Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation

News

  • Map of the cosmos ‘sees’ the dark Universe Scientists from University of Portsmouth have helped to create the most accurate map of the structure of dark matter in the Universe, supporting the theory that dark energy and dark matter make up most of the Universe. For the first time, scientists from the international Dark Energy Survey (DES) collaboration, including Dr David Bacon from the ...
  • Mapping super massive black holes in the distant Universe Astronomers have constructed the first map of the Universe based on the positions of supermassive black holes, which reveals the large-scale structure of the Universe. The map precisely measures the expansion history of the Universe back to when the Universe was less than three billion years old. It will help improve our understanding of ‘Dark Energy’, ...
  • ICG @15 June 22nd to 24th, 2017 The Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation is 15 years old this year and we plan to celebrate with an event to bring together past and present students, staff and visitors. We will hold a series of talks, seminars and a family barbecue this June. A summary of our schedule and talks: Thursday, 22nd ...
  • UK cosmology meeting @ Portsmouth Registration is now open for UK Cosmology meeting at Portsmouth on Wednesday 5th April 2017. https://www.icg.port.ac.uk/uk-cosmo-at-portsmouth-2017/ You can submit a title and abstract if you would like to contribute a talk. In case we cannot accommodate all contributors, priority will be given to people who did not talk in the last UK Cosmo meetings. Submissions of contributions ...
  • Budding astronomers explore wonders of Universe Edited from a story on the University of Portsmouth website: Astronomers of all ages explored the wonders of the Universe thanks to a Stargazing event in Portsmouth last week. University of Portsmouth astronomers hosted the event at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard on Tuesday 31st January 2017 and over 600 people visited despite the misty skies and rain. The ...
  • Cosmologists explore quantum gravity in the early universe This news item is slightly edited from a University of Portsmouth press release, which also appears on phys.org. Cosmologists trying to understand how to unite the two pillars of modern science – quantum physics and gravity – have found a new way to make robust predictions about the effect of quantum fluctuations on primordial density waves, ripples in ...
  • Visually impaired people helped to ‘see’ Universe This news item is slighted edited from a University of Portsmouth press release. Visually impaired people were able to ‘see’ the Universe this weekend at a galaxy workshop run by University of Portsmouth astrophysicists. The Tactile Universe pilot event was organised by the University’s Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation to engage the blind and visually impaired (BVI) ...
  • Booking open for free Tactile Universe public event for the vision impaired community Booking is now open for the first Tactile Universe public engagement event on Saturday 14th January 2017. This event will provide an opportunity for people with vision impairments to engage with the galaxy research carried out at the Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation. On Saturday January 14th 2017, the University of Portsmouth’s Institute of Cosmology and ...
  • British ESA astronaut and University Alumnus Tim Peake visits Portsmouth Two weeks ago, British ESA astronaut Tim Peake visited Portsmouth to participate in events organised by the University of Portsmouth and the UK Space Agency. Taking place on the 1st and 2nd November 2016, the daytime events celebrated the educational programme of Tim’s Principia mission, while a public event was held in the evening of ...
  • Oscar Winner Chris Lawrence visits ICG to explain Visual Effects of ‘Gravity’ and ‘The Martian’ Chris Lawrence, VFX Supervisor for the London-based company Framestore specializing in producing visual effects for film and advertising,  made a recent visit to the ICG to give a talk at one of the institute’s weekly seminars.  In his talk, Chris explained how he and his team created the spectacular visual effects and imagery for the ...
  • ICG Great South Runners Raise over £800 for Guide Dogs Six members of the ICG ran the 10 Mile Great South Run this past Sunday in aid of Guide Dogs. Collectively they raised over £800 pounds for this organization.  Donations for this good cause are still being accepted through the ICG South Run Team Justgiving Page. Well done to all who ran, and why not join ...
  • Cosmic mystery solved by new map of giant voids and superclusters A team of astrophysicists at the University of Portsmouth have created the largest ever map of cosmic voids and superclusters in the Universe, which helps solve a long-standing cosmological mystery. The map of the positions of voids – large empty spaces which contain relatively few galaxies – and superclusters – huge regions with many more galaxies ...
  • For Ada Lovelace Day: ICG Member Answers “What if there were more women in tech?” Today is Ada Lovelace Day, a celebration of the often neglected contributions women have made, and continue to make in science and technology. ICG astrophysicist, Dr. Karen Masters is quoted in this BBC article by Zoe Kleinman written for Ada Lovelace Day which asks: “What if there were more women in tech?“ Dr. Masters responded: “In astronomy there’s a ...
  • ESA astronaut Tim to talk to Portsmouth public Update 16:00 12th October – the first batch of tickets is sold out. More tickets will be released through eventbrite at 12.30pm on 19th October.  From the University of Portsmouth Press Office: Astronaut and University of Portsmouth alumnus Tim Peake will attend a free public event to be hosted by the University at the Portsmouth Guildhall on ...
  • Tactile Universe Receives Funding from the Royal Astronomical Society We are delighted to announce that the ICG Public Engagement project, The Tactile Universe has been awarded travel funding from the Royal Astronomical Society. The Tactile Universe has previously been successful in obtaining funding from the South East Physics Network, and is now halfway through this funded 6 month Portsmouth based pilot. This new RAS funding ...
  • Astronaut Tim to attend schools conference From the University of Portsmouth Press Office: Astronaut and University of Portsmouth alumnus Tim Peake has confirmed his attendance at a UK Space Agency Schools Conference to be hosted by the University on Wednesday, 2 November. Tim will attend the conference, which celebrates the work of over a million UK school students inspired by his Principia ...
  • Ogden Schools Physicist of the Year 2015/16 On Wednesday 13th July 2016, the third annual Portsmouth Ogden Schools Physicist of the Year (SPOTY) awards ceremony was held at the University of Portsmouth. The awards ceremony celebrated the achievements of the six Year 12 and 12 Year 10 pupils from local schools and colleges who were put forward for the award by their ...
  • Cosmic map will throw light on ‘dark energy’ From the University Press Office: An international team of astronomers has created the largest ever three-dimensional map of distant galaxies in a bid to help them understand one of the most mysterious forces in the universe. Scientists including a team led by Dr Florian Beutler at the University of Portsmouth’s Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation have spent ...
  • ICG Art-Science Project Premiere Announced A new ICG art-science project will open at the TodaysArt Festival 2016, it was announced yesterday. The Dutch festival will bring together an international community of contemporary digital culture and will host a two-day premiere of Entropy on the 23rd and 24th of September. After the premiere, Entropy will be presented as a highlight at ...
  • Scientists’ breakthrough in modelling universe From the University of Portsmouth Press Office: Research teams in Europe and the USA – including a cosmologist from the University of Portsmouth – have begun modelling the universe for the first time using Einstein’s full general theory of relativity. Watch Dr Marco Bruni explain how new developments will help create a detailed model of the universe. The ...
  • ICG to host Isaac Physics Fellow We’re delighted to announce, that beginning 4th July 2016, ICG will be hosting our first ever Isaac Physics Widening Participation Fellow. Dr. Nic Bonne, currently an (Australian Government funded Endeavour Fellow) was awarded this fellowship to be based at ICG, and will spend 50% of his time working on this project. Isaac Physics, is a Department ...
  • Yr 10 Work Experience Week, 2016 ICG has been delighted this week to welcome five young people from local schools (Brune Park, Gosport; Portsmough High School, and Kings School, Winchester) for a period of work experience. The students participated in a variety of events, and were each matched with a supervisor to work on a research project. The week ended today with ...
  • ICG Member on BBC Sky at Night ICG member, Dr. Karen Masters (Reader in Astronomy and Astrophysics) appears on this months edition of the BBC Sky at Night show, discussing the UV and X-ray images of the whirlpool galaxy, and what they tell astronomers about stellar birth and death in the merging system. View the episode on iPlayer here: Secrets of the Whirlpool ...
  • Star formation puzzle solved From the University Press Office A new study published in the journal Nature has found out why a mysterious kind of ‘galactic warming’ has prevented stars from forming in thousands of galaxies. A team of international astronomers announced the discovery of a new class of galaxies called ‘red geysers’, which can keep gas in these dormant galaxies ...
  • ICG wins departmental Athena SWAN Bronze Award The ICG is one of three University of Portsmouth departments to win an Athena SWAN Bronze Award recently. This award recognises commitment to advancing women’s careers. The award, presented by the Equality Challenge Unit, encourages and celebrates good employment practices for women across both STEM (science, technology, engineering and mathematics) and – for the first time ...
  • SEPnet funding to run astronomy outreach activities with the Portsmouth Blind and Vision Impaired Community A group at the Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation has been awarded money by the South East Physics Network (SEPnet) to develop outreach and public engagement activities that will engage the blind and vision impaired (BVI) community. The activities developed will focus on some of the latest astronomy, astrophysics and cosmology research carried out at ...
  • ICG astrophysicist joins House of Lords debate Next week, Karen Masters will be part of a House of Lords discussion about women in STEM subjects. Karen was invited to attend by Baroness Jolly and Dr Wanda Austin, president and CEO of The Aerospace Corporation, and joins as select group of 30 people from industry, academia, government and the military to take part in ...
  • ICG joins LSST We are pleased to announce that the ICG Portsmouth is now an institutional member of the LSST Corporation!
  • University of Portsmouth to host schools space conference From the University Press Office: Youngsters will have the chance to present their work to experts from the space industry at a conference hosted by the University of Portsmouth later this year. The Principia Schools Conference, on Wednesday, 2 November, is being organised by the UK Space Agency in collaboration with the University’s Institute of Cosmology and ...
  • ICG Director work-shadows Vice-Chancellor ICG Director Bob Nichol recently work-shadowed Graham Galbraith; the Vice-Chancellor of the University of Portsmouth. Read more about this experience 
  • ICG cosmologist featured on BBC Horizon   ICG cosmologist Bob Nichol will be part of a new BBC horizon show discussing the mystery of Dark Energy. The show will air on BBC2 on Wednesday March 30th (8pm) and feature a number of astronomers and cosmologists discussing the discovery and meaning of this strange substance that makes up 70% of the energy density ...
  • Undergraduate Visits to the Clanfield Observatory Undergraduate’s studying Physics or Maths at the University of Portsmouth have the opportunity to visit the Clanfield Observatory, and the South Downs Planetarium as part of two different Units, and also to work with volunteers from the Hampshire Astronomical Group to make use of the Clanfield 24″ Reflector for projects. First year Applied Physics (AP) and ...
  • Gatcombe Park Primary School has a Visit from Space! Pupils at Gatcombe Park Primary School had a Visit from Space last week, when Professor Claudia Maraston, Dr Jen Gupta and Dr Daniel Thomas visited their school for a morning of astronomy activities. The 30 Year 5 pupils found out more about the Universe that we live in, explored the scale of the solar system, ...
  • 2015 ICG/SEPnet Postgraduate Student Outreach Award We are delighted to announce that the 2015 ICG/SEPnet Postgraduate Student Outreach Award has been awarded to Claire Le Cras for her innovative public engagement work using dance to explain astrophysical concepts. Claire has developed a novel way to explain the life cycle of stars through dance, first developing a routine for her entry to Famelab ...
  • Portsmouth astrophysicist features in leading women portraits From the University Press Office A University of Portsmouth astrophysicist is featured in one of 21 commissioned portraits of leading women by the Royal Astronomical Society (RAS). Dr Jen Gupta, the SEPnet/Ogden Outreach Officer from the University’s Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation (ICG), appears alongside other prominent women in astronomy, space science and geophysics. The portraits were commissioned ...
  • Hundreds turn out for a night of stargazing Hundreds of people turned their eyes skywards earlier this month to explore the universe at a free stargazing event for the local public. University of Portsmouth astronomers hosted the event with Action Stations and HMS Warrior 1860 at Portsmouth Historic Dockyard, to tie in with the BBC’s Stargazing Live TV programmes. Budding astronomers and amateur stargazers were given the ...
  • ICG welcomes new staff member The ICG welcomes a new staff member this week – Daniel Whalen. Dan joins us from Institute for Theoretical Astrophysics at Heidelberg, and is currently working on using detections of primordial supernovae with Euclid, WFIRST and JWST to constrain the properties of the first stars. He is also modeling the evolution of supermassive primordial stars ...
  • Dark Energy Survey releases first data catalogs The Dark Energy Survey (DES) has released its first catalogs of data. The survey uses the Blanco 4-meter telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile, with a specially built 570-Megapixel digital camera known as DECam. DES has been running since August 2013, but the first data which was taken before the official start between ...
  • One foot in the Extremely Large Telescope The European Southern Observatory has approved the proposal for the MOSAIC instrument to pass into Phase A. MOSAIC is a multi-object spectro-graph to be mounted on the European Extremely Large Telescope, which will be the largest telescope on Earth for decades to come. MOSAIC has several scientific motivations ranging on all fields of contemporary astrophysics ...
  • Euclid mission passes next major hurdle ESA’s Euclid mission to study the dark universe has passed Mission Preliminary Design Review (M-PDR); a major step towards launch at the end of 2020. ICG astronomers are playing important roles in the preparations for this mission, including studies of galaxy clustering and management structure. “This is a major hurdle we have got over. Interestingly we ...
  • ICG researchers in a ceremony of the Bestowal of the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Star on Lord Martin Rees by the Government of Japan ICG researchers, David Matravers and Kazuya Koyama, were invited to attend a ceremony at the Embassy of Japan to celebrate the Bestowal of the Order of the Rising Sun, Gold and Silver Star on Lord Martin Rees by the Government of Japan in recognition of his significant contribution to strengthening and developing relations between Japan ...
  • One Small Step for Doll Kind… Lottie Stargazer, a doll designed with help from ICG member, Dr. Karen Masters is on her way to space with astronaut, and UoP alumnus Tim Peake. Read more about this exciting adventure in the UoP News Item: Stargazing Doll travels to space, or in this article for UTV Ireland: Astronaut Brings Irish Doll with him to ...
  • Five Years of Supercomputing The SCIAMA supercomputer based at the University of Portsmouth is approaching its fifth birthday. Up to now, around two hundred and fifty researchers have used the environment, including ICG members, the wider University of Portsmouth, and SEPnet. Many of the researchers collaborate with the ICG from institutions around the globe, logging in and using the ...
  • ICG members recognised at SEPnet Public Engagement Awards Two members of the Institute of Cosmology and Gravitation were highly commended at the second SEPnet Public Engagement Awards last week. The awards recognise physicists across the South East region for their exceptional contribution to engaging the public with their research. Dr Karen Masters, Reader in Astronomy and Astrophysics and ICG Outreach Coordinator, was highly commended in ...
  • Good luck, bonne chance, boa sorte Tim Peake! From the University Press Office (original story): To mark astronaut and alumnus Tim Peake’s launch into space on 15 December, University of Portsmouth cosmologists have recorded good luck messages for Tim in 15 different languages. Major Tim Peake, Britain’s first official astronaut, has spent three years preparing for his Principia mission to the International Space Station (ISS), ...
  • ICG astronomer in award-winning TV documentary Earlier this year, ICG astronomer Bob Nichol was featured as part of the BBC Horizon show entitled “Dancing in the Dark: The End of Physics?”  The programme examined the search for dark matter and included Nichol’s trip to both the Dark Energy Survey at CTIO and the Very Large Telescope (VLT) at ESO. The show won the ...
  • Igniting Curiosity with the ICG Astrodome Last Friday, ICG participated in the annual “Bright Sparks” day, hosted by the Portsmouth Grammar School. This is organized to be an exciting day of fun and discovery aimed at specially selected Y2 and Y4 students (age 6/7 and 8/9) from Primary and Junior Schools across the city. ICG has participated in this event for the ...
  • ICG Celebrates Ada Lovelace Day 2015 ICG members this week have been celebrating Ada Lovelace Day, an annual celebration of women in science, technology, engineering and mathematics. This year was particularly special as it marks the 200th anniversairy of Lovelace’s birth, with many news and media outlets celebrating the event (e.g. this BBC4 Documentary “Calculating Ada”). Our ICG Outreach Officer, Dr ...
  • Memories of Dennis Sciama Dennis Sciama, considered by many to be one of the founding fathers of modern cosmology and who the ICG’s Dennis Sciama Building is named after, is among five academics remembered in a recent Times Higher Education feature. As Stephen Hawking’s PhD supervisor he was featured in the recent film ‘Theory of Everything’, as noted in ...
  • Marco Bruni visits Cape Town for Roy Maartens birthday surprise workshop Marco Bruni made a surprise visit to Cape Town, to represent ICG at   a  workshop event to celebrate the 60th birthday of  Roy Maartens. Roy is Professor of Cosmology at ICG in Portsmouth and SKA Professor at the University of Western Cape. For the occasion Marco gave a talk on the birth of ICG, ...

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