Edwin A. Valentijn's Homepage

OmegaCEN  / Target
Kapteyn Astronomical Institute 
Department of Astronomy -  University of Groningen  The Netherlands


Postal address:
Prof. Dr Edwin A.Valentijn
Kapteyn Astronomical Institute
P.O. Box 800
NL-9700 AV Groningen
The Netherlands

Telephone (work):     +31 (0)50 3634011
mobile (work) :          +31 (0) 6 48276416
direct fax(work) :       +31 (0)50 3632003
Telephone (private):  +31 (0)50 5347274

email: Edwin A.Valentijn


Next VO course:  Modern Data Mining in Astronomy -- interacademiaal  Utrecht feb-may 2010



Working for the Netherlands Research School for Astronomy   NOVA   and leading   OmegaCEN  a National datacenter for wide field astronomical imaging.  OmegaCEN  is building and supporting an advanced Survey Information System: the virtual survey telescope.  At the center,  ~15 staff  and PhDs are involved in  research and development of data basing and processing  of very large data sets.

Founder of OmegaCEN (2002),  Astro-WISE (2001), Target ( 2008) and Target Holding (2009).

Professor in Astronomical Information Technology at the University of Groningen, since dec 2005.

I did my PhD at the Sterrewacht Leiden, on Radio Investigations of Clusters of Galaxies  with  Prof H. van der Laan as supervisor (1978), studying the intra cluster medium, cluster radio haloes and head-tail radio sources.
After that, I worked on X-ray astronomy (Einstein obervatory,) and optical surcface photometry,  studying cooling flows,  at the European Southern Observatory in Geneva and Garching, Munich. At ESO I was chairman of the working groups supervising the development of the MIDAS image analysis system. 
In 1984 I returned to the Netherlands to  help building up the new  UK-NL optical observatory at La Palma (Canarias) and studied dark matter in dumbbell and cD galaxies.
In 1989 I published with A. Lauberts the first large digital image survey (ESO-LV), which led to my paper on the opacities and dust content of spiral galaxies (Nature 1990).
During the 90's  I worked at SRON-Groningen and ESA Villafranca- Madrid to  build  and commission the
Infrared Space Observatory (ISO) satellite's Short Wave Spectrometer, which I used to pioneer the dectection of cool extragalactic molecular hydrogen- unseen matter in the universe. Since  1998  I work at the Kapteyn Institute for the OmegaCAM project  which led to the founding of the  OmegaCEN data center . My current research interests focus, apart from dark matter,  on the information theory of the universe and data modeling abstractions. 




On 13 May 2008 I gave a public  lecture (oratie) at the occasion of my formal inauguration as professor astronomical information technology at the University of Groningen -  The Information Universe:
-- printed ( .pdf) version of the lecture (booklet ISBN 978-90-367-3473-8
-- slides (.ppt)  of the lecture




My present and OmegaCEN's  involvement   in astronomical projects include:

  NOVA programme manager for the Calibration and the Data reduction of   OmegaCAM  -   a one square degree wide field imager for the VLT Survey Telscope (VST) at Paranal,  Chile,  which is expected to start operations in 2009

  Coordinator of  Astro-WISE  an European network linking National datacenters involved in astronomical wide field imaging. AstroWISE is on-going programme which started as an European Research and Development programme for the data  reduction and dissemination of wide field image data  (EU FP5 - RTD)

  Co-PI of VESUVIO -  an international research programme on nearby  Superclusters of Galaxies

  Co-PI of  KIDS  -  a  1500 Square degree ESO Public Survey  using OmegaCAM at the VLT Survey Telescope

  Co-I of various OmegaCAM  programmes OmegaWhite  and the VISTA  UltraVISTA public Survey

  Co-I on the Hubble Space Telescope  Coma Legacy Survey

  Member of ESA's Science Study Team for the Euclid mission in the Cosmic Vision programme

Member of RuG ICT - strategy comittee

  Partner of  the Lofar Radio Telescope project

  Board member, NL representative  and partner in the European Virtual Observatory

 the EU-FP6  Data center Alliance  Euro-VO-DCA and the EU FP7 EURO-VO AIDA project

  Leading the Target project  at the Donald Smith Centre for Information Technology  which supports the development of science operations for very large data projects, involving various groups of the  University of Groningen.

In dec 2006 -Jan 2007 I  organized   a Lecture series on "Virtual Observations"  at the Kapteyn Institute.

    Second course -  fall of 2008.    Programme of course Virtual Observatories Fall 2008

 Announcement Advanced course Virtual observatories fall 2008 (+ viewgraphs of last year course)


    Third course - spring 2010:   Modern Data Mining in Astronomy -  interacademiaal  Utrecht feb-may 2010

            The GANG of AstroWISE  -  the founding farthers of the AstroWise architecture in the days the system was perceived- Nice April 2001

  picture by Emmanual Bertin

ffrom left to right: Drs Danny Boxhoorn,  Dr  Kor Begeman, Dr Edwin A. Valentijn, Dr Roeland Rengelink and Dr  Erik Deul

The GANG of AstroWISE


Press releases:

  32 M budget of Target approved by SNN  - April 2009

  Euro-VO AIDA project  funded in EU FP7 programme - October 2007

   The Target project at the University of Groningen -  Interview in Pictogram  - August 2007

   Astro-WISE delivered and heading for  the future - August 2007 -  brochure published by OmegaCEN

   30 Januari 2006: Benoeming RuG

  13March 2002: Wide Angle on the Universe and additional -  Press info on Wide Angle on the Universe- .pdf format

  17 August 1999: ISO-SWS results of H2 survey - ISO DETECTS SIGNAL FROM DARK MATTER --

The ESO-LV project:

  ESO-LV home page

  Access to ESO-LV Galactic Extinction model, Choloniewski and Valentijn 

Not so recent links-  maintained overviews are availavle at ADS, Astro-Wise and Target websites


  Some (not so)  recent presentations and links  

  Index and further access to my publications

  Access to electronic reprints and PREPRINTS Choloniewski- Valentijn papers on Galactic extinction

I owned, sailed and maintained a wooden French sailing cutter (Dundee)  for 25 years and enjoyed very much Prof Blaauws sails back home from Vlieland on board of Rudolf Le Poole's skutsje

I' m proud to present Band-It -  expected soon in Jazz Cafe Spieghel Groningen: 18 december 2009 21:30