow-up team (listed at the end). The light curve of the event exhibits characteristic U-shaped changes and sudden sharp increases and decreases in brightness. These distinctive features are typical for a microlensing event when the lens is not a single object, but rather a pair. In this case the lens is likely to be a binary star system sitting in its complicated space-time geometry. This creates caustics, which lead to sudden jumps in brightness when crossed by the light rays from the lensed source.
As can be seen in the figure, the model predicts another sharp rise in brightness which is expected to happen in the first or second week of November 2016. We are currently waiting for the final predicted re-brightening, which will help solve the puzzle of the exact nature of the components of the binary system. Gaia16aye is the perfect example of the importance of ground-based follow-up of Gaia Alerts, carried out by professionals but also by amateur astronomers, which can make a huge scientific impact. Indeed, it would have been quite difficult to confirm Gaia16aye as a microlensing event without the extra follow-up, and certainly the binary nature of the lens, and constraints on the system components would be impossible.
Gaia Alerts
The Gaia satellite is an European Space Agency mission to map out our own galaxy, the Milky Way. To do this, Gaia will look at the entire sky over and over for five years, so that it can track the positions of the stars over time. But while Gaia is looking at the sky, it will also spot thousands of transients.
A transient is anything which appears, disappears or changes in the sky. Some of these transients can be stars exploding as supernovae, or black holes swallowing stars. The Gaia Alerts project is working to find out such events in the data from Gaia, and announce them to the world in real time.
When a transient is detected by Gaia an alert is triggered and the follow-up network of ground-based telescopes starts its work in order to give more information about the phenomenon.
The Gaia Science Alert Project invites amateur astronomers and scholars to contribute to the investigations. The information about participation terms are available at https://gaia.ac.uk/alerts
Joan Oró Telescope (TJO)
The Observatori Astronòmic del Montsec with the Telescopi Joan Oró is the third most contributing observatory among all of the participants in the Gaia photometric science alert project.
Telescopi Joan Oró has the capability to change the observatory scheduling in real time with the minimal human interaction as requires the Transient phenomena.
More information on Montsec Observatory can be found at www.oadm.cat/en/.
ESA news
The observatories already involved in following up this event are:
AAVSO, USA
APT2, Italy
Aristarchos Telescope, Greece
ASAS-SN, Hawaii, USA
Asiago, Italy
ASV, Serbia
Bialkow, Poland
Kryoneri, Greece
Leicester University, UK
LCOGT/SUPAscope network
Liverpool Telescope, La Palma, Spain
Loiano, INAF-OABO, Italy
Joan Oró Telescope, Montsec, Spain
Mercator, La Palma, Spain
Montarrenti, Italy
NOT, La Palma, Spain
Ondrejov, Czechia
OmicronC2PU, France
Ostrowik, Poland
Palomar 200-inch telescope (P200), Caltech, USA
PIRATE, Tenerife, Spain
pt5m, La Palma, Spain
RTT150, Turkey
SALT, South Africa
Skinakas, Greece
Sternberg Observatory, Russia
T100, Turkey
T60, Turkey
UBT60, Turkey
University College London, UK
Watcher, South Africa
Wise, Israel
Yerkes-41, USA
The lens of the Gaia16aye event, a little unusual because it was found towards the Galactic spiral arms, is likely to be a binary star system.
Gaia16aye is the perfect example of the importance of ground-based follow-up of Gaia Alerts, carried out by professionals but also by amateur astronomers, which can make a huge scientific impact
The Gaia Science Alerts project has already reported more than 1000 transient events, mainly dominated by supernovae and cataclysmic variables. In July and August 2016 the first microlensing events were detected. Microlensing happens when light rays from a distant star (we call this the source) are bent by the space-time curvature of an object (e.g. a star, a planet, or a black hole), lying exactly between the observer and the distant star. This hitherto unseen object is called the lens, and being closer to us, and moving faster across the sky, leads to a sometimes dramatic increase (and then decrease) in the brightness of the background source. These two Gaia events are a little unusual, because they were found towards the Galactic spiral arms, while most microlensing events are found in studies which concentrate on the central region (the Bulge) of the Milky Way.
The first microlensing event, called Gaia16aua, was identified independently by both Gaia and by the ground-based Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE). The second microlensing event, called Gaia16aye, might be even more exciting showing an interesting lightcurve as shown in the figure above.
Gaia16aye has been followed-up from the ground very intensively and more than 6000 data points were collected so far by a dedicated follow-up team (listed at the end). The light curve of the event exhibits characteristic U-shaped changes and sudden sharp increases and decreases in brightness. These distinctive features are typical for a microlensing event when the lens is not a single object, but rather a pair. In this case the lens is likely to be a binary star system sitting in its complicated space-time geometry. This creates caustics, which lead to sudden jumps in brightness when crossed by the light rays from the lensed source.
As can be seen in the figure, the model predicts another sharp rise in brightness which is expected to happen in the first or second week of November 2016. We are currently waiting for the final predicted re-brightening, which will help solve the puzzle of the exact nature of the components of the binary system. Gaia16aye is the perfect example of the importance of ground-based follow-up of Gaia Alerts, carried out by professionals but also by amateur astronomers, which can make a huge scientific impact. Indeed, it would have been quite difficult to confirm Gaia16aye as a microlensing event without the extra follow-up, and certainly the binary nature of the lens, and constraints on the system components would be impossible.
Gaia Alerts
The Gaia satellite is an European Space Agency mission to map out our own galaxy, the Milky Way. To do this, Gaia will look at the entire sky over and over for five years, so that it can track the positions of the stars over time. But while Gaia is looking at the sky, it will also spot thousands of transients.
A transient is anything which appears, disappears or changes in the sky. Some of these transients can be stars exploding as supernovae, or black holes swallowing stars. The Gaia Alerts project is working to find out such events in the data from Gaia, and announce them to the world in real time.
When a transient is detected by Gaia an alert is triggered and the follow-up network of ground-based telescopes starts its work in order to give more information about the phenomenon.
The Gaia Science Alert Project invites amateur astronomers and scholars to contribute to the investigations. The information about participation terms are available at https://gaia.ac.uk/alerts
Joan Oró Telescope (TJO)
The Observatori Astronòmic del Montsec with the Telescopi Joan Oró is the third most contributing observatory among all of the participants in the Gaia photometric science alert project.
Telescopi Joan Oró has the capability to change the observatory scheduling in real time with the minimal human interaction as requires the Transient phenomena.
More information on Montsec Observatory can be found at www.oadm.cat/en/.
ESA news
The observatories already involved in following up this event are:
AAVSO, USA
APT2, Italy
Aristarchos Telescope, Greece
ASAS-SN, Hawaii, USA
Asiago, Italy
ASV, Serbia
Bialkow, Poland
Kryoneri, Greece
Leicester University, UK
LCOGT/SUPAscope network
Liverpool Telescope, La Palma, Spain
Loiano, INAF-OABO, Italy
Joan Oró Telescope, Montsec, Spain
Mercator, La Palma, Spain
Montarrenti, Italy
NOT, La Palma, Spain
Ondrejov, Czechia
OmicronC2PU, France
Ostrowik, Poland
Palomar 200-inch telescope (P200), Caltech, USA
PIRATE, Tenerife, Spain
pt5m, La Palma, Spain
RTT150, Turkey
SALT, South Africa
Skinakas, Greece
Sternberg Observatory, Russia
T100, Turkey
T60, Turkey
UBT60, Turkey
University College London, UK
Watcher, South Africa
Wise, Israel
Yerkes-41, USA
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Microlensing Follow up, image of the week on the ESA's Gaia
On Wednesday September 28, the Nobel Prize in Physics and NASA astrophysicist John C. Mather visited the facilities of the Institute of Cosmos Sciences (IEEC-UB) at the Faculty of Physics of the University of Barcelona accompanied by the institute director Lluís Garrido and the scientific director José María Paredes.
John C. Mather is the senior project manager of James Webb Space Telescope, which NASA plans to launch into space in 2018. During his visit students of the faculty had the opportunity to delve into this huge project with a John C. Mather conference at the Aula Magna Enric Casassas.
In front of a packed out auditorium, the winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 2006 explained that the James Webb Space Telescope will be the most powerful ever built. And that it will open new areas in astronomy, with observations ranging from the first stars, galaxies and black holes, to the growth of galaxies, the formation of stars and planetary systems, the evolution of planetary systems and living conditions here on earth, and perhaps elsewhere.
The visit finished with an informal meeting with ICCUB senior researchers and engineers, in which scientific issues that are currently being studied at ICCUB were discussed and new research proposals were made.
Mather compares the interpretation of the images we receive from space to the images of the audience of a football stadium. "We interpret images to know the history of the father who takes his son to football, those who have spent their lifetime going to the football stadium ... Similarly we must interpret images of space to know the story of the Universe," says Mather.
John C. Mather awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2006 for discovering the black body form and anisotropy of the cosmic microwave background.
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The laureate Nobel Prize in Physics John C. Mather visits th