They talked about the Spanish participation in the event processor of the Athena mission and the X-IFU instrument
April 22nd, 2022
The TEC2SPACE-CM network, created for the development of new technologies in space instrumentation, has organized RIA-Tec2Space conference to discuss the state of astronomical instrumentation in Spain. The event is held at CSIC headquarters and has the support of the Infrastructure Network in Astronomy (RIA) of the Ministry of Science and Innovation, in collaboration with the Center for Technological and Industrial Development (CDTI) and the State Research Agency (Coordinators of the Areas of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Space).
The meeting was attended by IFCA researchers of Galaxies and AGNs group, Beatriz Cobo and Maite Ceballos, to explain the operation of Athena space mission, IFCA's participation in the event processor of the X-IFU instrument, the software developed at IFCA, SIRENA, the application of machine learning to improve the detection and reconstruction of events and future lines of work.
Maite Ceballos and Beatriz Cobo yesterday at the RIA-Tec2Space meeting
RIA-Tec2Space is aimed at national groups and companies interested in the development of astronomical instrumentation, both ground and space, and this particular edition focuses on fostering opportunities for collaboration in space science, opening a forum for discussion to the national astronomical community involved in the development of instruments. In addition, the conference aims to be a meeting point to learn about and discuss opportunities for Spanish entities to participate in ground and space science programs, including both the research community and companies.
Galaxies and AGNs at IFCA
Galaxies and AGNs group investigates the evolution of galaxies throughout cosmic history. In particular, discovering how and when stars formed in galaxies, how and when supermassive black holes grew at their center and what is the relationship between both processes, known as feedback. These studies extend from the local universe to the earliest and most distant galaxies that formed, but with special emphasis on the epoch of greatest activity, when the universe was 20-50% of its present age (z~1-3).
To this end, the group carries out astronomical observations across the entire electromagnetic spectrum, from radio, including infrared, optical and X-rays, both for individual sources and as part of multi-wavelength surveys (leading some of them, such as the Bright Ultra-hard XMM-Newton Survey -BUXS-). Competitive access to the most important astronomical observatories on the ground (VLT and ALMA at ESO, IRAM, VLA/Jansky, Effelsberg, EVN, GTC, ORM, CAHA, etc.) and in space (XMM-Newton, Spitzer, Herschel) is in itself a fundamental objective for the group, since scientific advances depend to a large extent on it.
In the field of large infrastructures in astronomy as well as advanced astronomical instrumentation associated with them, the group participates in leading positions in the most competitive projects in Spain, Europe and the world. Some members of the group have relevant positions in future space missions such as Athena (ESA), and in ground-based observatories such as GTC, OAJ and ESO.
For Maite Ceballos the meeting "has demonstrated the importance of science, technology and industry walking hand in hand to advance the development of astronomical instrumentation in Spain and has laid the groundwork to strengthen this collaboration in the future".
