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Czech Involvement with the European Southern Observatory
Photograph of the night sky above ALMA, a facility ESO operates together with international partners, taken by Czech photographer Petr Horálek. Credit: P. Horálek/ESO
Czechia joined ESO as a Member State on 30 April 2007. The country was the first ESO Member State from the Central and Eastern European region, with its scientists and engineers making important contributions to the organisation over the years.
Czechia currently contributes 1.13% of ESO’s revenue (2021 contribution), worth 2 169 000 EUR.
As of mid 2022, there are six Czech employees at ESO, all in Germany. Furthermore, ESO has awarded two studentships and 11 fellowships to Czech nationals since 2006, as well as one internship since 2014.
Czechia is represented in the various ESO governing and advisory bodies by astronomers and policy experts; the current Czech representatives of ESO’s various committees with national representation can be found here.
The ESO Science Outreach Network (ESON) includes Czech representatives who act as ESO’s media and outreach local contacts.
Here follows some information about Czechia’s involvement with ESO.
Discoveries by Czechia-based astronomers using ESO telescopes
Czech researchers and those based at Czech institutions have been involved in important discoveries using ESO facilities, such as
A team led by Czech and French astronomers used the SPHERE instrument on ESO’s Very Large Telescope (VLT) to image 42 of the largest objects in the asteroid belt. Never before had such a large group of asteroids been imaged so sharply, revealing a wide range of peculiar shapes, helping astronomers trace the origins of the asteroids in our Solar System.
Several Czech astronomers were involved with taking the first images of the Sun with ALMA in 2017. This revealed new features, in particular the dark centre of a cold sunspot, almost twice the size of Earth.
Czech involvement in ESO instruments and telescopes at ESO sites
Czechia contributes to ESO telescopes and telescopes hosted at ESO sites in a variety of ways. For example:
Czechia is one of the countries hosting an ALMA Regional Centre (ARC). The Czech node provides the interface between the ALMA observatory and scientific community and promotes the solar observations observing mode.
Czechia will be a member of the future CTA ERIC, the European Research Infrastructure Consortium, that will construct and operate the Cherenkov Telescope Array (CTA). The CTA will be a ground-based observatory for very high energy gamma-ray astronomy. It will consist of two arrays of dishes, a southern-hemisphere array hosted at ESO’s Paranal Observatory and a northern array on the island of La Palma, Spain. ESO will also be a member of the CTA ERIC and is represented in the council of the CTA.
After a shutdown lasting almost 20 years, the ESO 1.52-metre telescope was re-commissioned and modernised in 2022 as part of the PLATO Spec international project under Czech leadership. The reconstruction was carried out by ProjectSoft HK a.s. The telescope was equipped by the Chilean project partners with the new Pucheros+ spectrograph, which will be replaced in 2024 by the even more powerful PLATO Spec instrument. The modernised telescope with a top-of-the-line instrument, which is operated remotely, will primarily be used to research extrasolar planets, but also eruptive and variable stars in connection with the space missions of the European Space Agency PLATO and later ARIEL.
Czech industry and technology contributions to ESO
ESO has several large contracts and subcontracts with Czech industry for the development of instruments at the VLT, including parts for the GRAVITY and MATISSE. Furthermore, Czech company Frentech Aerospace s.r.o. was awarded a contract to contribute to the ALMA frontend.
Czech industry contributions to the ELT
Czech companies Frentech Aerospace s.r.o. and OSTROJ a.s. have contributed to ELT instrumentation.
Additional Involvement
The Ministry of Education, Youth and Sports of Czechia (MEYS) and ESO signed an agreement in 2019 to promote on-the-job training. This agreement allows students from Czech Universities and young interns of scientific or engineering occupation to carry out an on-the-job training programme at ESO.
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