Outline of the School
The primary aim of the XXVIII Winter School is to provide a up-to-date overview of the reasearch that is currently being done related to the exploration of the Solar System, covering different topics like asteroids, comets, icy objects, planetary atmospheres, dynamical models, and a variety of planetary space mission. It will also include for the first time practical lessons on planetary data reduction, analysis, and archiving. The School is particularly designed to offer young researchers tips and guidelines to help them direct their future research towards these themes.
The School will provide several advanced courses in the specific topics described above, including two courses imparted by researchers of the European Space Agency and focused on ESA planetary space missions. Additionally, four virtual classes on planeatary space missions will be imparted by experts from the Centre for Lunar and Asteroid Surface Science (CLASS), part of the NASA Solar System Exploration Research Virtual Institute (SSERVI). This year, and for the first time, the School will also include a small workshop on planetary data reduction and analysis, and it will put the focus on planetary data archiving. This is especially interesting nowadays, when the amount of scientific data from dedicated surveys and space missions is considerable large.
This School aims to bring together in a relaxed working atmosphere eminent and experienced scientists who are actively working on a variety of forefront research projects, and who have played a key role in major advances over the recent years. The list of invited researchers includes leading theoreticians and pioneering observers in each area of the subject who have been carefully chosen to represent all the leading research teams in each topic covered in the School. The School will tackle many aspects Solar System Exploration and is particularly designed to introduce young researchers to the planetary sicence. The format of the School, which includes practical sessions, will also encourage direct interaction between the participating students and lecturers. The school is primarily intended for doctoral students and recent postdocs in any field of research in Astronomy. Participants of the Winter School will have the opportunity to display their current work by presenting a poster.
The Winter School will take place at San Cristóbal de La Laguna (Tenerife, Canary Islands, Spain) from Monday 7th to Wednesday 16th November 2016. The lectures will be delivered in English and will be published by Cambridge University Press in a dedicated monograph, which will be sent free of costs to all of the School’s participants. Speakers will present their topics in a series of four lectures. Visits to the IAC's Headquarter in La Laguna, the Teide Observatory in Tenerife and the Roque de los Muchachos Observatory in La Palma will be scheduled as part of the activities.
Those interested in attending the Winter School should register following the instructions provided in the Registration page. Once registered, please login to the personal area of the website and complete the required information. In addition we request a letter of reference from a thesis advisor or Head of Department which should be emailed to winter@iac.es. These should reach the IAC before June 23rd. Selected candidates will be informed by July 1st.