Research Division Seminar
Astrophysics, Technology. Big Data: the emerging research center DZA in Germany

Abstract

As a measure to fight global climate change, legislation is essentially terminating coal mining in Germany. In order to help with the necessary transformation of the economy, the federal government has set aside a total of 40 billion Euros for investment into new infrastructure in the affected regions. The state of Saxony decided to use a significant fraction of these funds to create two major research centers -- in essence to invest in brains, and not only in concrete and steel. As a result of a two-stage competition, the proposal of a group of astrophysicists has won a grant of 1.4 billion Euros to create, over a period of 15 years, the Deutsches Zentrum für Astrophysik (DZA). 
The talk will explain the structure of the institute, the current status, and the main focus on (1) fundamental research in Astrophysics, (2) technology development, and (3) big data & eScience. As for technology development, several examples will be presented that are intended to exploit the regional strength in semiconductor and photonics industry, e.g. CMOS sensors, photonic integrated circuits, photonic lanterns, etc.
In a second part of the talk, I will make a connection from the intended DZA engagement in novel detector technologies to the future WST: perhaps the next big project of ESO once the ELT has been finished. I will briefly touch upon the concept of the telescope, and report on the science case about resolved stellar populations that was developed in collaboration with IAC and others, and published recently as part of the WST White Paper (Mainieri+2024).