From Extrasolar Planets to Cosmology: The VLT Opening Symposium

This symposium was dedicated to science opportunities with the VLT. All major areas of astronomical research were discussed in the plenary sessions, ranging from where we stand in cosmology to the new frontiers in the solar system. The workshops published in this volume focussed on different ways of finding clusters of galaxies at high redshift, on gravitational lensing by distant compact clusters, on the use of stellar populations as distance, age or abundance indicators, and on the extraordinary progress made in the discovery of extrasolar planets. This book affords a glimpse of what will be at the center of astrophysical research in the forthcoming decade. It is addressed to researchers and graduate students.

This book discusses the hot topics in astrophysics for the upcoming decades from an observer's vantage point. It defines in a way the future tasks of the world's most powerful ground-based telescope, the VLT. Includes supplementary material: sn.pub/extras

Inhalt
From the contents: Science in the VLT and Beyond.- Clusters of Galaxies at High Redshift.- Star-Way to the Universe.- From Extrasolar Planets to Brown Dwarfs.