Science Users Information

These pages are aimed at ESO community astronomers and contain all the information required in order to prepare, execute, process and exploit observations with ESO facilities. They also provide information on the scientific activities taking place at ESO. Details can be accessed via the navigation menu.


ESO Science Announcements

Call for Proposals for ALMA Development Studies

Published: 28 May 2025

ESO is pleased to announce the Call for Proposals (CfP) for development studies for ALMA upgrades, with a deadline for proposal submission on Wednesday 27 August 2025 at 11:00am CEST. Interested institutes should register on the In-Tend portal and express interest in the ALMA Development Studies 2025 with reference FCFP-129429-AMA. The specific focus of this call includes the relevance to the implementation of the ALMA Development Roadmap priorities, and particularly the development of new receiver components allowing an expansion to 4x the current IF bandwidth, as well as software initiatives that enable and maximize the science output of the Wideband Sensitivity Upgrade.

4MOST Survey Management Plan Published

Published: 27 May 2025

Following an extended review and acceptance process, the 4MOST survey management plan (SMP) for the five year public surveys is now available. The 4MOST SMP documents describe the timeline of the public releases, the project organisation, the preparation and data acquisition, data processing and publication of the science data products. It includes an extended description of the single surveys, with detailed specific information on the target selection and on the science data products associated with the individual science cases. While the raw data are immediately public, the science data products will be released according to the data release plan detailed in the document available from the 4MOST SMP web page.

SOXS Day, 1st July 2025, ESO-Garching bei München

Published: 27 May 2025

ESO will host a SOXS day on July 1, 2025, to present the SOXS instrument and its science opportunitites to the community. During this day, talks will be delivered on the instrument capabilites and the operations model, the science opportunities and the GTO programme, and the policies that will govern the operations of SOXS. Further, there will be time for questions and discussions. The meeting will be held at the ESO HQ in Garching in hybrid mode. Potential participants are kindly asked to register.

ESO Summer School: "Writing and Communicating your Science", 4-8 August 2025, Garching near Munich, Germany

Published: 23 May 2025

Good science deserves great communication! ESO is pleased to announce the first ESO science writing school, which will take place over one week in August, at the ESO headquarters in Garching, Germany. This school is designed to empower (mostly) PhD students and early-career postdocs with the tools and confidence to effectively present their scientific research – both in writing and in person.

Release of NIRPS Pipeline Reduced Spectra

Published: 20 May 2025

This is the collection of reduced spectra from the high-resolution near-infrared spectrograph NIRPS (Near Infra-Red Planet Searcher) in operation at the ESO La Silla 3.6m telescope. NIRPS complements HARPS, extending its capability into the infrared. It offers a wavelength range from 970 to 1850 nm. The median resolving power is 82000 in the High Accuracy mode and 75000 in High Efficiency mode.

The Messenger

The Messenger 194 is now available. Highlights include:

  • Doyon, R., Bouchy, F. et al.: NIRPS Joins HARPS: Setting New Standards at Infrared Wavelengths
  • Nazari, P., Jerabkova, T. et al.: Artificial Intelligence Usage by ESO Telescope Users
  • De Breuck, C., Díaz Trigo, M.: The Promises and Challenges of the ALMA Wideband Sensitivity Upgrade

The ESO Science Newsletter

The April 2025 issue is now available.

The ESO Science Newsletter, mailed approximately once per month, presents the most recent announcements. Subscription is controlled through the Manage Profile link on the User Portal. Back issues (2013-) are archived.


Citing ESO data in research papers

Researchers are kindly asked to indicate the identifiers (programme IDs or Data DOIs) of the (new or archival) observations they used in their papers as explained in ESO’s data citation policy. This enables the telbib curators to cross-link research output to make data Findabie, Accessible, Interoperable, and Reusable as suggested by the FAIR Principles.  


Pitch Your Research to ESO COMM

Are you an author on an upcoming scientific study based on ESO data that could be relevant to journalists or the wider public? Or are you a Principal Investigator on ESO observations with potential to become stunning images? If so, please consider sending to ESO your paper and/or a preview of the image(s) obtained with ESO telescopes.