Hendrik van de Hulst centennial symposium On behalf of the observatory, we are organizing the Hendrik van de Hulst centennial symposium on the interstellar medium of galaxies: status and future perspectives, November 5-9, 2018, in the Boerhaave museum in Leiden.
New postdoc joins the group Dr. Livia Vallini has joined the interstellar medium group on a prestigious Marie Curie postdoctoral fellowship for a project called DEEPIMPACT to study molecular processes at early cosmic times. Welcome from us all!
New PhD student joins the group Sanjana Panchagnula has accepted our offer for a PhD project on the photo fragmentation of PAHs using the experimental set-up, i-PoP. Her position is partly funded through the Marie Curie Initial Training Network, EUROPAH, funded by the EU under Horizon 2020, and the Dutch Astrochemistry Network funded by NWO. Sanjana will finish up her master's studies at King's College London and will start in Leiden on September 1, 2018. Welcome from us all!
Cameron Mackie's PhD manuscript approved The reading committee has approved Cameron Mackie's manuscript. He will defend his PhD on Thursday, March 29, 2018 at 1:45pm in the Academie building. April 1, he will move to the Chemistry Department of the University of California, Berkeley where he will work with professor Martin Head Gordon.
New master students join the ISM group Susie Tuntipong and Keegan Thompson joined the group as a MSc student.
School on PAHs Xander Tielens and Antoine Gusdorf are organizing a school about Polycyclic Aromatic Hydrocarbons (PAHs) in the Interstellar Medium (ISM). This school will give a comprehensive view of the role of PAHs in space. As part of the school you can expect thorough introductions to astronomical observations & theory, experimental & quantum chemical techniques relevant for the study of PAHs in the ISM of galaxies, and observing opportunities from the ground and with the to-be-launched James Webb Space telescope. Read more
Cornelia Pabst shared her results and experience with the rest of Leiden university This week Cornelia Pabst gave a talk during the this week's dicoveries event. There Cornelia explained how using the unique capabilities of the airborne Stratospheric Observatory For Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) we can get a better picture of the interstellar medium. Her recent work has focused on the Orion star forming region, where she has used the [CII] 158 micron line to understand the interrelation between interstellar gas and stars. Read more
Dario Campisi joins the group Dario Campisi is a PhD candidate Marie Curie Fellow involved on Marie Skłodowska-Curie European training network funded under Horizon2020 called EUROPAH. Dario will spend four years in Xander Tielens and Inge Loes ten Kate's groups working on Density functional theory (DFT) investigations of PAHs and the organic inventory of meteorites. At the moment, Dario is involved in two projects: one investigating hydrogen production from a small PAH with Alessandra Candian, Prof. Rocco Martinazzo of Milan University and Prof. Liv Hornekær of Aarhus University, and the second one on using quantum periodic approaches with Dr. Nelson Dzade of Utrecht University and the collaboration of other scientists, for investigating the interactions and breakdown reactions of PAHs on olivinic surfaces of meteorites as implication of amino acid formation astrocatalytic processes.
Heather Andrew's PhD manuscript approved Heather Andrew's PhD thesis manuscript "Shining Light on PAHs in Space" was approved by his reading committee. She will defend her thesis on June 7, 2017.
More riches Congratulations to Sebastiaan Krijt who was awarded a prestigious Hubble fellowship! Read more
A member of the ISM group becomes a frequent flyer on SOFIA Cornelia Pabst flew an astounding 13 (!) times with the upGREAT team on SOFIA. This earned her special recognition as a SOFIA frequent flyer (unfortunately, there is no miles-plus program) as well as an amazing survey of the Orion A molecular cloud in the [CII] 158 micron line.
New PhD student in the ISM group Andrew Barr has accepted a PhD position in our group to study the organic inventory and chemical processes that play a role in Hot Cores associated with regions of massive star formation. This study is based upon the EXES/SOFIA and TEXES/Gemini survey of such regions. Welcome aboard!
Junfeng Zhen is on the tenure track Junfeng Zhen has accepted a tenure track position in the astronomy department of the university of science and technology of China (USTC) where he will build up a new laboratory for astrophysics from scratch. We hope to welcome him back for further experiments with this "child" i-PoP over the coming years.
Welcome to this Universe Nina Koen Maaskant & Astrid Newsum welcome their daughter, Nina. Congratulations from us all! Remember, Nina, that with such parents, the Universe is your cradle.
The lowest frequency detection of a carbon radio recombination line In a recent paper by the radio recombination line group, observations with LOFAR are used to constrain the interstellar gas pressure. These observations also enabled the detection of the lowest frequency Cα recombination line at 11 MHz, close to the ionospheric cutoff. Read more
Nikki and Bavo graduated Nikki Zabel and Bavo Croiset graduated this week. It was a pleasure having them as members of the group.
New master students join the ISM group Esmee Stoop and Andrew Barr joined the group as MSc students. Esmee will be working on bubbles and Andrew on SOFIA observations.
Farewell to the 2016 LEAPS student After two months in Leiden as a LEAPS student Soheb is leaving the ISM group. During this period he realized a study of symbiotic stars which had a very good reception. Look forward to see the results in the literature!
LEAPS student 2016 Soheb Mandhai joined the ISM group as part of the LEAPS program. He will be working with Liz Guzman-Ramirez and Marcelo Leal-Ferreira on the analysis of a sample of symbiotic stars.
Farewell to Isabel Aleman Isabel Aleman stayed in Leiden as a member of the ISM group for a bit more than 3 years. During her stay she worked in a number of research projects related to PAHs and Planetary Nebulae. From these, we highlight the first detection of OH+ in PNe. She also supervised 3 students as part as the LEAPS (2014, 2015) program, created and worked as executive editor of the Newsletter AstroPAH, and organized the international meetings "The Interaction of Stars with the Interstellar Medium of Galaxies", "30 Years of PhotoDissociation Regions", and "WorkPlaNS". On February 2016 she left Leiden to start a postdoc position at the University of Sao Paulo, Brazil.
The WORKPLANS workshop was a success After a week of discussions, interesting results and planning the WORKPLANS workshop came to an end. Read more
WORKPLANS workshop is starting the 25th of January The WORKshop for PLAnetary Nebulae observationS, organized by members of the group, will start next week in the Lorentz center of Leiden university. Read more
Kirsten got her paper accepted At intermediate regions of the Milky Way galaxy the gas-phase atomic D/H ratio is observed to be highly variable, with a range of a factor of 4-5, with measurements as low as about 5.0 ppm for θ Car and as high as about 21.8 ppm for γ2 Vel. One possible explanation for the variation is that some of the deuterium is being locked up in grains or PAHs. Through NIR spectroscopic observations of 53 HII regions using the AKARI satellite, we detected in 6 of the sources the spectroscopic signature of deuterated PAHs at 4.4 micron (the aromatic CD stretch) and at 4.63 and 4.75 micron (the aliphatic asymmetric and symmetric CD stretches. respectively). In all cases, the aromatic C-D stretching feature is weaker than the aliphatic C-D stretching feature, which suggests that the deuterium atom preferentially adds aliphatically. Additionally, based on the weak or absent deuterated features in most of the observed spectra, it is suggested that the mechanism for PAH deuteration in the ISM is uncommon; this is congruous with the idea that deuterium locked up in PAHs contributes to the observed gas-phase variation. Read more
Farewell to Rowin Recently, we said goodbye to Rowin Meijerink. Rowin started his career as a graduate student in Leiden with Frank Israel on "Models of the ISM in galaxy centers". He then joined Al Glasgold at UC Berkeley and later Geoff Blake at Caltech on postdoctoral fellowships to study the IR emission from protoplanetary disks around low mass protostars. Rowin returned to the Netherlands to work with Paul van der Werf in Leiden and Marco Spaans in Groningen on the analysis and interpretation of Herschel SPIRE and PACS studies of starburst and Ultra luminous InfraRed Galaxies. Rowin is a world leader in the physics of UV and X-ray irradiated gas and has written seminal papers in this area. In Leiden and Groningen, he also has supervised a number of graduate students in their studies in this area. On December 1 2015, Rowin has started working in SparkOptimus. We wish him all the best in this new career.
New members of the X-people Carmen Toribio, Cornelia Pabst, Kim Emig and Nikki Zabel joined the ISM group.
Farewell to the 2015 LEAPS students After 2 months as LEAPS students Andrea Gaughan, Sam Kerber and Prince Tiwari left the group.
Alessandra Candian's VENI fellowship Alessandra Candian received a prestigious VENI fellowship from NWO to join the group as an independent researcher for three years. Read more
An Abundance of riches Sebastiaan Krijt was offered the prestigious Humboldt fellowship to go to the University of Heidelberg as well the Rubicon fellowship that he can take to the Center for Astrophysics at Harvard University. He was also offered a postdoctoral fellowship at Chicago University.
Brahm Ochsendorf's PhD manuscript approved Bram Ochsendorf's PhD thesis manuscript "Tales of Orion: the interplay of gas, dust, and stars in the interstellar medium" was approved by his reading committee. He will defend his thesis on September 1, 2015.
Francisco Salgado's PhD manuscript approved Francisco Salgado's PhD thesis manuscript "Studies of dust and gas in the interstellar medium of the Milky Way" was approved by his reading committee. He will defend his thesis on September 2, 2015.
LEAPS students 2015 Andrea Gaughan, Sam Kerber and Prince Tiwari joined the ISM group as part of the LEAPS program. They will take part in the research projects conducted in the group for a period of 10-11 weeks.
Annemieke Petrignani's VIDI grant Annemieke Petrignani received the prestigious VIDI grant from NWO to start her own research group on interstellar PAHs at the van't Hoff Institute for molecular sciences at the University of Amsterdam. Read more
