Welcome!
We are investigating the physical conditions
and the life cycle of interstellar matter and dust in our Galaxy and
galaxies based on infrared observations with space projects, such as
the Infrared
Telescope in Space (IRTS), AKARI,
ESA's Infrared Space
Observatory (ISO), NASA's satellite Spitzer
Space Telescope, ESA's Herschel Space
Observatory, and NASA/ESA/CSA's James Space Telescope. The IRTS is the first Japanese infrared space
project in 1995 and AKARI is the first Japanese satellite dedicated for
infrared astronomy launched in 2006. These
investigations revealed the
ubiquitous presence of aromatic matter in space for the first time
and provided key
information on their processing in space. We have developed
mid-infrared instruments on board the IRTS and AKARI, and
contributed to the cryogenic telescope development and its ground
test. We have also made
complementary studies of the dust properties with the COMICS
Recent research topics
What's New
* 2022/12/24 Where have nitrogen and deuterium gone in the Universe?
* 2017/04/24 The 4th international conference will be held at University Tokyo for October 17-20, 2017
* 2016/09/30 Discovery of an Extragalactic Hot Moleuclar Core
* 2016/01/10 AKARI asteroid catalog paper obtains the PASJ excellent paper award (Japanese link only)
* 2014/03/24 AKARI made a key step to understand the material evolution in the universe
* 2014/03/19 The second
SPICA core science meeting is held at Unviersity of Tokyo on March 26th and 27th
* 2014/01/24 The 3rd AKARI international conference is held at Oxford, U.K.
* 2013/01/11 AKARI LMC catalogs are released to the public (Japanease link only)
* 2012/05/09 Discovery of Dusty ``Quarts Star''
* 2012/02/08 AKARI
Finds Carbon Monoxide Molecules Embedded in Ten Million Degree Gas
* 2011/10/13 Second AKARI
international
conferece is held at Cheju, Korea
*
2011/03/08:Ex-graduate
student Dr. Daisuke Ishihara is awarded the prize for young researchers
from the Society for Promotion of Space Science for his contribution to
the AKARI all-sky survey (Japanease link only)*
2010/03/31: AKARI
all-sky suvey catalogues are released to the public
* 2009/2/16-19: First
international conference on AKARI,
a Light to Illuminate the Misty
Universe, was held on
the campus of the University of Tokyo
Contact
Department of Astronomy,
Graduate School of Science
The University of Tokyo
7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku,
Tokyo, 113-0033, Japan
TEL : +81-3-5841-4268 FAX : +81-3-5841-7644