The University of Manchester will play a key role in a new European collaboration, which aims to boost accessibility and coordination of leading astroparticle and astronomy research infrastructures.
The Astrophysics Centre for Multi-messenger Studies in Europe (ACME), funded by the European Union and coordinated by Centre national de la recherche scientifique (CNRS), is an ambitious initiative that is designed to provide seamless access to instruments, data and expertise, focussing on the new science of multi-messenger astrophysics.
Multi-messenger astrophysics is a relatively new but rapidly growing field that uses information from various cosmic signals, such as photons, gravitational waves, neutrinos, and cosmic rays, to study some of the most extreme and mysterious phenomena in the Universe like black hole mergers, neutron star collisions, and supernova explosions. Combining data from multiple sources – or messengers – offers a more comprehensive understanding than traditional astronomy alone.
The ACME will bring together 40 leading institutions from 15 countries, including The University of Manchester’s Jodrell Bank Centre for Astrophysics (JBCA), and aims to forge a basis for strengthened long-term collaboration between these research infrastructures irrespective of location and level-up access opportunities across Europe and beyond.
The e-MERLIN/VLBI National facility, which The University of Manchester operates on behalf of the Science and Technology Facilities Council, and expertise from the UK’s SKA Regional Centre will play a crucial role in facilitating these goals.
Professor Rob Beswick from The University of Manchester, who co-leads ACME’s transnational access programme, said: “ACME is an incredibly exciting opportunity. This project will bring together a wide range of world-class researchers and astronomical research infrastructure spanning astroparticle and gravitational wave facilities along the entire electromagnetic spectrum, with a common focus to advance multi-messenger astrophysics,”
The AMCE project will be coordinated by Prof Antoine Kouchner (CNRS/Université Paris Cite) and Paolo D’Avanzo (INAF). A key element of the project is to develop six new multi-messenger Centres of Excellence across Europe, which will serve as hubs of expertise for all researchers in all aspects of direct and multi-messenger science programmes, providing support from proposals to data analysis and science interpretation.
Dr David Williams-Baldwin, who leads JBCA’s involvement in these new Centres of Excellence says “The ACME project will bring many infrastructures and groups together across Europe in a unique collaboration to provide the astronomy and astroparticle communities unprecedented access to data, workflows and expertise. ACME will revolutionise how researchers in multi-messenger fields work and collaborate in the future.”
ACME officially launched in September 2024 at a kick-off meeting held in Paris.
