Related papers: ELT Contributions to The First Explosions
With the ability to see into optically obscured regions with more than an order of magnitude better sensitivity and spatial resolution relative to current (sub)mm telescopes, ALMA will provide a unique look into the physics of galaxy…
The next generation of large ground-based optical and infrared telescopes will provide new challenges for designers of astronomical instrumentation. The varied science cases for these extremely large telescopes (ELTs) require a large range…
The Transient High Energy Sky and Early Universe Surveyor (THESEUS) is a space mission concept aimed at exploiting Gamma-Ray Bursts for investigating the early Universe and at providing a substantial advancement of multi-messenger and…
The observational evidence for the acceleration of the universe demonstrates that canonical theories of cosmology and particle physics are incomplete, if not incorrect, and that new physics is out there, waiting to be discovered.…
The light echo systems of historical supernovae in the Milky Way and local group galaxies provide an unprecedented opportunity to reveal the effects of asymmetry on observables, particularly optical spectra. Scattering dust at different…
I will focus on the study of the Cosmic Dark ages and in particular on the properties of the galaxies responsible for the reionization of Hydrogen and on the possibility of detecting the first generation of galaxies and the first stars. I…
The 39-meter European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) is expected to have very low throughput in the blue part of the visible spectrum. Because of that, a blue-optimised spectrograph at the 8-meter Very Large Telescope could potentially…
While ALMA and JWST are revolutionizing our view of star and planet formation with their unprecedented sensitivity and resolution at submillimeter and near-IR wavelengths, many outstanding questions can only be answered with observations in…
The investigation of the emergence of life is a major endeavour of science. Astronomy is contributing to it in three fundamental manners: (1) by measuring the chemical enrichment of the Universe, (2) by investigating planet formation and…
The era of the universe's first (Population III) stars is essentially unconstrained by observation. Ultra-luminous and massive stars from this time altered the chemistry of the cosmos, provided the radiative scaffolding to support the…
Einstein Telescope (ET) is the European project for a gravitational-wave (GW) observatory of third-generation. In this paper we present a comprehensive discussion of its science objectives, providing state-of-the-art predictions for the…
The EAGLE and EVE Phase A studies for instruments for the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT) originated from related top-level scientific questions, but employed different (yet complementary) methods to deliver the required…
This chapter describes the prospects for detecting the first black holes in our Universe, with a specific focus on instruments/telescopes that will come online within the next decade, including e.g. the SKA, WFIRST, EUCLID, JWST, and large…
Supernova explosions are among the most energetic phenomena in the known universe. There are suggestions that cosmic rays up to EeV energies might be accelerated in the young supernova shell on time scales of a few weeks to years, which…
High Time Resolution Astrophysics (HTRA) concerns itself with observations on short scales normally defined as being lower than the conventional read-out time of a CCD. As such it is concerned with condensed objects such as neutron stars,…
So far, 24 Isolated neutron stars (INSs) of different types have been identified at optical wavelengths, from the classical radio pulsars to more peculiar objects, like the magnetars. Most identifications have been obtained in the last 20…
The Planetary Camera and Spectrograph (PCS) for the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) will be dedicated to detecting and characterising nearby exoplanets with sizes from sub-Neptune to Earth-size in the neighbourhood of the Sun. This goal is…
During their formation and early evolution, rocky planets undergo multiple global melting events due to accretionary collisions with other protoplanets. The detection and characterization of their post-collision afterglows (magma oceans)…
Gamma-ray bursts are the most luminous explosions in the Universe, whose origin and mechanism is the focus of intense interest. They appear connected to supernova remnants from massive stars or the merger of their remnants, and their…
The next generation of multi-object spectrographs (MOS) will deliver comprehensive surveys of the Galaxy, Magellanic Clouds and nearby dwarfs. These will provide us with the vast samples, spanning the full extent of the Hertzsprung-Russell…