SSA Space Weather Coordination Centre

On Wednesday, 3 April 2013, the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Solar-Terrestrial Centre of Excellence (STCE) will present a new European Space Weather facility to the media. The centre is being developed as part of ESA's Space Situational Awareness (SSA) Programme.

See http://www.sidc.oma.be/news/185/welcome.html

and http://www.sidc.oma.be/news/187/welcome.html

Fireball of February 13, 2013 = last stage of Soyuz launcher

The fireball observed above Belgium and the Netherlands on February 13 around 22h10, was the re-entry of the third stage of the Soyuz rocket (SL4-R/B) that transported the unmanned space cargo Progress (M-18M) to the international space station ISS.

Odissea prize 2012

Elodie Gloesener, PhD student on the IAP (Interuniversity Attraction Pole) TOPERS Planet(Planets: Tracing the Transfer, Origin, Preservation, and Evolution of their ReservoirS), won the Odissea prize for her work in the frame of a Master in Space Sciences at the University of Liège on methane and clathrates of Mars (Promotor Veronique Dehant & Ozgur Karatekin). She studied the temperature and pressure conditions allowing clathrates to be stable in the interior of Mars and those that allow the degassing of methane observed in the Martian atmosphere.

Pictures of the ceremony in the Senate: see

http://www.senate.be/event/20130117_Odissea/fr/index.html http://www.senate.be/event/20130117_Odissea/nl/index.html

A prize of he Class of Sciences of the Belgian Royal Academy for a researcher of the ROB

Attilio Rivoldini, planetary scientist at the Royal Observatory of Belgium, won a competition of the Class of Sciences of the Belgian Royal Academy. His work was sent as an answer to a request for "an original contribution, experimental or theoretical on the physics of planets and moons of the solar system."

Attilio Rivoldini works under PRODEX (PROgramme Development of scientific EXperiments) managed by the European Space Agency (ESA), in collaboration with the Belgian Federal Science Policy Office (BELSPO) en is also a member of the IUAP (Inter-university attraction pole) Planet Topers.

Hypergiant !

A team of scientists including Dr. Alex Lobel of the ROB, reported they have finalized a thirty years long investigation of a hypergiant star. In that period the surface temperature of this gigantic and extremely bright star quickly rose from five to eight thousand degrees. With this discovery a crucial 'missing link' in the evolution of hypergiant stars has been found.

See http://alobel.freeshell.org/press.html

or http://www.aanda.org/articles/aa/pdf/2012/10/aa17166-11.pdf

Total eclipse of the sun in Australia

Observations from space (PROBA2-SWAP) and from Australia were coordinated by Belgian scientists.

Images are available at http://proba2.oma.be/news/solar_eclipse_20121113 where you also can find the blog of Dr. Anik De Groof with fantastic images.

The Solar-Terrestrial Centre of Excellence, STCE organises a space weather conference of world class

The European Space Weather Week, ESWW is THE annual event for researchers, users and others interested in Space Weather. The conference brings everybody concerned in contact with all possible aspect of space weather: from fundamental research to practical applications, from researcher to user. 300 participants worldwide chair their expertise and ideas.

All info here: http://www.stce.be/esww9/