Euclid DR1-Foundation

Posted in Euclid, The Universe and Stuff with tags , , on November 12, 2026 by telescoper

As it was foretold, today saw the first main data release – termed DR1-Foundation – from the European Space Agency’s Euclid Mission. I’ve taken the liberty of including the official press release below, but first I thought I’d do a quick summary of what this represents. The data products from the Euclid survey are divided into three levels of data processing function:

  • LE1 – the “raw” data frames, prior to calibration, generated at the Science Operations Centre from the time-ordered data and telemetry received from the spacecraft
  • LE2 – the calibrated and corrected data for the two instruments (VIS and NISP) – images, spectra, catalogues of point sources, etc
  • LE3 – the high-level data products (galaxy catalogues, cosmic shear maps, etc) designed for cosmological analysis

Today’s release comprises LE1 and LE2 only for just less than 2000 square degrees. This is called DR1-Foundation. The LE3 data will be added next year to make the full DR1. Since LE3 is required for the cosmological analysis that is the prime motivation for the Euclid mission, it follows that there will be no official cosmology results from Euclid DR1 until mid-2027 at the earliest. Other results based on “Foundation” data may of course emerge before then.

Although there are no cosmology results accompanying DR1-Foundation, it still represents a rich treasury, including images of and other data from over a billion objects, all of which is now publicly available.

Here is a gallery of selected images to whet your appetite:

Here is a bonus graphic showing the function of the grism spectrograph, turning each galaxy image (left) into a spectrum (right). You can drag the vertical bar to compare the two images.

Now here is the official press release:

Press Release Text

The European Space Agency’s Euclid mission has released its first major batch of data. With this release, which captures the light of more than a billion objects and covers an area of sky as big as 9500 full Moons, ESA’s dark Universe detective lays the foundation for its largest-ever 3D map of the cosmos.

The new data release, named DR1-Foundation, comprises around 13 months of observations, and marks the first major release of mission data since the space telescope’s launch in mid-2023. For the first time, it gives scientists the puzzle pieces they need to begin constructing a detailed 3D map of the cosmos – crucial to solve the many mysteries of the dark Universe (including dark energy, dark matter, and the cosmic web [1]).

The data are accompanied by spectra and images, including large sky mosaics. “These are far more than beautiful pictures; today marks a scientific milestone in our study of the cosmos,” says ESA’s Director of Science, Prof. Carole Mundell. “This major Euclid data release represents the largest space-based survey of its kind, laying the foundation of future discovery in a new regime for astronomy and demonstrating the excellence of European technology, science and international collaboration.”

Brand new science and discovery

Today’s release is the first to demonstrate Euclid’s abilities as a sky surveyor. Its breadth, panoramic mosaics, and wide sky coverage in visible and near-infrared light support a wide range of new science. DR1-Foundation reveals unprecedented numbers of cosmic objects, and includes:

  • Over 900 million galaxies
  • The spectra from more than 160 million sources [4]
  • Euclid Wide Survey results from 1900 deg² of sky – a total of 1.7 million GB of data

“This is a change in scale from Euclid’s previous releases, which included a few days of observations over around 60 deg² of sky,” says Valeria Pettorino, ESA’s Euclid project scientist. “We’re now releasing more than a year of data covering a significantly larger area. This unlocks ground-breaking science.”

A machine for discovering rare objects

In space, above Earth’s image-blurring and light-dimming atmosphere, Euclid can complete deep and wide surveys of the sky in a way that ground-based telescopes cannot. As a result, this data release delivers vastly more cosmic objects than any preceding survey, pushing the boundaries of detection for rare and distant objects. These include strong gravitational lenses and galaxy clusters [5]; more information on each can be found in the background section below.

The strong gravitational lenses sought by Euclid are extremely rare, and form when the light travelling to us from distant galaxies is significantly distorted by a foreground galaxy. This release contains the largest strong lens catalogue ever – bigger than all previous catalogues combined.

“Strong lensing provides unique insight into the dark Universe, allowing us to ‘weigh’ individual galaxies, including their invisible dark matter, and explore how the Universe is expanding,” says Natalie Lines of the University of Portsmouth, UK, and member of Euclid Consortium. “Over 10 years ago, we forecast that Euclid would revolutionise the field of strong lens discovery. That day is finally here.”

Galaxy clusters reveal how matter is formed and organised across the Universe. “Euclid doesn’t just look far back in time – it does so across huge areas of sky,” adds Euclid Consortium member Barbara Sartoris of JL Lagrange laboratory, Nice, France. “This gives us an unprecedented view of large samples of ancient galaxy clusters that were previously out of reach. We will explore these in the coming months to learn how these giants grew, and decipher what they reveal about the dark Universe.”

Just the beginning

With this release, Euclid begins to reveal the dark cosmos. Scientists can mine the dataset to determine the distances to individual galaxies and place them into the 3D structure of the Universe, connecting them to the vast, invisible mesh of the cosmic web. This distance-measuring and mapping is something Euclid does via spectroscopy – by splitting the light from galaxies into ‘rainbows’ that tell us about their distance (and for especially bright ones, their origin and composition too [5]).

While enormous, the dataset only covers about 14% of the total sky area Euclid will survey. The full Data Release 1, to come in mid-2027, will build on today’s release and add more crucial parts to the cosmic puzzle, including observations of weak lensing to complement the strong ones, and calculations of how galaxies and galaxy clusters fit into the cosmic web.

“DR1-Foundation includes raw data, calibrated images, catalogues, and spectra over a huge sky area, with enough statistics to uncover even rare objects,” adds Valeria. “It will be used to map the large-scale structure of the Universe in unprecedented detail. So much discovery is yet to come.”

Additional quotes

  • “The release was made possible by the skill, dedication, and commitment of the teams involved in the Euclid Data Space project,” says Bruno Altieri, ESA Archive Scientist at ESAC. “The Euclid Data Space platform helps users access, visualise and process Euclid data. Storing and sharing such large catalogues, with more than a billion objects, was no mean feat – but the team rose to the challenge.”

Background

[1] The cosmic web

Galaxies cling to dense knots in the ‘cosmic web’, a mesh of filaments stretching out through the cosmos. These filaments can extend for many millions of light-years – with one light-year being the distance light travels in a year – but are mostly invisible, as they are made predominantly of dark matter. To map this web and reveal the secrets of how and where matter forms throughout the Universe, we need the meticulous detective work of telescopes like Euclid.

[2] Strong lensing

Strong gravitational lensing is one of the few ways we can measure the mass of galaxies. The combined mass of different components in galaxies – stars, dark matter, supermassive black holes – distorts distant light as it travels across the Universe to us. Strong lenses allow us to study these individual components, uncover the nature of the dark matter haloes that galaxies sit within, and explore the expansion of the Universe. They also act as natural magnifying glasses, revealing galaxies from billions of years ago that would otherwise be too faint to study.

For decades, strong lenses have remained valuable but elusive. They are rare, with only one galaxy in several thousand acting as a lens. Many are too small to be seen through the blurry atmosphere of Earth, and previous space telescopes were unable to cover the wide area needed to find large numbers of them.

This new release of Euclid data finally provides the quality and quantity of imaging needed to identify strong lenses at scale: around 15 000 systems in a haystack of more than a billion stars and galaxies. This was only possible thanks to a combination of machine learning and the help of thousands of citizen scientists who volunteered to help scour Euclid imaging via the ‘Space Warps’ project, hosted on Zooniverse).

Crucially, these lenses were all found by the same telescope and in the same way. This allows scientists to study strong lenses as a population of thousands rather than a collection of rare individuals – something impossible until now, almost fifty years after the first strong lens was discovered.

This data treasure trove also contains even rarer lens configurations that used to be one-off discoveries, such as compound lenses, where multiple background galaxies at different distances are lensed by the same foreground galaxy, and more unusual lenses, such as the dense centres of spiral galaxies.

Alongside strong lensing, Euclid is exploring the more visually subtle version of the effect: weak lensing (more information here).

[3] Quasars

Quasars are a brief but standout phase in the life of massive galaxies. In this phase, lots of material swirls inwards to fall into the black hole lurking at a galaxy’s centre, throwing off intensely bright light as it does so. Euclid is completing a ‘census’ of quasars over cosmic history, using these objects to understand the very first generation of galaxies to exist. The telescope has discovered truly ancient quasars dating back to when the Universe was just 5% of its current age. This new dataset adds over 60 million more candidates to the tally.

[4] Spectroscopy

Euclid uses a technique known as spectroscopy to measure the light from galaxies and stars. In simplified terms, Euclid splits this light into rainbows by directing the light into a camera that works like a prism. The gases within a galaxy produce different markers at specific points in this rainbow. By studying these markers and their position in the spectra, scientists can explore which materials are present in the galaxy, and also measure its distance.

Specifically, Euclid hunts for the light coming from star-forming clouds of hydrogen gas in distant galaxies (light known as hydrogen-alpha). DR1-Foundation provides the ‘rainbows’ of light, or spectra, for 160 million sources. Euclid scientists will hunt for hydrogen-alpha within these spectra to measure the distances to galaxies and map the 3D structure of the cosmic web – the main goal of Euclid spectroscopy.

More information on spectroscopy can be found here.

[5] Galaxy clusters

Galaxy clusters are the largest cosmic structures held together by gravity. Euclid’s investigations into such clusters include how massive they are, how many galaxies they contain, and their distance. Additionally, Euclid reveals difficult-to-spot collapsing ‘protoclusters’: the progenitors to today’s galaxy clusters, visible as we look ‘back in time’. Rather than relying on indirect methods to measure their distance, Euclid provides direct measures of redshift (a cosmic measure of distance that reveals a protocluster’s age) – a real advantage over previous protocluster searches.

This data release also includes key information on the faint, diffuse starlight that encircles the brightest galaxy within a cluster, known as intracluster light (a result of gas stripped away from surrounding galaxies over time as they interact and merge). This light acts as a fossil record for how the cluster came to be, and can trace hidden tendrils of dark matter. However, it’s very faint, making it difficult to detect – but Euclid’s sensitive eyes have spotted intracluster light in hundreds of clusters out to immense distances.

Euclid’s images include breathtaking views of the Horologium supercluster and members of the Messier 81 galaxy group (including Messier 81 itself, NGC 3077, NGC 1291, Holmberg IX, and Abell 3128).

Notes and further information

An overview of Euclid’s DR1, and information on how to access the data released in DR1-Foundation, can be found here: cosmos.esa.int/web/euclid/data-release-dr1

Data can be explored, visualised and analysed on Euclid Data Space (euclid.dataspace.esa.int). All of Euclid’s data and associated images – not just those included in this news release – can be explored in full colour on ESASky (sky.esa.int).

More in-depth stories about DR1-Foundation can be found on the Euclid Consortium website: euclid-ec.org

About Euclid 

Euclid is in the process of imaging billions of galaxies across the Universe, and measuring distances for millions of them. It’s investigating dark energy, dark matter, and tracing the last 10 billion years of cosmic history.

The mission launched in July 2023 and started its routine science observations on 14 February 2024. In November 2023 and May 2024, the world got its first glimpses of the quality of Euclid’s images, and in October 2024 the first piece of its great map of the Universe was released. Euclid followed up with a preliminary batch of survey data in March 2025 and June 2026. This new release comprises the mission’s first substantial release of data in the form of DR1-Foundation – a release including around 1.7 million GB of data that will set the scene for future investigation into the large-scale structure of the Universe. The full DR1 release will be completed in mid-2027, with the subsequent part of DR1 also bringing data on galaxy clusters and weak lensing.

Euclid is a European mission, built and operated by ESA, with contributions from its Member States and NASA. The Euclid Consortium – consisting of more than 2000 scientists from 300 institutes in 15 European countries, the USA, Canada and Japan – is responsible for providing the scientific instruments and scientific data analysis. ESA selected Thales Alenia Space as prime contractor for the construction of the satellite and its service module, with Airbus Defence and Space chosen to develop the payload module, including the telescope. NASA provided the detectors of the Near-Infrared Spectrometer and Photometer, NISP. Euclid is a medium-class mission in ESA’s Cosmic Vision Plan.

For more of the mission’s discoveries and data releases see: esa.int/Science_Exploration/Space_Science/Euclid

You can also watch a video of the webinar announcing the release here.

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Universities and AI: where is the Leadership?

Posted in Artificial Intelligence, Education, Maynooth with tags , , , , on November 11, 2026 by telescoper

There is a report out today report by the UK “Office for Students and Advance HE, a charity promoting university governance and teaching, about the use of AI in universities. It says that the use of AI by students for essays, dissertations and other unsupervised coursework has made it “close to impossible” to assess such work reliably and suggests a return to traditional written exams, including viva-voce examinations, in-person presentations, and other forms of supervised assessment.

I’ll quote this paragraph from the report:

131. To date, innovation and experimentation with AI has generally been led by individual departments and academic staff. Institutions should now demonstrate leadership on AI by adopting a strategic approach that recognises the technology’s complex and wide-ranging implications across teaching, professional services and beyond. This requires visible strategic leadership that empowers staff to make decisions about the technology’s use in the interests of students, alongside driving the meaningful implementation of any AI strategy and ensuring staff are AI-literate.

At Maynooth University, where I work, academic staff have learnt the hard way that leadership of any kind – whether strategic or visible or not – just doesn’t exist when it comes to teaching and learning (even though these should represent one of the core missions of the institution). AI is just one example of an issue concerning which Senior Management appears utterly clueless. This isn’t entirely a bad thing. Most ideas emerging from the top are poor, so it’s better when they don’t have any ideas at all. That leaves it to departments and individual lecturers to decide what to do. This is the situation described in the paragraph quoted above.

Over a year ago I wrote a post about the GenAI issue. Here is an excerpt:

I have been concerned about the integrity of the coursework element of these modules in the light of improvements in Generative AI. Only a couple of years ago GenAI could not solve the sort of problems I set for homework, but now it generally can – especially for EE206. I don’t altogether object to people applying artificial intelligence to solve mathematical problems, but the issue is that it does make mistakes. Moreover, instead of saying “sorry I can’t solve that problem” it will generally present a superficially plausible but incorrect solution. Although students will probably use GenAI for problem-solving, I think it is important that they learn to do such problems themselves, otherwise they won’t know whether the solution coughed up by the algorithm is correct or not. That way lies disaster.

The only way to learn mathematics is by doing it. If students get GenAI to do the mathematics for them, then they won’t learn it. In the past we have given marks for coursework (usually 20% of the module mark) mainly to encourage students to do them. Students who don’t bother to do these exercises generally do badly in the final exam (80%).

For these reasons I am moving the assessment from weekly homework sheets – which could be tackled with AI – to supervised in-class tests for which students can use notes on paper, but not laptops or phones, just like they would in the final examination. I will of course give examples for the students to have a go at themselves, and I will give feedback on their attempts, but they will not contribute to the module score. Another advantage of this approach is that students won’t have to do so much work against deadlines outside of class.

This approach went well last year and I’ve continued it this year. (In fact we had a class test in EE206 today.) Many of my colleagues have also adopted this model. I have, incidentally, shown students how to get various GenAI tools to solve mathematical problems so they can check their own work for formative assessment purposes. They can not use GenAI, however, in any contributory (summative) assessment.

The problem is that not all university departments are committed to academic integrity. Some appear happy to dish out first-class degrees to anyone who can type a prompt into CoPilot. Courses perceived to be easy to pass in such a way will prosper at the expense of those that insist on challenging students. Some overall policy is therefore required. This has been happening for some time already. The solution I propose is simple enough for even a Vice-President to understand. If my University – or any other – wishes to prioritize academic integrity and maintain academic standards then it should make a rule that no unsupervised coursework should contribute to progression through the degree or the final classification.

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Striking Uncertainty

Posted in Biographical, Maynooth, Politics with tags , , , , on November 10, 2026 by telescoper

A hot topic around the Department for the last few days has been whether or not we’re all going to be on strike on Thursday 12th November. Since the suspension of the strike planned for 21st October, negotiations between the public sector unions aand government officials got going and then stopped and a new strike day was called, initially for 11th November, then changed to 12th November (i.e. this Thursday).

Instead of the pickets at individual workplaces as on 14th October, the plan for 12th November was a number of rallies as seen on the map above.

The route for the Dublin march is shown on the left here. The complication for Dublin is that there are two EU summits taking place this week thanks to it being Ireland’s turn at the EU presidency, so a big area of the city is cordoned off. We have received instructions on where to gather at the start – our marching orders, so to speak – and I’m planning to go into Dublin by train in the morning as other public transport is heavily disrupted by the EU business.

There are rumours that progress may have been made in the negotiations so the strike may be suspended (again) and the rallies called off but as things stand they are still very much on.

I am very annoyed with the Government, and especially Tanaiste Simon Harris, for the way they have handled this dispute. For one thing, they have been leaking details to the compliant establishment media of what is claimed to have been offered, which is inappropriate when the discussions are supposed to be confidential. Worse, though, the leaks have been misleading: they have for example been describing an “11%” offer which is nothing of the sort. Yesterday Simon Harris on the one hand called for “de-escalation” of the dispute and on the other said the unions had 48 hours to decide whether to “take it or leave it”. That doesn’t sound like de-escalation to me! With breathtaking hypocrisy, Harris also called upon the unions to engage “in good faith” with the offer. Where was the “good faith” when the Government failed to start negotiations until long after the previous deal expired and failed to implement that deal in full anyway?

These inept political posturings haven’t helped the negotiations one little bit, but if a deal is struck and Thursday’s strike is cancelled then whatever is offered will be reported to union members who will have a ballot on whether or not to accept it. I will be looking very carefully at the details before casting my vote.

As for work, I have a contingency plan in place for Thursday. As things stand, my two tutorials are cancelled but I have the material ready in case they go ahead. If I am on strike on Thursday I may take the opportunity presented by a trip into Dublin to do a little shopping after the rally.

On a personal note I was relieved that the strike was postponed from 11th November (tomorrow) because tomorrow I was due to have my latest knee treatment then and that would have been cancelled if there was a strike that day. That wouldn’t be the end of the world as I could have it later but between you and me I am struggling a bit with the old arthritis and really want to get it done. Now whatever happens with the strike I’ll get my injections tomorrow. The last time I had the jabs, six months ago, one knee decided to swell up which was quite unpleasant for a couple of days. I’ve had these injections a dozen times, though, and that’s the first problem I’ve had so hopefully I’ll be fine for Thursday.

Update: Wednesday 11th November. I awoke to news that Thursday’s strike and accompanying rallies have been called off. A draft deal has been agreed between the union negotiators and the government officials which will now be put to union members. This feels like a surrender. The deal being reported involves a 9.75% pay increase, staged over 33 months (from the expiry of the previous deal at the end of June 2026). If it is accepted then we will be locked into it until March 2029 whatever happens to inflation in that time.

The initial pay rise is 2% backdated to September (not to July, when it should have been, as that is when the previous agreement expired). This means pay will have risen just 1.4% between the expiry of the last agreement and April 2027, a long way behind inflation which is currently over 4%. I don’t see how this can be acceptable.

There is an additional 1% in the package for “local bargaining”, which formed part of the previous deal and was never implemented, so I assume that will be the case this time too, so disregard it. I can only speak for myself but the agreement seems to me very disappointing and I shall be voting against accepting it. It remains to be seen what the rest of the union membership thinks. For the time being, industrial action is suspended.

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All The Things You Ave Maria

Posted in Music with tags , , , , , on November 9, 2026 by telescoper

I was listening to the radio the other day and heard a version of the Ave Maria, aka “Hail Mary”, sung as a concert aria by Sumi Jo who performs it on this video.

The piece was composed by Vladimir Vavilov around 1970, although it is often misattributed to the Giulio Caccini. What struck me listening to it, however, was the similiarity of its chords to one of my favourite jazz standards, All The Things You Are, which was composed in 1939 by Jerome Kern. I’m not a trained musician but I think I have a reasonable ear for harmonies. I suppose it comes from listening to so much jazz. Anyway, this one is really very obvious, especially the section from 1:03…

The chords for Vavilov’s first 8 bars are:

Am | Dm7 | G7 | CM7 | FM7 | Dm | B7 | E

While Jerome Kern gives us

Am7 | Dm7 | G7 | CM7 | FM7 | F#m7 B7 | EM7 | EM7

I rest my case!

I’m not necessarily saying that Vavilov copied Jerome Kern. It is possible for two people to arrive at the same idea independently. I wrote a post a while ago about the similarity between a piece by Ravel and one by John Coltrane.

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An Irish Airman Foresees His Death – W.B. Yeats

Posted in Poetry with tags , , , on November 8, 2026 by telescoper 
I know that I shall meet my fate
Somewhere among the clouds above;
Those that I fight I do not hate,
Those that I guard I do not love;

My country is Kiltartan Cross,
My countrymen Kiltartan’s poor,
No likely end could bring them loss
Or leave them happier than before.

Nor law, nor duty bade me fight,
Nor public men, nor cheering crowds,
A lonely impulse of delight
Drove to this tumult in the clouds;

I balanced all, brought all to mind,
The years to come seemed waste of breath,
A waste of breath the years behind
In balance with this life, this death.

by William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)

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Weekly Update from the Open Journal of Astrophysics 07/11/2026

Posted in OJAp Papers, Open Access, The Universe and Stuff with tags , , , , , , , , , on November 7, 2026 by telescoper

It’s time for another Saturday update of activity at the Open Journal of Astrophysics. Since the last update we have published a further three papers, bringing the number in Volume 9 (2026) to 259 and the total so far published by OJAp up to 707.

I continue to include the posts made on our Mastodon account (on Fediscience); these announcements also contain a clickable form of the DOI for each paper. Our Mastodon account has regular updates and other announcements from OJAp too, including posts from the OJAp blog.

The first paper this week was published on Tuesday 3rd November in the folder Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics. The title is “Selection effects in correlated observations with application to distance-ladder observations” and it is by Will J. Percival (U. Waterloo, Canada). It presents a discussion of the selection bias resulting from correlated observables, how to mitigate such effects, and the implications for the Hubble Tension.

The overlay for this one is here:

You can find the officially accepted version on arXiv here and the announcement on Fediverse here:

Open Journal of Astrophysics

New Publication at the Open Journal of Astrophysics: "Selection effects in correlated observations with application to distance-ladder observations" by Will J. Percival (U. Waterloo, Canada)

doi.org/10.33232/001c.173510

November 3, 2026, 9:36 am 1 boosts 1 favorites

The second paper for this week, published on Wednesday 4th November in the folder Astrophysics of Galaxies, is “Effects of Resolution and Local Stability on Galactic Disks: I. Multiple Spiral Mode Formation via Swing Amplification” by SungWon Kwak, Ivan Minchev, Christoph Pfrommer & Matthias Steinmetz (Leibniz-Institüt für Astrophysik Potsdam, Germany) and Sukyoung K. Yi (Yonsei U., Republic of Korea). This article presents a theoretical study of the formation of spiral modes in Milky Way type galaxies, showing that a simulated halo with appropriate mass resolution can sustain multi-mode spiral structure.

The overlay looks like this:

The official version of the paper can be found on arXiv here and the Fediverse announcement here:

Open Journal of Astrophysics

New Publication at the Open Journal of Astrophysics: "Effects of Resolution and Local Stability on Galactic Disks: I. Multiple Spiral Mode Formation via Swing Amplification" by SungWon Kwak, Ivan Minchev, Christoph Pfrommer & Matthias Steinmetz (Leibniz-Institüt für Astrophysik Potsdam, Germany) and Sukyoung K. Yi (Yonsei U., Republic of Korea).

doi.org/10.33232/001c.173548

November 4, 2026, 8:47 am 0 boosts 2 favorites

The third and final paper of the week, published on Friday November 6th 2026 in the folder Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics is “Clustering redshift distribution calibration of weak lensing surveys using the DESI-DR1 spectroscopic dataset” by R. Ruggeri (Queensland U. Tech, Australia) and 64 others distributed around the world. Using DESI spectroscopic data, researchers independently calibrate redshift distributions for DES, KiDS, and HSC weak-lensing samples, finding agreement with existing methods and offering a robust way to reduce cosmological uncertainties.

The overlay for this is here:

The accepted version of this one can be found on the arXiv here and the Mastodon announcement here:

Open Journal of Astrophysics

New Publication at the Open Journal of Astrophysics: "Clustering redshift distribution calibration of weak lensing surveys using the DESI-DR1 spectroscopic dataset" by R. Ruggeri (Queensland U. Tech, Australia) and 64 others distributed around the world.

doi.org/10.33232/001c.173639

November 6, 2026, 8:22 am 1 boosts 0 favorites

That concludes this week’s update. It has been a slower week than average, but we have plenty of papers in the pipeline and I’m still hopeful that we will reach a total of 300 papers this year.

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Dr? No.

Posted in Education with tags , , , , on November 6, 2026 by telescoper

A scandal seems to have developed at the University of Galway concerning Tom Felle, an associate professor at said University’s Department of Journalism and Media who was Head of the Department until last year, and who has been described as “Dr Tom Felle” on the university’s website. Mr Felle – who is, ironically, an expert in disinformation and “fake news” – claimed to have a doctorate in journalism from City, University of London (now City St George’s), where he used to work as a senior lecturer, but this is false – he has never been awarded a PhD from that institution. There seems to have been a lack of due diligence in Galway.

All this reminds me of 17 years ago, in October 2009, when I posted an item about Mark Brake, a Professor at the University of Glamorgan, who falsely claimed on a funding application that he had a PhD from Cardiff University.

(The University of Glamorgan no longer exists as such, as in April 2013 it merged with University of Wales, Newport, to form the University of South Wales.)

I thought for old times’ sake I would post the Brake piece again. The following blog post led to me being threatened with a libel action. My response was to pass on the name and address of my solicitor with the message “Go ahead. Make my day” (or words to that effect). I never heard back. Everything I said was (a) true and (b) in the public domain anyway.

It’s a PhD Jim, but not as we know it…

This morning there was some discussion in the Department about how many academics there might with fictitious credentials. I am not sure recruiters actually check degree awards and the like. They should do.

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Remembering the 5th of November

Posted in Biographical, History with tags , , , on November 5, 2026 by telescoper

Today is November 5th, so tonight is Guy Fawkes’ Night (or Bonfire Night). This is not celebrated in the Republic of Ireland, not least because of its anti-Catholic origins, but is a big thing in the United Kingdom. In Ireland the bonfires and fireworks happen on Halloween. Bonfire Night commemorates the Gunpowder Plot of 1605, which was intended to blow up the Houses of Parliament. Guy Fawkes was supposed to light the blue touchpaper on that occasion and it has been a tradition to burn his effigy on the bonfire on the anniversary of the attempt, every November 5th, while letting off fireworks.

When I was young, Guy Fawkes’ Night was the thing we celebrated rather than Halloween. Although we didn’t put on anything elaborat, most families held their own bonfire in their garden and fireworks could easily be bought from local shops who stocked up at this time of year. Since we had open ground right in front of our house, we had very big bonfires where I grew up in Benwell which lots of other kids came to. Once, I remember, my uncle Richard brought some thunderflashes (essentially stun grenades) her had purloined when he was in the Army. They were so loud the police paid us a visit, but there were no arrests. The number of private bonfire parties has decreased markedly since then, owing to safety concerns, and they have largely been replaced by large scale organized celebrations.

Another tradition associated with November 5th also seems to have died completely. When I was a kid the thing to do was to make an effigy of Guy Fawkes (called a “Guy”) and parade him from door to door in the days before Bonfire Night – usually in a pram – asking for “Penny for the Guy”. The idea was if you had an impressive Guy, people would give you money which you used to buy fireworks for the forthcoming party. Of course you were hoping for a lot more than a penny.

Two young lads and a Guy

I suppose that this tradition has been displaced by the American import “Trick-or-Treat”, which I think is a shame. Next thing you know, there won’t be Guy Fawkes’ Night at all; it will be called 5/11 – or would it be 11/5?

Anyway, I remember one year spending ages making a really good Guy with a head of papier mâché and plasticine for his eyes, nose and mouth. My mum knitted him a hairpiece. I was really proud of my Guy, especially when he sat on top of the huge pile of wood that was going to form the bonfire.

When it was lit – which happened before the fireworks started – the heat from the flames started to melt the plasticine features of the Guy. The other kids rushed around in excitement as the adults sorted out the Roman Candles, Catherine Wheels and the rest of the soon-to-be-ignited pyrotechnics that would go bang and whizz though not necessarily in that order. But I stood traumatised, staring at the Guy. After a few minutes I started sobbing and ran to my mum in anguish as molten plasticine dripped down his face from his eyes.

Guy Fawkes was crying…

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Working to Rule?

Posted in Education, Maynooth, Politics with tags , , , , , , , on November 4, 2026 by telescoper

While we await confirmation of the next 24-hour strike planned for Thursday 12th November, I’ve been making contingency plans for teaching. A recent article in the Irish Times states that the Government’s offer is worth about 7.75% over 20 months, which is so far short of the cost-of-living increase required that it is insulting. Given the gap between the two sides I think the strike is highly likely to proceed. On that basis I went out and bought some thermal underwear in anticipation of standing on a cold picket line.

The public sector unions have been talking about escalating the work-to-rule (aka work-to-contract) which some unions, e.g. those involving teachers, have been implementing since the start of the dispute. My own Union, the Irish Federation of University Teachers (IFUT), has not been engaged in a work-to-contract for the very practical reason that academic contracts say very little about working hours or duties. It’s hard to do a work-to-rule if you don’t have any rules! Our technical and administrative staff are in a different situation as their working hours are fixed, but they are not yet involved in a work-to-rule.

The Director of Human Resources at Maynooth University recently wrote to all staff demanding that they state whether or not they worked on the last strike day (11th October) before “close of business” today. Having no idea when the University’s business is supposed to close, I asked for clarification and was told it meant 5pm. That must be when the administrative staff go home, but it’s not close of business for academic staff. Indeed there are lectures timetabled at 5pm every day. I rarely leave the office before 6.30, actually. While acknowledging the positives of flexible contracts I feel obliged to point out some of the ways that university managements exploit the goodwill of academic staff.

Take the next couple of weeks. Next week is Science Week (8th-13th November) at Maynooth University which involves several evening events, including Science Night, which is on Friday 13th November from 6 to 8.30, well past “close of business”. If we (by which I mean academics, technicians, etc) did work to rule then all those events would be cancelled. The following week we have two Open Days. The first on Friday 20th is in normal working hours, but the second is on Saturday 21st November. A work to contract would rule that out too. You can also respectively add our Space Week event, on Wednesday 9th October in the evening.

The University Management sees such events as recruitment exercises, required because the University has to recruit huge numbers of students so it can use the income they generated pay for the President’s luxury VIP taxi service and other perks, as well as the ever-increasing band of Vice-Presidents. All these events rely on ordinary staff giving their time freely to undertake these activities on top of the usual teaching and research and without remuneration, let alone unsocial hours payments.

All this however pales into insignifance compared to the grotesque exploitation of staff during the Covid-19 pandemic during which teaching staff were required to transform their working methods, undertake countless hours of unpaid overtime, and suffer long periods of isolation and stress. They did it because they knew there was an emergency and because they actually care. In return for this sacrifice they have received nothing but insincere platitudes.

Over the years that I’ve worked in universities, I’ve seen them systematically taken over by people who really don’t care at all about the important things that universities do, i.e. teaching and research. The effect on ordinary staff is exhaustion caused by the overwork required to meet arbitrary criteria of productivity imposed by a remote and uncaring managerial class. Universities are thus a microcosm of neoliberal society at large, with the management being the propertied class, the academics being the workers, and the students being mere commodities.

While most academic staff have enjoyed having flexible contracts, the lack of defined duties and responsibilities has allowed managers to use them systematically to exploit us. I am now definitely of the opinion that we should have real contracts as opposed to what we have now which basically says “do what your Head of Deparment tells you to do.” If we had proper contracts, by which I mean of a sort we could actually work to, then that work cause a fundamental shift in the balance of power within higher education institutions.

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Laniakea – Camille Pépin

Posted in Music, The Universe and Stuff with tags , , , , on November 3, 2026 by telescoper

I thought you might like to hear a recording of piece I heard a couple of weeks ago at the National Concert Hall in Dublin. This is Laniakea by French composer Camille Pépin which is inspired by our Local Supercluster of galaxies which astronomers have named Laniakea, an Hawaiian word meaning “immeasurable heaven”. Stylistically the music reminds me a lot of John Adams, and I don’t mean that in a negative way!

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