New simultaneous X-ray and radio observations of the archetypal mode-switching pulsar PSR B0943+10 have been carried out with XMM-Newton and the LOFAR, LWA and Arecibo radio telescopes in November 2014. They allowed us to better constrain the X-ray spectral and variability properties of this pulsar and to detect, for the first time, the X-ray pulsations also during the X-ray-fainter mode. The combined timing and spectral analysis indicates that unpulsed non-thermal emission, likely of magnetospheric origin, and pulsed thermal emission from a small polar cap are present during both radio modes and vary in a correlated way.

Observationally measuring the location of the H2O snowline is crucial for understanding the planetesimal and planet formation processes, and the origin of water on Earth. The velocity profiles of emission lines from protoplanetary disks are usually affected by Doppler shift due to Keplerian rotation and thermal broadening. Therefore, the velocity profiles are sensitive to the radial distribution of the line-emitting regions. In our work (Notsu et al. 2016, 2017), we found candidate water lines to locate the position of the H2O snowline through future high-dispersion spectroscopic observations. First, we calculated the chemical composition of the disks around a T Tauri star and a Herbig Ae star using chemical kinetics. We confirmed that the abundance of H2O gas is high not only in the hot midplane region inside the H2O snowline but also in the hot surface layer and the photodesorption region of the outer disk. The position of the H2O snowline in the Herbig Ae disk exists at a larger radius from the central star than that in the T Tauri disk. Second, we calculated the H2O line profiles and identified that H2O emission lines with small Einstein A coefficients (∼10−6 − 10−3 s−1) and relatively high upper state energies (∼ 1000K) are dominated by emission from the hot midplane region inside the H2O snowline, and therefore their profiles potentially contain information which can be used to locate the position of the H2O snowline. The wavelengths of the H2O lines which are the best candidates to locate the position of the H2O snowline range from mid-infrared to sub-millimeter, and the total line fluxes tend to increase with decreasing wavelengths. We investigated the possibility of future observations using the ALMA and mid-infrared high-dispersion spectrographs (e.g., SPICA/SMI-HRS). Since the fluxes of those identified lines from a Herbig Ae disk are stronger than those of a T Tauri disk, the possibility of a successful detection is expected to increase for a Herbig Ae disk.

Owing to their extreme crowding and high and variable extinction, stars in the Galactic Bulge, within ±2° of the Galactic plane, and especially those in the Nuclear Star Cluster, have only rarely been targeted for an analyses of their detailed abundances. There is also some disagreement about the high end of the abundance scale for these stars. It is now possible to obtain high dispersion, high S/N spectra in the infrared K band (~2.0 − 2.4 µm) for these giants; we report our progress at Keck and VLT in using these spectra to infer the composition of this stellar population.

Additional acceleration of protons and electrons passing through a 3D reconnecting current sheet (RCS) of the solar corona and heliosphere is investigated with PIC approach. The simulation confirms spatial separation of electrons and protons and generation of a polarisation electric field induced by separated particles. In the heliospheric current sheet with a weak magnetic field there are two populations of particles: transit and bounced. The transit particles (both protons and electrons) are accelerated to high energies while the bounced electrons fail to reach the midplane. Instead they form an electron cloud of horseshoe or medallion types at some distance D from its midplane, which is larger for bigger guiding field magnitudes. These energetic electrons and protons appearing near the HCS boundaries can be a great danger for the satellites crossing the sector boundaries.

The IAU was founded in 1919 “to facilitate the relations between astronomers of different countries where international co-operation is necessary or useful” and “to promote the study of astronomy in all its departments”. These aims have led the IAU throughout the century of its existence, but the way it has tried to fulfil them has changed. We have tried to trace the changing role of the IAU in the international astronomical community through the twentieth century and into the twenty-first. The IAU has striven – occasionally struggled – to protect international scientific cooperation across the deep political divides that characterized the 20th century, while maintaining an important function in the context of the rapidly evolving science itself and the changing fabric of institutions involved in astronomy. We especially argue how the emphasis of the IAU’s activities has shifted from the first aim – facilitating collaboration by organizing meetings and defining common standards – to the second aim: promoting astronomy by outreach and development programs.

We have analyzed the Debrecen Photoheliographic Data (DPD) and the Solar Optical Observing Network (SOON) sunspot group data during the period 1977 – 2015 and find that during the maximum of solar cycle 23 there is a large difference in the mean meridional motion of sunspot groups determined from DPD and SOON data.

The coronal field typically reorganizes itself to attain a force-free field configuration. We have evaluated the power law index of the energy distribution f(E) = f0E−α by using a model of relaxation incorporating different profile functions of winding number distribution f(w) based on braided topologies. We study the radio signatures that occur in the solar corona using the radio data obtained from the Gauribidanur Radio Observatory (IIA) and extract the power law index by using the Statistic-sensitive nonlinear iterative peak clipping (SNIP) algorithm. We see that the power law index obtained from the model is in good agreement with the calculated value from the radio data observation.

Planets form in disks around young stars. The planet formation process may start when the protostar and disk are still deeply embedded within their infalling envelope. However, unlike more evolved protoplanetary disks, the physical and chemical structure of these young embedded disks are still poorly constrained. We have analyzed ALMA data for 13CO, C18O and N2D+ to constrain the temperature structure, one of the critical unknowns, in the disk around L1527. The spatial distribution of 13CO and C18O, together with the kinetic temperature derived from the optically thick 13CO emission and the non-detection of N2D+, suggest that this disk is warm enough (≳ 20 K) to prevent CO freeze-out.

The LIGO detectors have just completed a successful and exciting observation run. Both facilities are now undergoing upgrades and commissioning, including doubling the circulating power in the interferometer which will increase LIGO’s sensitivity above 100 Hz. This paper motivates the power increase and discusses the problems in general that arise with higher power and the progress to date with addressing them. Topics include input power noise coupling, parametric instability, and thermal effects.

Benjamin Baillaud was appointed president of the First Executive Committee of the International Astronomical Union which met in Brussels during the Constitutive Assembly of the International Research Council (IRC) on July 28th, 1919. He served in this position until 1922, at the time of the First General Assembly of the IAU which took place in Rome, May 2–10. At that time, Baillaud was director of the Paris Observatory. He had previously been director of the Toulouse Observatory for a period of 30 years and Dean of the School of Sciences of the University of Toulouse. He specialized in celestial mechanics and he was a strong supporter of the “Carte du Ciel” project; he was elected chairman of the permanent international committee of the Carte du Ciel in 1909. He also was the founding president of the Bureau International de l’Heure (BIH) and he was directly involved in the coordination of the ephemerides at an international level. In this paper, we present some of his activities, particularly those concerning international programmes, for which he received international recognition and which eventually led to his election in 1919 to the position of first president of the IAU. We also briefly recount the very first meetings and years of the IAU.

The four main findings about the age and abundance structure of the Milky Way bulge based on microlensed dwarf and subgiant stars are: (1) a wide metallicity distribution with distinct peaks at [Fe/H] = -1.09, -0.63, -0.20, +0.12, +0.41; (2) a high fraction of intermediate-age to young stars where at [Fe/H] > 0 more than 35 % are younger than 8 Gyr, (3) several episodes of significant star formation in the bulge 3, 6, 8, and 11 Gyr ago; (4) the ‘knee’ in the α-element abundance trends of the sub-solar metallicity bulge appears to be located at a slightly higher [Fe/H] (about 0.05 to 0.1 dex) than in the local thick disk.

Sophisticated instrumentation dedicated to studying and monitoring our Sun’s activity has proliferated in the past few decades, together with the increasing demand of specialized space weather forecasts that address the needs of commercial and government systems. As a result, theoretical and empirical models and techniques of increasing complexity have been developed, aimed at forecasting the occurrence of solar disturbances, their evolution, and time of arrival to Earth. Here we will review groundbreaking and recent methods to predict the propagation and evolution of coronal mass ejections and their driven shocks. The methods rely on a wealth of data sets provided by ground- and space-based observatories, involving remote-sensing observations of the corona and the heliosphere, as well as detections of radio waves.

PSR B0943+10 is an old non-recycled pulsar which for decades has been mostly known for its rapid and spontaneous radio mode switching. Recently, Hermsen et al. (2013) discovered correlated changes in the thermal X-ray emission from the polar cap, thus demonstrating that radio modes are not just a product of the local changes in the radio emission region, but a sign of some global magnetospheric transformation. At about the same time, owing to the commissioning of the new generation of low-frequency radio arrays, the broadband observations at the lowest edge of ionospheric transparency window became available. At these radio frequencies profile morphology and the single-pulse properties of PSR B0943+10’s emission become very dynamic, providing details not only about the emission itself, but also about the conditions in the polar gap. Here, I will present the recent results of the LOFAR observations of PSR B0943+10 and discuss their contribution to the multiwavelength picture.

We report another 6.7 GHz methanol maser burst in the high mass star region G33.641-0.228. The flare is in its second component at vLSR = 59.6 km s−1 and was observed in August-September 2016 by VIRAC radio telescope RT-32 in Irbene, Latvia. Several bursts of the second spatial component of G33.641-0.228 have been reported previously by Fujisawa et al. The maximum peak flux density of the source was measured to reach 343 Jy that is 13 times increase from its ground level. Significant oscillations were discovered during the decay phase indicating a more complex burst mechanism that cannot be explained by a simple heating of the region.

Pulsars were discovered on the basis of their individual pulses, first by Jocelyn Bell and then by many others. This was chart-recorder science as computers were not yet in routine use. Single pulses carry direct information about the emission process as revealed in the detailed properties of their polarization characteristics. Early analyses of single pulses proved so dizzyingly complex that attention shifted to study of average profiles. This is turn led to models of pulsar emission beams—in particular the core/double-cone model—which now provides a foundation for understanding single-pulse sequences. We mention some of the 21stC single-pulse surveys and conclude with a brief discussion of our own recent analyses leading to the identification of the pulsar radio-emission mechanism of both slow and millsecond pulsars.

We construct two classes of the magnetohydrostatic equilibria of the axisymmetric flux tubes with twisted magnetic fields in the stratified solar atmosphere that span from the photosphere to the transition region. We built the models by incorporating specific forms of the gas pressure and poloidal current in the Grad-Shafranov equation. This model gives both closed and open field structure of the flux tube. The other open field model we construct is based on the self-similar formulation, where we have incorporated specific forms of the gas pressure, poloidal current and two different shape functions. We study the homology of the parameter space that is consistent with the solar atmosphere and find that the estimation of the magnetic structure inside the flux tubes is consistent with the observation and simulation results of the magnetic bright points.

We have measured the IMF of the inner Galaxy using ~3000 OGLE-III microlensing events. Each event’s timescale depends on both the lens mass, and the velocities and distances of the lens and source. New dynamical models were used provide the distribution of distances and velocities, and thereby measure the lens mass distribution. Using a power-law or log-normal parameterisation the resultant IMF is indistinguishable from local measurements by Kroupa or Chabrier respectively. The lenses lie in the inner Galaxy where the stars are mostly ~10 Gyr old and formed on a fast α-element enhanced timescale thereby constraining IMF variability with the properties of the collapsing gas cloud. Furthermore microlensing measures the stellar mass budget, including dark remnants, to low mass. Stars contribute most of the mass in the inner Galaxy with a low fraction remaining for dark matter. Reconciling this with local dark matter estimates requires a core or shallow cusp in its profile.

Discovery of strongly-lensed gravitational wave (GW) sources will unveil binary compact objects at higher redshifts and lower intrinsic luminosities than is possible without lensing. Such systems will yield unprecedented constraints on the mass distribution in galaxy clusters, measurements of the polarization of GWs, tests of General Relativity, and constraints on the Hubble parameter. Excited by these prospects, and intrigued by the presence of so-called “heavy black holes” in the early detections by LIGO-Virgo, we commenced a search for strongly-lensed GWs and possible electromagnetic counterparts in the latter stages of the second LIGO observing run (O2). Here, we summarise our calculation of the detection rate of strongly-lensed GWs, describe our review of BBH detections from O1, outline our observing strategy in O2, summarize our follow-up observations of GW170814, and discuss the future prospects of detection.

Prof. Jorge Sahade (1915–2012) was the first Latin American President of the International Astronomical Union (1985–1988). From then on, he had a very active participation as president, vice-president, and organizing committee member of several Commissions and Divisions of the IAU, related to stellar astrophysics and exchange of astronomers. Prof. J. Sahade was born in Argentina and was one of the first students graduated in astronomy at the National University of La Plata. He served as director of the Astronomical Observatory of Córdoba (1953–1955) and of the Observatory of La Plata (1968–1969). He was the first Dean of the Faculty of Exact Sciences of the National University of La Plata. He promoted the purchase of a 2.15-m diameter telescope, today located in the Complejo Astronómico El Leoncito, San Juan, Argentina. He founded the Institute of Astronomy and Physics of Space (IAFE) in Buenos Aires and was its first director (1971–1974). He was also director of the “Comisión Nacional de Actividades Espaciales” (the Argentina Space Activity Agency) and promoted the inclusion of Argentina as a partnership of the Gemini Observatory. Prof. Sahade also focused on the development of the astronomy in Latin America and this led to the creation of the “Liga Latinoamericana de Astronomía” (nowadays LIADA).

His research field was interacting binary systems and he published about 150 papers, among them is the well-known discovery of the “Struve-Sahade effect”. I met him when he was 70 years old; he was a very enthusiastic astronomer, who travellled everywhere to promote the astronomy in Latin America (Argentina, Perú, Honduras). Among his last dreams was the creation of a Latin American Institute to develop and enhance astrophysics in South and Central America, the revival of UV astronomy and many more impressive works that he would have liked to end and publish.