• News

News

30 Jul 24

The Royal Observatory of Belgium and the National Geographic Institute become Partners of the United Nations Global Centre of Expertise in Geodesy

Following a joint application, the Royal Observatory of Belgium (ROB) and the National Geographical Institute (NGI) were awarded the prestigious status of ‘Partner of the United Nations Global Geodetic Centre of Excellence’ (UN-GGCE). This recognition highlights the many contributions that both institutes make in geodesy, the science of Earth measurement and representation.  [...]

30 July 2024 Read more...
02 Jul 24

Permanent exhibition on seismology at Fort Eben-Emael

Thanks to a fantastic collaboration with the non-profit organisation Fort Eben-Emael, the staff of the Seismology and Gravimetry service of the Royal Observatory of Belgium were able to open a new fascinating exhibition on seismology on 27 June 2024. [...]

02 July 2024 Read more...
10 Jun 24

First evidence of water frost on the tallest volcanoes of Mars

Brussels, 10 June 2024 – A new study reveals for the first time the presence of water frost on the peak of Martian volcanoes near the equator. This discovery was published in a recent Nature Geoscience paper, with contributions from researchers of the Royal Observatory of Belgium (ROB) and the Royal Belgian Institute for Space Aeronomy (BIRA-IASB).   [...]

10 June 2024 Read more...
27 May 24

Cem Berk Senel is a laureate of EOS Pipet 2024

The Flemish popular science magazine EOS Wetenschap has recently presented five young scientists in its contest EOS Pipet 2024. Each was chosen for their significant contribution to scientific research. Among them is Cem Berk Senel, postdoctoral researcher at the Royal Observatory of Belgium (ROB), who recently published a paper in Nature Geosciences that attracted a great deal of media attention. [...]

27 May 2024 Read more...
16 Apr 24

New Black Hole discovered with ESA’s Gaia satellite

Brussels, 16 April 2024 – Today the European Space Agency (ESA) and the Gaia collaboration teams reveal the discovery of a high-mass stellar black hole of 33 times our Sun’s mass in the Milky Way. The Royal Observatory of Belgium contributed to this discovery thanks to the radial velocity data it helped to process.
Third black hole discovered with Gaia data
A stellar black [...]

16 April 2024 Read more...
11 Apr 24

Violent star history: beautiful nebula and magnetic star born from a stellar clash

Brussels, 11 April 2024 – When astronomers looked at a stellar pair at the heart of a stunning cloud of gas and dust, they were in for a surprise. Star pairs are typically very similar, like twins, but in HD 148937, one star appears younger and, unlike the other, is magnetic. In a newly published Science research paper, scientists, including Laurent Mahy [...]

11 April 2024 Read more...
17 Feb 24

150th anniversary of Quetelet’s death

150 years ago, on February 17, 1874, Adolphe Quetelet, founder and first director of the Royal Observatory of Belgium, passed away. He was one of the best-known Belgians of his time. A keen statistician, he is best known as the inventor of the Quetelet index, better known today as the BMI (Body Mass Index). Books have been written about this [...]

17 February 2024 Read more...
12 Feb 24

International Day of Women in Science: interview with Fabienne and Sabrina

February 11 is the International Day of Women and Girls in Science, a day recognised by UNESCO. According to the UNESCO Institute for Statistics, 33.3% of scientists are women. This percentage is of the same order of magnitude as that of female researchers at the Royal Observatory of Belgium, which is between 30 and 35% women among its scientific staff. [...]

12 February 2024 Read more...