The launch of SVOM is officially scheduled by our Chinese partners for June 24, 2024. In the photo accessible by clicking on the link XX, you can admire the SVOM payload integrated into the hall of the SECM (Shanghai Micro Satellite Engineering Center) in Shanghai. All tests have been successfully completed, and the satellite is now ready for launch. The purpose of the Flight Acceptance Review (FAR), scheduled to take place in Shanghai from January 22 to 26, 2024, will be to formally approve the satellite's readiness to move to the launch pad located in Xichang in Xishuang.

This morning of October 25, 2022, the Sun had an appointment with the Moon: a partial eclipse was visible from Saclay. For this occasion, we installed a Halpha solar telescope on the lawn in front of the 709. The weather was rather generous since the sky was partially clear and everyone could observe the solar disk covered in small part by the disk of the Moon in backlight, showing us two sunspots, filaments, spicules and some protuberances.

Galaxy cluster at z=2.915 associated with a diffuse Lyα emission likely revealing the accretion of cold gas from the cosmic web Credit: Daddi et al. (2021) Clusters of galaxies are the most massive bound structures in the Universe. Today, they are mainly composed of so-called dead galaxies (i.e. without star formation activity) containing mostly very old stars. To understand how these objects were formed, we need to go back in time, to the epochs when they were assembled.