ARI Project Descriptions

National and International Networks

Heidelberg Graduate School of Fundamental Physics (HGSFP)

The HGSFP provides an excellent and flexible education in the fields of fundamental interactions and cosmology, quantum dynamics and complex quantum systems as well as astrophysics and cosmic physics.

International Max-Planck-Research School for Astronomy and Cosmic Physics (IMPRS)

The IMPRS is operated by the Max-Planck-Institutes for Astronomy and for Nuclear Physics together with the Faculty for Physics and Astronomy. It offers students a first-class education in the framework of the Heidelberg Graduate School of Fundamental Physics.

Witnesses of Cosmic History: Formation and evolution of black holes, galaxies and their environment (SPP 1177)

In the framework of the DFG Priority Programme SPP 1177 the project "Co-evolution of supermassive black holes and galactic nuclei" is aimed to elucidate the interaction between single and binary supermassive black holes and their nuclear environments, as a means of constraining the dynamical histories of observed galaxies; the past and current rates of interactions of supermassive black holes with stars; and the likely future evolution of supermassive black hole nuclei.

MODelling DEnse STellar Systems (MODEST)

MODEST is an informal international collaboration of leading groups in the field of stellar dynamics, stellar evolution, and the hydrodynamics of stellar collisions. The long-term aim is to provide a realistic model of young star clusters, globular clusters, and other dense stellar systems, which take all these effects into account. In the frame of MODEST a common software will be develped, and workshops and schools are organized regularly. The ARI is in charge of the Working Group 3 Stellar Dynamics, the Home Page of the network can be found at http://www.manybody.org/modest/.

International Research and Graduate School for Nonlinear Dynamics in Active Galactic Nuclei and Planetary Systems (IRGDYN)

IRGDYN is an association of funded international cooperations aiming to stellar dynamics in Active Galactic Nuclei and in Planetary Systems with special emphasis to educate graduate students.

European Leadership in Space Astrometry (ELSA)

ELSA is a Marie Curie Research Training Network supported by the European Community's Sixth Framework Programme (FP6). The network contract was concluded between the European Commission and ELSA on 1st October 2006 and has a duration of 4 years.
The overall objectives of ELSA are to develop the theoretical understanding and practical analysis tools of importance for the European Space Agency's astrometric mission Gaia (to be launched in late-2012) and to foster the development of a new generation of researchers in the area of space astrometry.

Gaia Research Network for European Astronomy Training (EU ITN GREAT)

The Initial Training Network (ITN) "GREAT" (2011 - 2014) is funded by the European Union (EU) in its Seventh Framework Programme. The GREAT ITN trains graduate students working on Gaia-related science. The GREAT ITN focuses on unravelling the origin and history of our home galaxy, on tracing the birth place and understanding the astrophysical properties of the stellar constituents of our Galaxy, on deepening the understanding of planetary systems by linking the study of exoplanets to the origins of the solar system, and on taking up the grand challenges offered by Gaia in the domains of the distance scale and the transient sky.

Gaia Research Network for European Astronomy Training (ESF RNP GREAT)

The Research Network Programme (RNP) "GREAT" is a European research infrastructure funded by the European Science Foundation (ESF). It aims at facilitating the full scientific exploitation of the Gaia satellite mission of the European Space Agency by supporting focused interaction on a European scale. The ESF RNP GREAT (2010 - 2015) provides partial funding for topical workshops, training events, exchange visits, conferences and so forth with the aim of addressing the major scientific issues that the Gaia satellite will impact upon.

Gravitational Wave Astronomy with LISA (DLR project)

In this project a large set of gravitational wave emission templates by merging events of compact objects like binary neutron stars or black holes will be calculated. The aim is to allow the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) the identification of gravitational events from these sources.

Virgo EGO Scientific Forum (VESF)

VESF is a forum for the European science community around the collaborations VIRGO (a ground based interferometer for detection of gravitational waves in the 10-1000 Hz frequency regime, see the VIRGO sensitivity curve) and EGO (European Gravitational Wave Observatory). Together with the Theoretical Physics Institute of the University of Jena we work on a proper formulation of Post-Newtonian dynamics of compact binaries in N-body simulations and for the determination of waveforms and polarizations (see project page).

Large International Projects

Astrometric Satellite Mission Gaia

Gaia is the next big astrometry mission by the European Space Agency ESA to be launched in 2012. Gaia will measure the positions, parallaxes, proper motions, luminosities and colours of more than 1 billion stars with unprecedented precision, complemented by radial velcities and spectra of 100 million stars. Main goal is to elucidate the structure, formation and evolution of the Milky Way. For more details see also Gaia@ARI. Special tools for the efficient use of the vast amount of astrometric data provided by Gaia are developed by the European Leadership in Space Astrometry (ELSA).

Probing Lens Anomaly NETwork (PLANET)

PLANET is a collaboration to follow-up gravitational lensing events with the aim to discover extra-solar planets. This method is potentially sensitive to masses as small as the Earth's.

Sloan Digital Sky Survey III (SDSS III)

Building on the legacy of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) and SDSS II, the SDSS III (2008 - 2014) is carrying out a program of four surveys to map the structure and dynamics of the Milky Way, to find and characterize extrasolar planetary systems, and to understand dark energy and the nature of the universe. The photometric and spectroscopic survey data are obtained with a dedicated 2.5m telescope at Apache Point Observatory, USA.

Radial Velocity Experiment (RAVE)

RAVE (2003-2011) in Australia measures radial velocities and the chemical composition of 1 million stars at the Southern sky to determine the evolution of the Milky Way disc.

Panoramic Survey Telescope & Rapid Response System (Pan-STARRS)

Pan-STARRS (2010 - 2013) is a northern imaging sky survey covering three quarters of the sky. Pan-STARRS at Hawaii will start very soon a new Northern sky survey, which is able to measure five times fainter objects than the SDSS. Additionally to brightnesses and colours the variability of objects will be determined. The search for extrasolar planets and the investigation of structure and evolution of the Milky Way and distant galaxies are important aims of the project.

High Performance Computing & E-science

GRApe + mpraCE (GRACE)

GRACE is a cooperation project, supported by the Volkswagen-Stiftung, with the Technischen Informatik, Lehrstuhl V of the university of Mannheim and the working group Computational Astrophysics at the Universitätssternwarte München. The hybrid-structure of this new type of super-computer combines three elements: a normal 64 prozessor Beowulf PC cluster, special developed computer hardware with fixed-wired gravitational force computation (GRAPE), developed in a project of Japanese astrophysicists at the Univ. of Tokyo, and flexible reprogrammable chips (FPGA, field programmable gate array). A peak performance of 4 Tflop/s computational speed is actually realized for the numerical modelling of dense stellar systems (young star clusters, galactic nuclei with binary Black Holes) and the simulation of turbulence and star formation in galaxies and the interstellar medium. In order to reach this performance for our applications with a usual High Performance Computer a ten times larger peak performance would be necessary, realized today only by the three fastest computers in the Top 500 list.

German Astrophysical Virtual Observatory (GAVO)

GAVO is the German contribution to the Virtual Observatory and member of the International Virtual Observatory Alliance (IVOA). IVOA's mission is the development of standards and software to facilitate structured and worldwide access to astronomical resources like data, archives, services, programs, etc. Within IVOA, GAVO's activities focus on simulations and theory as well as catalogue archives. Examples include providing interactive and intuitive access to results of n-body simulations or spectra of hot stars and the publication of astrometric or photometric catalogues. GAVO is funded by the German federal research administration (BMBF); further participants are Universität Tübingen, Max-Planck-Institut für extraterrestrische Physik (MPE) in Garching and Astrophysikalisches Institut Potsdam (AIP).

AstroGrid-D

AstroGrid-D is a research project in the area "e-Science" and "Grid middleware" for the support of scientific work in the context of the German D-Grid-Initiative. As interdisciplinary partners in the AstroGrid-D, the larger German astronomical research institutes, grid-specific research groups of computer science as well as some high speed computing centres have joined their efforts to get together some strategic goals, which will lead to a general and sustainable Grid-infrastructure, that will be available for all German scientists.

WissGrid

As a D-Grid project, WissGrid’s objective is to establish long-term organizational and technical Grid structures for the academic world. WissGrid combines the heterogeneous needs from a variety of scientific disciplines and develops concepts for the long-term sustainable use of the organizational and technical grid infrastructure. In this context, the project aims to strengthen the organizational cooperation of scientists in the grid and to lower the entry barriers for new community grids. Three key tasks have been identified from WissGrid’s objectives:

1. Operational model for academic grid users

2. Blueprints for new community grids

3. Long-term storage for research data

The ZAH (Zentrum für Astronomie der Universität Heidelberg) is active in the creation of blueprints for the integration of new communities in scientific Grid technology and in the development of sustainable strategies for long-term preservation of research data. In this context, we can build on the experience of the Grid community AstroGrid-D and use the proximity to the German Astrophysical Virtual Observatory GAVO.

Contact: A. Just