This review contains: (1) the scientific motivations for studying Planetary Nebulae in the Magellanic Clouds; (2) a review of this field of study, from the origins to the most recent results, focusing on the papers that have been published since the last IAU Symposium on Planetary Nebulae; (3) a review of the Hubble contribution to the field, from the early results to our own Magellanic Cloud P...

We report circumstances and observational techniques used with the CFHT Multi-Object Spectrograph that led us to the discovery of low-luminosity carbon stars in the Fornax dwarf spheroidal galaxy. We review the carbon star surveys carried out with this system and present our main results. A more detailed study based on our CFHT and ESO observations will be published in the proceedings of the IA...

This brief paper summarizes a “key general review” with the same title given at the IAU meeting in Rio de Janeiro. The intent of the review talk was to give a broad and well-illustrated overview of recent work on the icy middle and outer Solar system, in a style interesting for those astronomers whose gaze is otherwise drawn to more distant realms. The intent of this written review is the same.

This article summarises the subject matter of Special Session 3 at IAU General Assembly XXVII in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, which took place on August 6-7, 2009. In it, we overview the state of Astronomy in Antarctica as it is in 2009. Significant astronomical activity is now taking place at four stations on the Antarctic plateau (South Pole, Domes A, C & F), as well as at the coastal station of M...

We discuss the observational status of the interstellar lithium isotopic ratio and its significance with respect to the galactic evolution of lithium. Based on invited talks given at: ESO/EIPC Workshop on “Light Elements Abundances”, Isola d’Elba, Italy, May 22–28, 1994 ESO Workshop on “Science with the VLT”, Garching, Germany, June 28 – July 01, 1994 IAU General Assembly, Joint Discussion 11, ...

The future of space-based astrometric missions appears to be very promising. Three missions were described at IAU Colloquium 180. These are the Full-sky Astrometric Mapping Explorer (FAME), the Space Interferometry Mission (SIM) and the Global Astrometric Interferometer for Astrophysics (GAIA) missions. These missions will substantially improve the accuracy of global astrometric measurements ma...