News
“I love dealing with topics that go against the grain”
“What am I going to do when my time at PlanetS is up?” This is a question that doctoral students and postdocs who know how few and far between the coveted professorships are must ask themselves. In the InsiderS newsletter, we introduce physicists who have successful careers outside the university. Andreas Hirstein is head of […]
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Knowledge transfer with a short-term project
Are you PhD-student, postdoc or engineer, PlanetS Member or Associate? Have you developed competences or ideas that maybe applied to areas outside your specific research activities? Would you like to have a work experience outside of PlanetS in industry or in another research laboratory/institution for a limited period of time while still being employed by […]
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Facebook volunteers wanted
Adding some valuable skills to your CV in just 5 to 10 minutes per week… impossible you think? Well, you are wrong, it is possible. By Thibaut Roger On the first of March 2016, the NCCR PlanetS, following recommendation of the evaluating panel, created its Facebook page. Two and a half year later, we are […]
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The VLT at Palexpo in Geneva
“When last year the organizers of the Cité des Métiers asked us whether the astronomy department of the University of Geneva would accept to be the guest of honour of the exhibition, we immediately realized that the visibility offered by such an event represented an opportunity to be seized. The rest proved that we were […]
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How do YOU shop?
Gendered marketing seems to be bigger than ever By Nadine Afram Stereotyping at an early age, in fact from the day we are born and surrounded by our pink dolls and pink bedrooms or monster trucks and superheroes, can affect us longer than we like to think. In STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths), women […]
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“I am constantly on the lookout for new locations for the pillars”
In communication and in outreach, we are always confronted with one challenging question: How do we reach new audiences that have never heard of us before? One of the media that carries the content and messages of NCCR PlanetS to the outside world are the 10 exoplanet pillars – 5 German versions, 3 English versions […]
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General Assembly 2019
The 5thNCCR PlanetS General Assembly will take place from Monday, 28 January to Wednesday, 30 January 2019. For the second phase of the NCCR the organizers decided to choose a new venue – Beatenberg instead of Grindelwald where the last 3 General Assemblies took place. The main attraction of Beatenberg is its location. “From our […]
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Milestone for SAINT-EX project
SAINT-EX is a 1 meter robotic telescope under construction at the National Astronomical Observatory of Mexico in San Pedro Martir. It is designed to look for earth-sized, potentially habitable planets orbiting ultra-cool stars. The telescope being built by the ASTELCO company is funded by the Center for Space and Habitability CSH at the University of […]
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CHEOPS launch slot announced
The CHaracterising ExOPlanet Satellite, CHEOPS, will target 15 October to 14 November 2019 for launch as the European Space Agency ESA announced on 23 November 2018. CHEOPS will lift off on a Soyuz rocket operated by Arianespace from Europe’s spaceport in Kourou, sharing the ride into space with a satellite that is part of the […]
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Encouraging prospects for moon hunters
Astrophysicists of the University of Zürich, ETH Zürich and the NCCR PlanetS show how the icy moons of Uranus were born. Their result suggests that such potentially habitable worlds are much more abundant in the Universe than previously thought. The unprecedentedly complex computer simulations were performed at the Swiss National Supercomputing Centre (CSCS) in Lugano. […]
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