Science Programme

• The plenary sessions, 9.00-10.30, Monday to Thursday, and from 14.00 Thursday will be held in the Weston Auditorium.
• All parallel sessions will be sited in the suite of lecture theatres adjacent to the Weston Auditorium, or in the Weston.
• In the programme below, parallel sessions are identified by shorthand titles: full titles are given in the list beneath the programme

Posters can be of sizes up to A0 portrait (width: 841 mm, height: 1189 mm) or A1 landscape (width: 841 mm, height 594 mm). Posters may ONLY be attached to the poster boards using Velcro (supplied).

The conference Abstract Book is now available in PDF format.

	Mon 20th	Tue 21st	Wed 22nd	Thu 23rd
09:00- 10:30	09:00 Welcome from UoH Vice-Chancellor 09:05 RAS introduction 09:10 Address by Lord Drayson 09:50 STEREO: from the Sun to the Earth - Richard Harrison, RAL Chilton 10:10 Electron Acceleration and Loss in the Radiation Belts - Richard Horne, BAS Cambridge	ESO programme 09:00 ESO overview - Tim de Zeeuw, ESO 09:30 Exo-planets - Michel Mayor, Geneva 10:00 Dynamics and Evolution of Star Forming Galaxies at z=1-3 - Linda Tacconi, MPE Garching	ESA programme 09:00 Astronomy in ESA's science programme - David Southwood, ESA 09:50 Highlights from high energy astrophysics missions - Arvind Parmar,ESTEC 10:10 Hightlights from solar-terrestrial missions - Daniel Mueller, ESA/GSFC	09:00 Astronomy, physics and astrobiology with the Square Kilometre Array - Joseph Lazio, NRL Washington DC 09:30 Highlights in ground-bassed gamma-ray astronomy - Werner Hofmann, Heidelberg 10:00 Asteroseismology in the era of the CoRoT space mission - Conny Aerts, Leuven/Nijmegen
10:30- 11:00	Coffee/Posters	Coffee/Posters	Coffee/Posters	Coffee/Posters
11:00- 12:30	Cosmology Radio Astronomy BDs/planets MIST /MHD seismology * UKSP /Solar Atmosphere Explosive transients AGN Mercury European Astronomy	Cosmology Radio Astronomy BDs/planets MIST /UKSP /Particle acceleration ESO 1: ALMA MHD seismology * X-rays, next decade Near volume of galaxies Pro-Am session Machine learning	High redshift surveys Gravitational lenses Life cycle of dust IYA 2009 MIST /UKSP /Solar minimum Upcoming ESA missions Binary stars Milky Way & satellites VO Star formation	High redshift surveys Gravitational lenses Life cycle of dust IYA 2009 MIST /Heliospheric structure UKSP /Dynamics of solar magnetic fields High-energy astrophysics Star formation Astroseismology Galaxy clusters
12:30- 14:00	EAS Business Meeting MIST Business Lunch	RAS Women's Lunch BLAST! Screening	Careers Lunch UKSP Lunch Starry Messenger Premier	PATT Chairs Meeting SCAP Lunch
14:00- 15:30	Cosmology Radio Astronomy BDs/planets UKSP /MHD seismology * MIST /General session Explosive transients AGN Epoch of reionisation 2-4m telescopes	Cosmology Radio Astronomy BDs/planets IYA 2009 MIST /Particle acceleration UKSP /Solar & stellar interiors ESO 2: E-ELT X-rays, next decade Gravitational waves Near volume of galaxies Minor SS bodies	High redshift surveys Gravitational lenses Life cycle of dust IYA 2009 MIST /UKSP /Solar minimum Space technologies Binary stars Milky Way & satellites VO Star formation	RAS Programme 14:00 Introduction and Welcome 14:15 Awards Ceremony 14:50 RAS Invited Lecture by George Ellis (University of Cape Town), the 2009 RAS Gerald Whitrow lecturer on "Evidence and Theory, Fact and Fancy: the state of Cosmology today".
15:30- 16:00	Coffee/Posters	Coffee/Posters	Coffee/Posters	Coffee/Posters
16:00- 18:00	16:00 EAS introduction and award to Tycho de Brahe prize recipient 16:05 EAS Tycho Brahe Prize Lecture - Kinematically decoupled galaxies - Françoise Combes (Obs de paris, France) Cosmology Radio Astronomy BDs/planets MIST /UKSP /Magnetic reconnection MHD seismology * Explosive transients AGN Epoch of reionisation 2-4m telescopes	High redshift surveys Gravitational lenses Life cycle of dust MIST /General session UKSP /Stars as the Sun ESO 3: Observing Gravitational waves Near volume of galaxies 17:30 EAS General Assembly	High redshift surveys Gravitational lenses Life cycle of dust IYA 2009 MIST /UKSP /Solar-STP missions High-energy astrophysics Star formation Galaxy clusters	Community Forum 16:00 - Community Forum: Panel Discussion with Andy Fabian (Chair) Joachim Krautter Keith Mason Mike Cruise David Southwood Roberto Gilmozzi
19:30- 20:30	Public Lecture Speaker: Giovanna Tinetti (UCL, Royal Soc. Fellow) Title: Characterising extrasolar worlds today and tomorrow	Public Lecture Speaker:Gary Hinshaw (NASA) Title: Taking the Measure of Our Universe	Public Lecture Speaker: Michael Hoskin (Cambridge) Title: William Herschel and the Construction of the Heavens	Public Lecture Speaker: Michael Foale NASA, Astronaut) Title: Astronomy and the Making of an Astronaut

* the MHD seismology session is joint between the general programme, MIST and UKSP.

Full names of symposia/sessions

Symposia (5x1.5 hrs, listed first in each time period above)

• The next era in radio astronomy: the pathway to SKA
• The standard cosmological models - successes and challenges
• Understanding substellar populations and atmospheres: from brown dwarfs to exo-planets
• The life cycle of dust
• Multi-wavelength high redshift surveys
• Three decades of gravitational lenses
• The IYA 2009 in Europe

• UK Solar Physics (UKSP) meeting
• Magnetosphere, Ionosphere, Solar Terrestrial (MIST) meeting

Sessions (ranging in length from 1x1.5hrs to 4x1.5hrs)

• MHD seismology of solar, space and astrophysical plasmas (Joint with MIST and UKSP)
• Mercury - recent insights and future goals
• In-situ and remote characterisation of minor bodies
• Binary stars: observation and theory
• Asteroseismology in the era of the CoRoT and Kepler missions
• Star formation: from massive stars to brown dwarfs
• The Galaxy and its Satellites
• Explosive transients in distant galaxies
• High energy non-thermal astrophysics
• The local volume: constraints on galaxy formation and evolution
• Galaxy clusters and their evolution
• Epoch of reionisation: First light to the earliest galaxies currently known
• Outflows, feedback and the central engines of AGN
• Towards the first detection of gravitational waves
• X-ray astronomy in the next decade
• Enabling technologies for space-based astronomy and space science
• Europe's medium telescopes: status and prospects
• The Virtual Observatory and distributed computing
• Application of machine learning techniques to astronomical data analysis
• Pro-Am session

Special sessions to inform the community (not open to general abstract submission)

• Plans and opportunities for European astronomy
• Continuing ESO sessions:
• 1. ALMA: status, science capabilities and the path towards science operations
  2. E-ELT: the European Extremely Large Telescope
  3. How to use ESO - The life-cycle of an ESO observing program
• Upcoming ESA astrophysics missions
• RAS meeting and Community Forum