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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Man in white coat looks through telescope

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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Virtual lectures: Babelsberg Starry Night on 16.01.2025

The next talk of the Virtual Babelsberg Starry Nights of the Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam (AIP) on the topic "Searching for the X-ray emitters in the Universe" (German) by Dr. Iris Traulsen will be broadcast on the YouTube channel “Urknall, Weltall und das Leben” (Big Bang, Universe and Life) from Thursday, 16thJanuary 2025.

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Unveiling the Uncharted Milky Way: Completing the Galactic Stellar Map

By peering into the cosmic dance of stars, a team led by researchers from the Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam (AIP) has unravelled the complex structure of our Milky Way galaxy. Assuming that each observed star represents a larger population of stars sharing the same orbit, they have reconstructed the properties of these “hidden” stars, filling in gaps in the Galactic disc that holds the secrets of our Galaxy's past, present, and future.

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A star’s surface revealed: 16-year study shows chaotic dynamo

The STELLA observatory in Tenerife studied a star’s surface for 16 years. Unlike the cyclic spots on our sun, this star exhibited chaotic, non-periodic star spot behavior, revealing a fundamentally different dynamo mechanism. The groundbreaking study has now been published in Nature Communications.

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Call for nominations and applications for the Johann Wempe Award 2025

In honour of Prof. Dr. Johann Wempe (1906 – 1980), the last director of the former Astrophysical Observatory of Potsdam (AOP), the AIP grants the Johann Wempe Award to outstanding scientists. Applications and nominations are accepted until 31st January 2025.

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

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.

The next talk of the Virtual Babelsberg Starry Nights of the Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam (AIP) on the topic "Searching for the X-ray emitters in the Universe" (German) by Dr. Iris Traulsen will be broadcast on the YouTube channel “Urknall, Weltall und das Leben” (Big Bang, Universe and Life) from Thursday, 16thJanuary 2025.

 

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

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

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

Abundance ties: Nephele and the globular cluster population accreted with ω Cen: Based on APOGEE DR17 and Gaia EDR3

Pagnini, G., ... Khoperskov, S., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 693, A155 – Published January 2025

S5: New insights from deep spectroscopic observations of the tidal tails of the globular clusters NGC 1261 and NGC 1904

Awad, P., ... Cullinane, L. R., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 693, A69 – Published January 2025

eRO-ExTra: eROSITA extragalactic non-AGN X-ray transients and variables in eRASS1 and eRASS2

Grotova, I., ... Tubín-Arenas, D., Homan, D., Krumpe, M., ... Bahic, S., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 693, A62 – Published January 2025

Dwarf galaxies in the MATLAS survey: The satellite system of NGC 474 under scrutiny with MUSE

Müller, O., ... Pawlowski, M. S., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 693, A44 – Published January 2025

The Rotation Properties of δ Sct and γ Dor Stars

Wang, J., Chen, X., Deng, L., Zhang, J., Sun, W.
The Astrophysical Journal, 978, 1, 53 – Published January 2025

Radial Velocity and Astrometric Evidence for a Close Companion to Betelgeuse

MacLeod, M., ... Granzer, T., ... Strassmeier, K. G., ... Weber, M.
The Astrophysical Journal, 978, 1, 50 – Published January 2025

The e-TidalGCs project: Modeling the extra-tidal features generated by Galactic globular clusters (Corrigendum)

Ferrone, S., ... Khoperskov, S., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 693, C2 – Published January 2025

The GAPS Programme at TNG: LXV. Precise density measurement of TOI-1430 b, a young planet with an evaporating atmosphere

Nardiello, D., ... Mallonn, M., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 693, A32 – Published January 2025

IFUM integrated field spectroscopy of ten M104 satellite galaxy candidates

Crosby, E., ... Pawlowski, M. S.
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 536, 3, 2072 – Published January 2025

The Lyman alpha reference sample: XV. Relating ionised gas kinematics with Lyman-α observables

Herenz, E. C., ... Micheva, G., Roth, M., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 693, A252 – Published January 2025

Energy Dissipation in Strong Collisionless Shocks: The Crucial Role of Ion-to-electron Scale Separation in Particle-in-cell Simulations

Shalaby, M.
The Astrophysical Journal, 977, 2, L43 – Published December 2024

Phase-space Correlations of Satellite Galaxy Systems and Challenges to ?CDM Cosmology

Pawlowski, M. S.
Publications de l'Observatoire Astronomique de Beograd, 104, 59 – Published December 2024

Tracing Back a Second-generation Star Stripped from Terzan 5 by the Galactic Bar

Souza, S. O., Valentini, M., Chiappini, C., ...
The Astrophysical Journal, 977, 2, L33 – Published December 2024

Long-term Doppler imaging of the star XX Trianguli indicates chaotic non-periodic dynamo

Strassmeier, K. G., Kővári, Z., Weber, M., Granzer, T.
Nature Communications, 15, 1, 9986 – Published December 2024

Jet Interaction with Galaxy Cluster Mergers

Domínguez-Fernández, P., ... Weinberger, R., ...
The Astrophysical Journal, 977, 2, 221 – Published December 2024

Exploring the Diversity of Faint Satellites in the M81 Group

Gozman, K., ... de Jong, R. S., ...
The Astrophysical Journal, 977, 2, 179 – Published December 2024

Erratum: "The Low-redshift Lyman Continuum Survey. I. New, Diverse Local Lyman Continuum Emitters" (2022, ApJS, 260, 1)

Flury, S. R., ... Micheva, G., ...
The Astrophysical Journal Supplement Series, 275, 2, 47 – Published December 2024

The Second Case of a Major Merger Triggering a Starburst in a Green Pea Galaxy

Purkayastha, S., ... Pharo, J., ...
The Astrophysical Journal, 977, 1, 68 – Published December 2024

Galaxy formation and symbiotic evolution with the inter-galactic medium in the age of ELT-ANDES

D'Odorico, V., ... Richter, P., ...
Experimental Astronomy, 58, 3, 21 – Published December 2024

Partial alignment between jets and megamasers: Coherent versus selective accretion

Dotti, M., ... Bollati, F., ...
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 692, A233 – Published December 2024

Simulating the LOcal Web (SLOW): III. Synchrotron emission from the local cosmic web

Böss, L. M., ... Sorce, J. G.
Astronomy and Astrophysics, 692, A232 – Published December 2024

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

13.02.2025, 14:30 – 15:30
Scientific
14.02.2025, 19:00 – 20:00
Public Event

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

20.02.2025, 14:00 – 16:00
Scientific

Abstract: The field of planet formation is in an exciting era, where recent observations of disks around protostars have revealed a diversity of substructures, some possibly planet related. It is therefore important to understand the physical and chemical nature of the protoplanetary building blocks, as well as their spatial distribution, to better understand planet formation. Each one of the fundamental disk properties – disk mass, surface density distribution, outer radius, vertical extent, temperature structure, and transport – is of fundamental interest as they collectively set the stage for disk evolution and corresponding planet formation theories. Furthermore, constraining and comparing the chemistry of disks to the compositions of exoplanet atmospheres – a major priority for current space missions – informs our understanding of the planet-formation process. In this talk I will review our understanding of the fundamental properties of disks including the relevant observational techniques to probe their nature, modeling methods, and the respective caveats. Finally, I will present preliminary findings from the ALMA Large Program DECO (The Disk-Exoplanet C/Onnection).

27.02.2025, 14:00 – 16:00
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.

27.03.2025, 14:30 – 16:00
Scientific
03.04.2025, 9:00 – 14:00
Public Event

Only for registered participants

03.04.2025, 14:00 – 16:00
Scientific

TBD

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.

Public Event
Scientific
Internal Event
Holidays