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National Astronomical Observatory Japan invites Bodo Ziegler

30.08.2018

Prof. Bodo Ziegler (Department of Astrophysics) was awarded with a prestigious research grant from the National Astronomical Observatory Japan (Japan) to spend the whole month of September at their research institutes. He will be accompanied by our PhD student Jose Perez.

Prof. Bodo Ziegler (Department of Astrophysics) was awarded with a prestigious research grant from the National Astronomical Observatory Japan (Japan) to spend the whole month of September at their research institutes. NAOJ administers several research facilities and telescopes (both at optical/near-infrared and radio wavelengths) similar to ESO with the European telescopes in Chile.


Ziegler will spend three weeks at the Mitaka campus in Tokyo and one week in Hilo, Hawaii. The latter is the headquarter for the powerful Japanese 10m-telescope called SUBARU on the summit of Mauna Kea, one of the best locations for optical observatories.

Projects related to galaxy evolution

Ziegler will be hosted by Dr. Masao Hayashi (Mitaka) and Prof. Tadayuki Kodama (Sendai) working on projects related to galaxy evolution and clusters of galaxies at a cosmological epoch corresponding to 3Gyrs after the Big Bang. This collaboration joins superb imaging from the recently installed HyperSuprime Camera on SUBARU and 3D-spectroscopy with the KMOS spectrograph, a 2nd-generation instrument at ESO's VLT. The data allows the derivation of physical characteristics of apparently very faint and small galaxies like the star formation rate, chemical mix of elements already produced in stars, and the motion of gas clouds (kinematics) probing the gravitational potential of each galaxy, which is dominated by the otherwise invisible Dark Matter. All pieces together will reveal the evolutionary status of galaxies at an epoch when galaxy clusters start to assemble due to the mutual gravity of dozens of galaxies in a confined volume.


During his visit, Ziegler will also work with his Japanese colleagues on plans to expand their investigation to radio observations with the large ALMA array to examine in future also the cold gas component (molecules) of their targets.
Ziegler will be accompanied by his PhD student Jose Manuel Perez Martinez who was awarded with a KWA grant from the University of Vienna. His thesis work and astrophysical knowledge will greatly benefit from the direct interchange with the Japanese team.