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ESO
The European Southern Observatory designs, builds & operates world-class observatories on the ground for the benefit of society   🇨🇱 @ESO_Chile
Sep 22, 2022 6 tweets 3 min read
1/ Using @almaobs , astronomers have found a hot bubble of gas swirling around Sagittarius A* the black hole at the centre of our galaxy, at 30% of the speed of light.
🔗 eso.org/public/news/es…

Image & artist’s illustration: @ehtelescope , @ESO /M. Kornmesser. Ack.: M. Wielgus Image 2/ Clues about this bubble were hidden in ALMA data obtained in 2017 as part of observations with the Event Horizon Telescope.
Sep 9, 2022 4 tweets 2 min read
1/ Like in this image of the star Albireo with Starlink satellites, an increasing number of satellites will be detectable above all astronomical observatories. #ProtectDarkSkies
Credit: Rafael Schmall Image 2/ We are actively involved in research to study the potential effects of new satellite constellations. Our studies found that telescopes such as our VLT and ELT will be “moderately affected” by these satellites. (3% of twilight observations) #ProtectDarkSkies
May 12, 2022 25 tweets 9 min read
📢 Breaking news: Meet the Black Hole at the Centre of our Galaxy! Astronomers have unveiled the 1st image of the supermassive black hole at the centre of the Milky Way. The image was produced by a global research team @ehtelescope 📷EHT Collaboration “It is very exciting for ESO to have been playing such an important role in unravelling the mysteries of black holes, and of Sgr A* in particular, over so many years,” commented ESO Director General @xbarcons 👇
May 12, 2022 4 tweets 1 min read
1/ Do you want to play some Wordle with us? 2/ One more guess:
Jan 13, 2022 4 tweets 4 min read
1/ It’s #ESOUsersDay, and we’d like to congratulate our colleague @cfmanara , astronomer at ESO in Garching, who has been awarded an @ERC_Research Starting Grant! #ERCStG His project will investigate the origin of the rings & asymmetric structures in protoplanetary discs. Image @cfmanara @ERC_Research 2/ His project uses VLT instruments like X-Shooter, ESPRESSO, UVES, CRIRES+, SPHERE & MUSE as well as @almaobs The goal is to study the signatures that planets and winds leave on discs, pushing current studies to distant and massive star-forming regions and preparing for the ELT
Jan 12, 2022 6 tweets 8 min read
1/ Did you watch #DontLookUp by @GhostPanther ? Fun fact: when Dr. Mindy is scribbling orbital equations on a whiteboard, that’s actually our own @MichaelMarsset , currently an @ESO fellow in Chile! Image @GhostPanther @MichaelMarsset 2/ Michaël is an expert on asteroids, having used our VLT to study their shapes and formation history. In 2020 he was a postdoc at @MIT and when the movie team reached out looking for a "double" for that scene, he didn't think twice.

Credit: @ESO /M. Marsset Image
Jul 22, 2021 5 tweets 4 min read
1/ Astronomers made the first clear detection of a moon-forming disc around an exoplanet, using @ALMAObs , in which ESO is a partner.

🔗eso.org/public/news/es…
Credit: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO)/Benisty et al. 2/ The disc in question, called a circumplanetary disc, surrounds the exoplanet PDS 70c, one of two giant, Jupiter-like planets orbiting a star nearly 400 light-years away.

Credit: @ESO /L. Calçada, ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO)/Benisty et al.
Sep 4, 2020 20 tweets 6 min read
1/20 Happy 20th anniversary UT4! Do you know this giant telescope, part of the Very Large Telescope (VLT) at @ESO ’s Paranal Observatory? You might recognise it from its cool lasers pointing at the sky. Does this sound like science fiction? We open this thread to tell the story. 2/20 The 4th Unit Telescope of ESO’s VLT is known as UT4 or Yepun, meaning Venus or evening star in Mapudungun, an indigenous language of Chile. It has a main mirror 8.2 metres in diameter and weighs around 430 tonnes.
May 20, 2020 4 tweets 3 min read
1/4 Observations with ESO’s SPHERE instrument on the Very Large Telescope have revealed the telltale signs of a star system being born.
Credit: @ESO /Boccaletti et al.
eso.org/public/news/es… Image 2/4 The young system, AB Aurigae, lies only 520 light-years away from Earth in the Auriga constellation.
Credit: @ESO /Boccaletti et al. /M. Kornmesser
Jan 13, 2020 10 tweets 7 min read
1/10 All eyes on #Betelgeuse these days. What’s happening to this well-known star in the constellation of #Orion? 2/10 Normally one of the brightest stars in the sky, it’s now fainter than ever before in recorded history.
Oct 8, 2019 8 tweets 3 min read
1/ Michel Mayor & Didier Queloz have been awarded the #NobelPrize2019 in Physics for the discovery of the first exoplanet around a Sun-like star.
eso.org/public/announc… 2/ The discovery of exoplanet #51Pegasib was announced on 6 October 1995 by Mayor and Queloz, who detected it using the ELODIE spectrograph at the Observatoire de Haute-Provence in France.