03/19/2025 The first Euclid data published by ESA (Q1) provide impressive insights into the depths of the universe. They include high-resolution images of 26 million galaxies, reveal the finest structures and make it possible for the first time to precisely determine the shape and distance of more than 380,000 galaxies. And ORIGINS researchers at MPE play a central role in all of this.

03/11/2025 Zum siebten Mal vergibt der Exzellenzcluster ORIGINS die „ORIGINS PhD Awards" für zwei herausragende Doktorarbeiten in den Bereichen der Astro-, Kern- und Teilchenphysik sowie Biophysik. Interdisziplinäre Arbeiten, welche die verschiedenen Forschungsbereiche von ORIGINS verbinden, werden bevorzugt. Bewerbungsschluss ist der 15. Juli 2025.

03/03/2025 Most stars form in clusters, deeply embedded in the densest and coldest cores of giant molecular gas clouds. A few million years into the formation of a cluster the remaining gas is finally expelled by supernova explosions. Thereafter the clusters lose stars in the galactic tidal field and eventually disrupt. This entire life-cycle is very difficult to observe. Star clusters begin their lives deeply embedded in their birth clouds and are invisible to most observatories and the disruption of a single cluster can take tens of millions of years or more. An international team…

02/05/2025 Filaments are slender, thread-like structures of dark matter, gas and galaxies, forming a complex network known as the cosmic web. Theoretical models predict that they attract and channel cold gas to fuel star formation in galaxies. An international team led by ORIGINS researchers from the Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität of Munich (LMU), the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics (MPA) and the European Southern Observatory (ESO) has now, for the first time, discovered a dozen massive hydrogen clouds along a filament. The filament is also very unusual: it consists of an…

02/03/2025 ORIGINS PhD student Eva Sextl from the University Observatory of the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich wins the first AI-Hub@LMU award for the most innovative AI-based research project for her work “Spectral Genesis: Converting Galaxy Images into Spectroscopic Insights with Generative Artificial Intelligence”.

01/24/2025 Astronomers, including ORIGINS scientists, have discovered extremely powerful winds pummeling the equator of WASP-127b, a giant exoplanet. Reaching speeds up to 33 000 km/h, the winds make up the fastest jet stream of its kind ever measured on a planet. The discovery was made using the European Southern Observatory’s Very Large Telescope (ESO’s VLT) in Chile and provides unique insights into the weather patterns of a distant world.

01/07/2025 ORIGINS scientist Prof. Dr. Barbara Ercolano will become a ‘Max Planck Fellow’ at the Max Planck Institute for Extraterrestrial Physics (MPE), where she will work with Prof. Dr. Paola Caselli's ‘Astrochemistry’ group to study the regions where exoplanets are born. She is currently working at the University Observatory Munich and will use this joint position to strengthen the collaboration between the Max Planck Society (MPG), the Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich (LMU) and the ORIGINS Cluster of Excellence.

11/22/2024 The ORIGINS Cluster of Excellence is again awarding two doctoral prizes this year. The outstanding works of Laura Šerkšnytė from the Technical University of Munich (TUM) and Andrija Kostić from the Max Planck Institute for Astrophysics (MPA) are being honored. The ORIGINS PhD Awards were presented during the ORIGINS Science Week, which took place from November 18 to 21, 2024 at Seeon Monastery.

11/14/2024 Make way for science! At 7 pm on October 17 at Bahnwärter Thiel, the four Munich Excellence Clusters e-conversion, MCQST, ORIGINS, and SyNergy hosted their first-ever Science Slam with great success. Over 300 guests followed the event's motto, "Expect the Unexpected," and flocked to the iconic location in the Schlachthofviertel. There, the young researchers slammed with raw eggs, balloons and mixers, pizzapasta (or was it pastapizza?), radioactive bananas, tennis balls, tangled headphones, water bottles and croissants, and above all with a lot of heart and mind. It…

11/14/2024 Radioactive nuclei with very long lifetimes can provide us with important data on the formation history of our sun, especially if their lifetimes are strongly dependent on the environment. Thallium ($^{205}$Tl) is one of the few nuclei that are stable as an atom, but have only a short lifetime without their electron shell, for example in a stellar plasma. An international collaboration including ORIGINS scientists has now succeeded in measuring the $\beta$ decay of fully ionized $^{205}$Tl in the bound state. The results confirm that a long-lived, huge molecular cloud was…