An international piece of research, led by the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) has found clues to the nature of some of the brightest and hottest stars in our Universe, called blue supergiants. Although these stars are commonly observed, their origin has been an old puzzle that has been debated for several decades. By simulating novel stellar models and analysing a large data sample in the Large Magellanic Cloud, IAC researchers have found strong evidence that most blue supergiants may have formed from the merger of two stars bound in a binary system. The study is published in the

An international team of astronomers, in which researchers from the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias are taking part, share the intricate and delicate beauty of the classical nebula Messier 87, showing unprecedented detail, which gives a fascinating view of this celestial wonder.

ESA’s Euclid space mission reveals its first full-colour images of the cosmos. Never before has a telescope been able to create such razor-sharp astronomical images across such a large patch of the sky, and looking so far into the distant Universe. These images illustrate the telescope's potential to create the largest and most accurate 3D map of the Universe to date. The Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) has led one of the first five Euclid Early Release Objects (ERO) programmes. 95% of our cosmos appears to be made of these mysterious ‘dark’ entities But we don’t understand what