We’re celebrating our role as hosts of the UK’s leading astronomy conference next week (7-11 July) with a series of free events for the public to enjoy.

Almost a thousand of the world’s top space scientists will visit Durham University next week (7 to 11 July) as we host the UK’s National Astronomy Meeting (NAM) 2025.

Astronomers have uncovered a vast cloud of energetic particles surrounding one of the most distant galaxy clusters ever observed, marking a major step forward in understanding the hidden forces that shape the cosmos.

The global impact of our research has been highlighted during a visit by the European Research Council Scientific Council.

Scientists from our top-rated Physics department are playing a major role in the world’s most ambitious space project, the Legacy Survey of Space and Time (LSST), led by the Vera C. Rubin Observatory.

We will host the European Research Council's (ERC) Scientific Council Meeting this June. Leading up to the visit, we are highlighting some of the projects at Durham that are happening thanks to support from the ERC.

When an intense laser interacts with a gas of atoms, high-order harmonics are generated. In the time domain, this radiation forms a train of extremely short light pulses, of the order of 100 attoseconds. Attosecond pulses allow the study of the dynamics of electrons in atoms and molecules, using pump-probe techniques. Anne L'Huillier's lecture will highlight some of the key steps of the field of attosecond science. Her talk is titled 'The Route to Attosecond Light Pulses'.

New research has cast doubt on the long-held theory that our galaxy, the Milky Way, will collide with its largest neighbour, the Andromeda galaxy, in 4.5 billion years-time.

Congratulations to Professor Ryan Cooke from our Department of Physics who is the joint recipient of the 2025 Gruber Foundation Cosmology Prize.

Researchers have discovered that ultra-fast wind surrounding a supermassive black hole is not smooth and continuous as previously assumed, but instead resembles a rapid-fire stream of gas ‘bullets’.

The Lonsdale Lecture Prize is awarded annually by the early-stage crystallography group (ESCG) of the British Crystallographic Association in memory of Dame Kathleen Lonsdale. Dr Emma McCabe (Durham condensed matter physics) was honoured to be awarded this prize at the BCA spring meeting 2025.

Two researchers from our top-rated Physics department have been awarded prestigious Quantum Technology Career Acceleration Fellowships by UK Research and Innovation (UKRI) through the Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (EPSRC).