We present results of the X-ray spectral analysis of the $\sim$370 ksec deep survey obtained with XMM-Newton on the Chandra Deep Field South (CDFS). Using sample of 127 sources with redshift identifications and with a raw count limit of 100 (pn detector) we explored both the physical properties of individual sources, and the general properties of two AGN classes. The corresponding flux limits in the (0.5–2) and (2–10) keV bands are 1 $\times 10^{-16}$ and 9 $\times 10^{-16}$ erg cm$^{-2}$ s$^{-1}$, respectively. The average photon index is $\Gamma \sim$1.9 and $\Gamma \sim$1.8 for type-1 AGN and type-2 AGN, respectively. Although the properties of the spectra of more that 90% of AGN are in good agreement with the unified model, a fraction of ‘atypical’ objects (absorbed type-1 and unabsorbed type-2 AGN) was detected.

We present recent results on the carbon chemistry in photodissociation regions. We show that carbon chains and rings (CCH, c-C$_3$H$_2$ and C$_4$H) are tightly spatially correlated with each other, and with the mid-infrared emission due to PAHs (7 and 15 $\mu$m), mapped by ISOCAM. Neither the spatial distribution, nor the abundances of these species can be fit by state-of-the-art PDR models, which calls for another production mechanism. We discuss model predictions for carbon clusters and simple hydrocarbons. We show how selected abundance ratios can be used as a diagnostic of the physical conditions. We stress the need for more theoretical and laboratory work on fundamental processes relevant for the interstellar medium, which should be taken into account in the astrochemical models, but whose rates are not known accurately enough.

The results obtained during the first three years of operation of INTEGRAL will be reviewed. Over 30 GRBs have been localised by the INTEGRAL burst alert system (IBAS) and the coordinates distributed. The follow-up observations with XMM-Newton and large telescopes have led to many interesting results. A comparison will also be made between the sensitivities of INTEGRAL and SWIFT.

The IAU Symposium 230, Populations of High Energy X-ray Sources in Galaxies has been a wide-spectrum affair, with talks discussing results from the soft X-ray to the Gamma-ray range on virtually the entire universe, from our Galaxy to the high redshift regions when first galaxies emerged. I do not name any presenter in this summary, but concentrate on themes and results that I have found striking.

I review recent progress in determining the rate coefficients appropriate to modelling interstellar chemistry, give some information on appropriate databases from which rate coefficients can be obtained, and point to the importance of the gas-grain interaction in determining molecular abundances. Although many of the fundamental gas-phase reactions have been studied in the laboratory, the failure of the models to explain the observations of water and methanol in cold clouds indicates that grains may have an important role, both in acting as a surface for freeze-out and in the synthesis of complex molecules. The major challenge in astrochemistry is to develop a more quantitative model for the role of grains and, in some cases, to incorporate a better, probably more complex, physical model for interstellar clouds.

Owing to the rapid progress of space sciences and the high-energy astrophysics in the past 2–3 decades, historical supernova records have made important contributions to modern astrophysics and will continue to do so in the future. The main topics here are the earliest supernova observed by human beings and the AD393 guest star as well as our new concept of “Po stars”

Chandra observations have allowed the detection of a large number of low mass X-ray binaries (LMXBs) in early-type galaxies. Comparison to catalogs of globular clusters (GCs) from Hubble Space Telescope observations have shown that a high fraction of the LMXBs in early-type galaxies are associated with GCs. The fraction of LMXBs associated with globular clusters increases along the Hubble sequence from spiral bulges to S0s to Es to cDs. On the other hand, the fraction of globular clusters which contain X-ray sources appears to be roughly constant ($\sim$4% for $L_X \gtrsim 10^{38}$ ergs/s, $\sim$10% for $L_X \gtrsim 10^{37}$ ergs/s). There is a strong tendency for the X-ray sources to be associated with the optically more luminous GCs. There is a trend for the X-ray sources to be found preferentially in redder, more metal-rich GCs, which is independent of optical luminosity correlation.

The relative role of formation of LMXBs in GCs and in situ formation in the field is uncertain. One of the best ways to study this is to compare the spatial distribution of GC-LMXBs, field LMXBs, GCs, and optical light in the galaxies. Theoretical models and results of fits to the observed distributions are presented.

We explore the X-ray diagnostics of cosmic star formation history that have possible form recent deep field X-ray studies. We summarize the status of our understanding of the X-ray evolution of galaxies. We indicate the lessons learnt so far from number count plots, and criteria for distinguishing between normal/straburst galaxies and AGNs in deep X-ray surveys. We summarize how the observed correlations between X-ray emission and that at other wavebands indicate the value of X-rays as a probe of cosmic star formation.

HD34921 has been identified as the counterpart of the X-ray source 4U0515+38 (=1H0521+373). The InfraRed properties are reminiscent of the B[e] system CI Cam. Optical short-term variability suggests a compact companion. We discuss how this system fits in the overall framework of Be stars and X-ray binaries.

We present new experimental data and review previous experimental results on molecular hydrogen formation from atomic recombination on porous amorphous solid water (ASW) surfaces at temperatures from 10 K to 30 K, i.e. under conditions of relevance to cold dense interstellar clouds. We show that the desorption of molecular hydrogen formed on porous ASW surfaces is well described by a model, in which the molecules are assumed to be completely thermalized to the surface temperature and to be evenly distributed throughout the porous network of the ASW films. These results emphasize that, not only the chemical properties, but also the physical morphology of dust grain surfaces must be considered to obtain a full understanding of molecular hydrogen formation on interstellar dust grain surfaces.

Although our Galactic Center harbors a black hole (Sgr A*) of a few million solar masses, it and its environments are very quiet at present. In X-rays however, the close vicinity of Sgr A* shows very unique and various phenomena mostly originated from young stellar populations. We report on the X-ray perspective on the young stellar populations which are related to our Galactic Center activities. The discussion is essentially based on the observational facts of new X-ray objects in the Galactic Center region in the $1^\circ \times 2^\circ $ area. They are;

1. Clusters of young high mass stars, which are Sgr B2, Arches, IRS 13 and Quintuplet.

2. X-ray reflections in the giant molecular clouds, such as Sgr B2, Sgr C, M0.01-0.09 and others.

3. New candidates of X-ray supernova remnants (SNRs), which are Sgr A East, G0.570-0.018 and G359.8-0.3.

4. Non-thermal Jets, Filaments and Shells, which are unique X-ray features in the GC region. These X-ray features may be closely related with each other, hence may have common origins. A unified picture is presented for the X-ray activity of our Galactic Center comparing with the X-ray spectra from other type of galaxies such as;

5. Star burst galaxy (NGC 253), low luminosity AGN (M 81) and Seyfert 2 (NGC 1068).

The particle acceleration and the non-thermal radiation in the magnetospheres of collapsing stars are considered. The collapsing stars can be powerful sources of the high-energy charged particles and the non-thermal radiation bursts. These bursts can be observed by means of modern astronomical instruments.

It is discovered that young SNRs have very thin filaments emitting nonthermal X-rays from accelerated electrons. In this paper, a new age and distance indicator is proposed using the spectral and spatial features of nonthermal filaments. We applied this method to the Vela Jr. SNR, for which age and distance are still unknown, and estimated that this SNR is one of the nearest and youngest SNR in our Galaxy: the estimated distance and age are 0.33 (0.26–0.50) kpc and 660 (420–1400) years, respectively.

We report the serendipitous discovery of several ULX candidates in XMM-Newton observations. Such discoveries suggest that ULXs are not a negligible component of the extragalactic X-ray source population.

We present the results of ROSAT and XMM-Newton observations of the recurrent ultraluminous X-ray source (ULX) NGC 253 ULX1. This transient is one of the few ULXs that was detected during several outbursts. The luminosity reached 1.4$\,{\times}\,10^{39}$ \hbox{erg s$^{-1}$ and $0.5\,{\times}\,10^{39}$ erg s$^{-1}$ in the detections by ROSAT and XMM-Newton, respectively, indicating a black hole X-ray binary (BHXRB) with a mass of the compact object of $>$11 M$_{\odot}$. In the ROSAT detection NGC 253 ULX1 showed significant variability, whereas the luminosity was constant in the detection from XMM-Newton. The XMM-Newton EPIC spectra are well-fit by a bremsstrahlung model (kT$=2.24\,$keV, $N_H=1.74\times10^{20} \mbox{cm}^{-2}$), which can be used to describe a comptonized plasma. No counterpart was detected in the optical I, R, B, NUV and FUV bands to limits of 22.9, 24.2, 24.3, 22 and 23 mag, respectively, pointing at a XRB with a low mass companion.

We have conducted a survey of X-ray sources in XMM-Newton observations of M31, examining their power density spectra (PDS) and spectral energy distributions (SEDs). Our automated source detection yielded 535 good X-ray sources; to date, we have studied 225 of them. In particular, we examined the PDS because low mass X-ray binaries (LMXBs) exhibit two distinctive types of PDS. At low accretion rates, the PDS is characterised by a broken power law, with the spectral index changing from $\sim$0 to $\sim$1 at some frequency in the range $\sim$0.01–1 Hz; we refer to such PDS as Type A. At higher accretion rates, the PDS is described by a simple power law; we call these PDS Type B. Of the 225 sources studied to date, 75 exhibit Type A variability, and are almost certainly LMXBs, while 6 show Type B but not Type A, and are likely LMXBs. Of these 81 candidate LMXBs, 71 are newly identified in this survey; furthermore, they are mostly found near the centre of M31. Furthermore, most of the X-ray population in the disc are associated with the spiral arms, making them likely high mass X-ray binaries (HMXBs). In general these HMXBs do not exhibit Type A variability, while many central X-ray sources (LMXBs) in the same luminosity range do. Hence the PDS may distinguish between LMXBs and HMXBs in this luminosity range.

In the next generation surveys, the discovery of moving objects can be successful only if an observation strategy and the identification/orbit determination procedure are appropriate for the diverse apparent motions of the target sub-populations. The observations must accurately measure the displacement over a short interval of time; observations believed to belong to the same object have to be connected into tracklets. Information contained in tracklets is in most cases not sufficient to compute an orbit: two or more of them must be identified to provide an orbit. We have developed a method for recursive identification of tracklets allowing an unbiased orbit determination for all sub-populations and efficient enough to cope with the data flow expected from the next generation surveys. The success of the new algorithms can be easily measured only in a simulation, by consulting a posteriori some “ground truth”.

We present here the results of a simulation of the orbit determination for one month of operations of the future Pan-STARRS survey, based upon a Solar System Model with a downsized population of Main Belt asteroids and a full size populations of Trojans, NEO, Centaurs, Comets and TNO. The results indicate that the method already developed and tested to find identifications of NEO and Main Belt asteroids are directly applicable to Trojans. The more distant objects often require modified algorithms, fitting orbits with only 4 parameters in a coordinate system specially adapted to handle very short arcs of observations. These orbits are mostly used as intermediate results, allowing to find full solutions as more tracklets are identified.

When the number density of detections is as large as expected from the next generation surveys, both joining observations into tracklets and identifying tracklets can produce some false results. The only reliable way to remove them is a procedure of tracklet/identification management. It compares the tracklets and the identifications with a complex logic, allowing to discard almost all the false tracklets and all the false identifications. However, the distant objects still present a challenge for orbit determination: they require three tracklets in separate nights. If this requirement is met we have found no problem in achieving an unbiased orbit determination for all populations. Further work will lead to more advanced simulations, in particular by introducing a realistic model for astrometric and photometric errors.

As a prerequisite to returning their molecular inventory to the gas phase, icy grain mantles must desorb from the refractory core material of the grain. This desorption process can be instigated through interactions with photons or cosmic rays but can equally well be thermally driven. In this invited paper, the application of thermal desorption techniques borrowed from ultrahigh vacuum surface science to problems of astronomical interest will be discussed. The experimental methods employed by surface scientists to probe thermal desorption processes will be described and the analysis of the resulting empirical data outlined. The results of recent laboratory measurements from a number of groups will be highlighted.

This paper discusses several aspects of current research on high energy emission from supernova remnants, covering the following main topics: 1) The recent evidence for magnetic field amplification near supernova remnant shocks, which makes that cosmic rays are more efficiently accelerated than previously thought. 2) The evidence that ions and electrons in some remnants have very different temperatures, and only equilibrate through Coulomb interactions. 3) The evidence that the explosion that created Cas A was asymmetric, and seems to have involved a jet/counter jet structure. And finally, 4), I will argue that the unremarkable properties of supernova remnants associated with magnetar candidates, suggest that magnetars are not formed from rapidly ($P\approx 1$ ms) rotating proto-neutron stars. It is therefore more likely that they are formed from massive progenitor stars with high magnetic fields.

Orbit determination for Near-Earth Asteroids presents unique technical challenges due to the imperative of early detection and careful assessment of the risk posed by specific Earth close approaches. This article presents a case study of asteroid 99942 Apophis, a 300-400 meter object that, for a short period in December 2004, held an impact probability of more than 2% in 2029. Now, with an orbit based on radar ranging and more than a year of optical observations, we can confidently say that it will pass safely by the Earth in 2029, although at a distance of only about six Earth radii from the geocenter. However, the extremely close nature of this encounter acts to obscure the trajectory in subsequent years, when resonant returns to the vicinity of the Earth are possible. In particular, an impact possibility in the year 2036 has a roughly 5% probability of persisting through the very favorable 2013 radar and optical observing apparition. In the event that the 2036 potential impact has not been eliminated by 2013, a precise characterization of the Yarkovsky accelerations acting on the asteroid may become an important part of the orbit estimation and impact prediction problem. Even so, the sixteen years available to effect a deflection from 2013 until 2029, after which the problem would become intractable, are sufficient to respond to the threat should a deflection effort become warranted.