Welcome!

The Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam (AIP) is dedicated to astrophysical questions ranging from the exploration of our Sun to the evolution of the cosmos. It focuses on the study of stellar, solar and exoplanetary physics, extragalactic astrophysics and the development of research technologies in the fields of spectroscopy, robotic telescopes and E-science.

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MUSE Ultra Deep Field
The Babelsberg research campus.On the left, the Schwarzschildhaus with its glass façade and peaked roof; on the right, the historic metal-domed building of the library.  In the background, the white main dome of the Humboldthaus is visible through trees.

Live Babelsberg Starry Night at 18th March 2025

On Tuesday, 18 March 2025, from 7.15 pm, the AIP invites you to a Babelsberg Starry Night live on the Babelsberg campus. Dr Tanya Urrutia will give a lecture on the topic ‘Hubble & Webb Deep Fields – Images of the Young Universe’.

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Last starlight for ground-breaking Gaia

The European Space Agency’s Milky Way-mapper Gaia has completed the sky-scanning phase of its mission, racking up more than three trillion observations over the last decade to revolutionise the view of our home galaxy and cosmic neighbourhood.

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Research Area I: Stellar, Solar and Exoplanetary Physics

Cosmic events are determined by two natural forces: gravity and magnetic fields. The magnetic field research at the AIP is mainly focused on magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) simulations, the magnetically induced activities on the Sun and the stars, solar coronaphysics as well as space weather in our solar system and on planets around other stars.

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Research Area II: Extragalactic Astrophysics

Galaxies are fundamental cosmic building blocks. At the largest scales, they serve as markers to study the distribution of matter in the universe - active galaxies and quasars are particularly important because of their intrinsic brightness. Nearby objects can be spatially resolved and consist of populations with very different patterns of motion, star formation histories and chemical abundances.

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Research Campus Babelsberg

On the Babelsberg campus of the Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam (AIP), you can take a journey through the history of astronomy from the beginning of the last century in just a few steps. In 1913, today's Humboldthaus became the new home of the Berlin Observatory, which moved from the ever-growing city to the then undisturbed Babelsberg night sky.

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On Tuesday, 18 March 2025, from 7.15 pm, the AIP invites you to a Babelsberg Starry Night live on the Babelsberg campus. Dr Tanya Urrutia will give a lecture on the topic ‘Hubble & Webb Deep Fields – Images of the Young Universe’.

The next talk of the Virtual Babelsberg Starry Nights of the Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam (AIP) on the topic "The age of stars – and how it can be determined" (German) by Dr. David Gruner will be broadcast on the YouTube channel “Urknall, Weltall und das Leben” (Big Bang, Universe and Life) from Thursday, 20.02.2025.

Learn about the work at the Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam.

 

Have you heard?

The Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam (AIP) has suspended communication on its X account (formerly Twitter). The decision reflects concerns about the current direction of the platform, which is seen as inconsistent with our values like openness, scientific integrity, transparency and democratic discourse. AIP will continue to share news via its website and other social media platforms, such as Mastodon and Bluesky.

Latest Publications

You Shall Not Pass! The Propagation of Low-/Moderate-powered Jets Through a Turbulent Interstellar Medium

Borodina, O., ... Weinberger, R., ...
The Astrophysical Journal, 981, 2, 149 – Published March 2025

Active Galactic Nucleus Feedback in Quiescent Galaxies at Cosmic Noon Traced by Ionized Gas Emission

Bugiani, L., ... Weinberger, R.
The Astrophysical Journal, 981, 1, 25 – Published March 2025

Automatic Machine Learning Framework to Study Morphological Parameters of AGN Host Galaxies within z < 1.4 in the Hyper Supreme-Cam Wide Survey

Tian, C., ... Powell, M. C., ...
The Astrophysical Journal, 981, 1, 5 – Published March 2025

Signatures of black hole seeding in the local Universe: predictions from the BRAHMA cosmological simulations

Bhowmick, A. K., ... Weinberger, R., ...
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 538, 1, 518 – Published March 2025

Precise and Accurate Mass and Radius Measurements of Fifteen Galactic Red Giants in Detached Eclipsing Binaries

Rowan, D. M., ... Ilyin, I., ...
The Open Journal of Astrophysics, 8, 18 – Published February 2025

Contemporaneous optical-radio observations of a fast radio burst in a close galaxy pair

Hanmer, K. Y., ... Brink, J., ...
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society – Published February 2025

Asymmetries and Circumstellar Interaction in the Type II SN 2024bch

Andrews, J. E., ... Ilyin, I., ...
The Astrophysical Journal, 980, 1, 37 – Published February 2025

ASTRAEUS: X. Indications of a top-heavy initial mass function in highly star-forming galaxies from JWST observations at z > 10

Hutter, A., ... Gottlöber, S., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A254 – Published February 2025

Detecting clusters and groups of galaxies populating the local Universe in large optical spectroscopic surveys

Marini, I., ... Lamer, G., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A207 – Published February 2025

Planetary inward migration as the potential cause of GJ 504's fast rotation and bright X-ray luminosity: New constraints from eROSITA

Pezzotti, C., ... Poppenhaeger, K.
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A179 – Published February 2025

Magnetic connectivity of coronal loops and flare-accelerated electrons in a B-class flare: Based on X-ray, EUV (DEM analysis), and type-III radio burst observations

Bröse, M., Vocks, C., Warmuth, A., Mann, G., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A188 – Published February 2025

A multi-wavelength view of the isolated neutron star eRASSU J065715.3+260428

Kurpas, J., Pires, A. M., Schwope, A. D., ... Traulsen, I.
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A160 – Published February 2025

Transit-timing variations in the AU Mic system observed with CHEOPS

Boldog, Á., ... Poppenhaeger, K., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A137 – Published February 2025

The MUSE eXtremely Deep Field: Classifying the spectral shapes of Lyα-emitting galaxies

Vitte, E., ... Pharo, J., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A100 – Published February 2025

State-dependent signatures of jets and winds in the optical and infrared spectrum of the black hole transient GX 339–4

Ambrifi, A., ... Cúneo, V. A., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A109 – Published February 2025

MusE GAs FLOw and Wind (MEGAFLOW): XII. Rationale and design of a Mg II survey of the cool circum-galactic medium with MUSE and UVES: The MEGAFLOW Survey

Bouché, N. F., ... Wisotzki, L., ... Weilbacher, P. M.
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A67 – Published February 2025

An intriguing coincidence between the majority of vast polar structure dwarfs and a recent major merger at the M31 position

Akib, I., Hammer, F., Yang, Y., Pawlowski, M. S., Wang, J.
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A66 – Published February 2025

Solar energetic particles injected inside and outside a magnetic cloud: The widespread solar energetic particle event on 2022 January 20

Rodríguez-García, L., ... Warmuth, A., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A64 – Published February 2025

Testing a proposed planarity tool for studying satellite systems: The alleged consistency of Milky Way satellite galaxy planes with ΛCDM

Pawlowski, M. S., Júlio, M. P., Kanehisa, K. J., Müller, O.
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, L4 – Published February 2025

Effects of secular growth and mergers on the evolution of metallicity gradients and azimuthal variations in a Milky Way-like galaxy

Renaud, F., Ratcliffe, B., Minchev, I., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 694, A56 – Published February 2025

A reference framework for extremely metal-poor OB star studies: calibrations for stellar parameters and intrinsic colours

Lorenzo, M., ... Castro, N., ...
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 537, 2, 1197 – Published February 2025

Figuring Out Gas and Galaxies In Enzo (FOGGIE). VIII. Complex and Stochastic Metallicity Gradients at z > 2

Acharyya, A., ... Augustin, R., ...
The Astrophysical Journal, 979, 2, 129 – Published February 2025

The VMC Survey - LI. Classifying extragalactic sources using a probabilistic random forest supervised machine learning algorithm

Pennock, C. M., ... Cioni, M.-R. L., ...
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 537, 2, 1028 – Published February 2025

Publisher Correction: Fine structures of a solar type III radio bursts observed with LOFAR

Dabrowski, B., ... Vocks, C., ... Bröse, M., ... Mann, G., ...
Acta Geophysica, 73, 1, 1021 – Published February 2025

Fine structures of a solar type III radio bursts observed with LOFAR

Dabrowski, B., ... Vocks, C., ... Bröse, M., ... Mann, G., ...
Acta Geophysica, 73, 1, 987 – Published February 2025

The Theory of Resonant Cosmic Ray–driven Instabilities—Growth and Saturation of Single Modes

Lemmerz, R., Shalaby, M., Pfrommer, C., Thomas, T.
The Astrophysical Journal, 979, 1, 34 – Published January 2025

Searching the Non-Accreting White Dwarf Population in eROSITA Data

Friedrich, S., ... Schwope, A., ...
Astronomische Nachrichten, 346, 1, e20240139 – Published January 2025

Determining the acceleration regions of in situ electrons using remote radio and X-ray observations

Morosan, D. E., ... Warmuth, A., ... Mann, G., Vocks, C., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 693, A296 – Published January 2025

Chemical Evolution of R-process Elements in Stars (CERES): III. Chemical abundances of neutron capture elements from Ba to Eu

Lombardo, L., ... Gallagher, A. J., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 693, A293 – Published January 2025

The eROSITA Final Equatorial Depth Survey (eFEDS): The hard X-ray selected sample

Nandra, K., ... Krumpe, M., Lamer, G., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 693, A212 – Published January 2025

[List of AIP publications] [AIP publications in ADS]

06.03.2025, 14:30 – 17.02.2025
Scientific
06.03.2025, 14:30 – 15:30
Scientific
10.03.2025, 19:00 – 20:00
Public Event

The AIP invites to a public observation evening in the Great Refractor at the Telegrafenberg in Potsdam.

Astrophysics depends on the knowledge of stellar parameters, structure and evolution; the more accurate the more insightful. The most accurate stellar parameters over a wide range of evolutionary stages are determined via the analysis of (detached) eclipsing binary systems, whereas stellar interior structure can be inferred from investigations of stellar oscillations - asteroseismology. However, there are some ambiguities in these methods that can be resolved applying both methods, to pulsating stars in binary systems. On the other hand, proximity effects can complicate such analysis - or be an asset. An example are the so-called tidally tilted pulsators, stars in close binary systems that have their pulsational axes tilted into the orbital plane by the gravitational pull of their companion. Such objects were serendipitously discovered in space photometric data from NASA's TESS mission. One of their assets is that one sees the pulsations over all aspect angles during an orbital cycle. This permits their association with the surface distortions they create, leading to pulsational mode identification, and thus overcomes of the most important obstacles for asteroseismology. Another useful feature of these objects is that the orbital and pulsational geometries depend on each other and can therefore be determined in two ways. Recently it has been realized that some of these objects pulsate around three different axes. A theory has been developed to explain the physical origin of triaxial pulsations and that predicts how these can be identified, and the first observational proofs have been obtained. Triaxial pulsators hold the promise to sound stellar interiors in 3D. In this presentation, this very new field of research will be reviewed and it is attempted to convey a good perception of the geometries involved.

18.03.2025, 19:15 – 21:00
Public Event

The AIP invites you to a live Babelsberg Starry Night at the Babelsberg campus:

19.03.2025 – 20.03.2025
Scientific

Participation only after registration. The registration is now closed.

20.03.2025, 20:00 – 21:00
Public Event

Talk (in German): Sterne im Computertomographen (Axel Schwope)

27.03.2025, 14:30 – 16:00
Scientific
29.03.2025, 11:00 – 13:30
Public Event

Public observations of the solar eclipse with lectures on the Sun.
On this day, the recently opened Astro⭐Bistro will offer snacks and drinks.

03.04.2025, 8:30 – 13:30
Public Event

Only for registered participants

03.04.2025, 14:30 – 15:30
Scientific
03.04.2025, 20:00 – 21:00
Public Event

The AIP invites to a public observation evening in the Great Refractor at the Telegrafenberg in Potsdam.

10.04.2025, 14:00 – 16:00
Scientific

TBD

Public Event
Scientific
Internal Event
Holidays