The Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias (IAC) has opened the application period for the XXXVI Canary Islands Winter School of Astrophysics , which will be held from 17 to 22 November 2025. This edition is carried out in the framework of the CELESTE (Centre for Optical and Space Technologies of the IAC) programme funded by the European Union and will focus on key optical technologies for astronomy, a field that is driving 21st century discoveries about the universe. Applications will be accepted until Friday, 13 June. The IAC’s Winter School is renowned for its educational approach and

Ultra-faint dwarf galaxies, among the tiniest and faintest galaxies known, may hold the key to understanding one of the Universe’s biggest mysteries: the true nature of dark matter. A new study reveals that even a single collision between dark matter particles every 10 billion years — roughly the age of the Universe — is enough to explain the dark matter cores observed in these small systems. These galaxies, which contain only a few thousand stars, are dominated by dark matter and have relatively simple evolutionary histories. That makes them ideal cosmic laboratories for testing theories