Institute of Astronomy

News and Press Releases

Dr Floor van Leeuwen awarded the 2021 Jackson-Gwilt Medal

Published on 19/01/2021 

Dr Floor van Leeuwen is awarded the Jackson-Gwilt Medal 2021 for his reprocessing of the entire Hipparcos Catalogue, which remains the reference for the most accurate and complete astrometric data for the brightest stars.

Dr Floor van Leeuwen was the leader of the small team at the Royal Greenwich Observatory who worked on the original analysis of the Hipparcos data alongside astronomers from other countries.

Roberto Maiolino awarded the Royal Society Research Professorship

Published on 15/01/2021 

Professor Roberto Maiolino, Director of the Kavli Institute for Cosmology, Cambridge, has been awarded the prestigious Royal Society Research Professorship. This is the Royal Society's premier research award and "provides long term support to world-class researchers of outstanding achievement” and enables them "to focus on ambitious and original research of the highest quality”.

Dr Kaisey Mandel awarded ERC Consolidator Grant

Published on 10/12/2020 

Dr Kaisey Mandel, the interdisciplinary University Lecturer on Astrostatistics at the Institute of Astronomy, KICC, and the Statistical Laboratory of the Department of Pure Mathematics and Mathematical Statistics, has been awarded a prestigious Consolidator Grant from the European Research Council.

Fast-moving gas flowing away from young star's asteroid belt may be caused by icy comet vaporisation

Published on 30/11/2020 

A unique stage of planetary system evolution has been imaged by astronomers, showing fast-moving carbon monoxide gas flowing away from a star system over 400 light years away, a discovery that provides an opportunity to study how our own solar system developed.

The Gaia Early Data Release 3

Published on 26/11/2020