IRAM for astronomers

Science users

July 21, 2010
Call for proposals for the winter semester 2010/11
Covering the period from December 2010 to May 2011, this year’s second proposal deadline for IRAM facilities will be on September 14, 2010. As usual, the submission facility will be opened about three weeks before the deadline.

May 3, 2010
Summer 2010 PC ratings now available
Due to the exceptional circumstances caused by the Eyjafjallajokull volcano in Iceland, the IRAM program committee this time convened by telephone conference between Granada, Grenoble, Paris, Leiden, Bonn, Heidelberg and Garching on April 20 and 21 to discuss the proposals submitted for the summer 2010 scheduling period.

April 20, 2010
New Plateau de Bure correlator WideX now operating
We are pleased to announce that the new correlator for the Plateau de Bure Interferometer, WideX, has successfully been installed during the last few months, and is now fully operational. This new correlator, by quadrupling the available bandwidth, provides a two-fold increase in both the continuum sensitivity and the instantaneous spectral coverage.

April 12, 2010
Observing with ALMA - Early Science - Registration now open!
From November 29th to December 1st 2010, the IRAM node of the European ALMA Regional Center will organize a practical workshop on how to plan and analyze ALMA Early Science observations. The goal of the workshop is to provide the practical information needed to plan ALMA Early Science observations and answer the first Call for Proposals.

April 8, 2010
7th IRAM Interferometry School 2010 - Registration is now open!
IRAM will organize this year its 7th Millimeter Interferometry School. These schools are organized every two years since 1998. The 7th school will take place at the IRAM headquarters (Grenoble, France) on October 4-8th, 2010.

February 15, 2010
Call for proposals for the summer semester 2010
The call for proposals for the summer semester 2010 is now online!

February 11, 2010
Young galaxies gorge on gas
An international group of astronomers has used millimeter observations with the IRAM Plateau de Bure interferometer to demonstrate that a few billion years after the Big Bang normal, massive star forming galaxies like the proto-Milky Way had five to ten times more cold gas than today. “We have been able, for the first time...

February 8, 2010
First localisation of water in proto-planetary disk
For the first time, scientists were able to localize water in a disk around a young, solar-type star. The disks in which astronomers suppose planets to form, basically consist of gas and dust grains. Observations with the IRAM Plateau de Bure Interferometer have now shown that these proto-planetary disks can contain amounts of water about 100 times more than the content of Earth's oceans...

December 13, 2009
First Fringes with the new Plateau de Bure correlator WideX!
We are pleased to announce first astronomical light with WideX 1st unit on December 13, 2009. A team of IRAM astronomers and engineers was able to observe stable fringes towards the quasar 3C454.3 with WideX and the narrow band correlator on all fifteen baselines of the Plateau de Bure interferometer...

December 10, 2009
IRAM scales new heights: At 5000 meters altitude, the institute's equipments capture first fringes at ALMA
On November 5th 2009, first fringes on the high-altitude site were obtained with the band 7 receivers, measuring the continuum emission of a bright quasar, 3C454.3. The result testifies for the high quality and performances of IRAM receivers, which exhibit noise figures well below the initial ALMA specifications. With its highly recognized expertise, IRAM is one of the major partners in the construction of ALMA, a giant radio observatory in the Chilean desert...

September 25, 2009
Program of the IRAM Users' Meeting now online!
Taking up the opportunity of the IRAM 30 years anniversary, the IRAM Scientific Advisory Committee organizes an IRAM users' meeting on the day after (Thursday 1st of October). IRAM staff and five members of the IRAM Scientific Advisory Committee will be present...

September 21, 2009
30 years of IRAM - Updated conference program now online!
The updated program is now online. For more information on the program and how to reach the conference center use the button below.

September 10, 2009
Cold interstellar clouds beat the best labs on Earth
Astronomers use an exceptionally cold gas cloud in space to measure the structure of molecules to a precision that cannot be attained in the laboratory. With the IRAM 30-meter telescope they observed...

August 3, 2009
Call for proposals for the winter semester 2009/10
The call for proposals for the winter semester 2009/10 is now online!

June 25, 2009
5th IRAM 30m Summer School
We will use the IRAM 30m telescope to observe planets, stars, dusty clouds, and whole galaxies, out to the most distant objects known today. On the way, we will discuss the key science questions on the one hand, and calibration and observing techniques on the other hand...

May 14, 2009
IRAM detectors, tiny but great in space
ESA, the European space agency will soon launch two new scientific satellites for astronomy in a combined mission with its heavy load carrier Ariane 5. Both of them, Planck and Herschel, are equipped with the latest high technology from the Grenoble area. In particular the Herschel Space Observatory (HSO) will embark super-conducting detectors which have been designed and manufactured at the IRAM laboratories.