Within the Directorate for Science at its Headquarters in Garching, near Munich, Germany, ESO is inviting university students to apply to our ESO Summer Research Programme. The ESO Summer Research Programme is an opportunity for university students from science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields who have not yet started a PhD programme and have completed at least two years of their degree.

Within the scope of this programme, there are seven exciting individual projects topics to choose from. Please visit https://eso.org/sci/meetings/2026/SummerResearch2026.html to review all seven project topics, as you can only apply to one.

Applications for the ESO Summer Research Programme will be considered from students taking any astronomy, physical science, computer science or mathematical degree subjects. However, it is expected that students have some knowledge of physics, programming, data analysis techniques and, preferably, astronomy.

Students will be selected for the programme based on their academic achievements, research potential and likelihood to significantly benefit from the experience. Particular attention will be given to the motivation of the students to join the programme and specific motivation for Project E:

Project E: Excavating the fossil record of KILOGAS galaxies

Supervisors: Amelia Fraser-McKelvie, Nikki Geesink

Clues to a galaxy's past are concealed in the light that we observe today. Galactic archaeology techniques including spectral energy distribution (SED) fitting employs multiwavelength data from galaxies to infer their star formation activity across cosmic time. The ultraviolet to infrared spectra of all galaxies arises from stellar light, either directly, or reprocessed by the gas and dust of the surrounding interstellar medium. Each galaxy possesses a unique SED that contains a large amount of information about the stars of a galaxy from which we can derive information on its formation and evolution. This chemical 'fingerprint', coupled with information on the galaxy's current star formation and cold gas reservoir, allows us to gain a complete picture of the gas-star formation cycle in nearby galaxies.

The KILOGAS survey (https://kilogas.space/) is the largest survey of resolved cold gas in galaxies with complementary optical integral field spectroscopic observations. Its aim is to transform our understanding of the drivers of star formation activity in galaxies. The student will work with Dr Fraser-McKelvie (ESO) and external members of the KILOGAS team (located in Europe, North America, and Australia) to perform SED fitting on the KILOGAS sample of galaxies to determine their star formation histories. In combination with complementary ALMA observations and derived properties provided by the KILOGAS team, the student will work to understand the link between a galaxy's past behaviour, and its current day properties - effectively linking their past to their present.