ESCAPE - The European Science Cluster of Astronomy & Particle Physics ESFRI Research Infrastructures has received funding from the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme under Grant Agreement no. 824064.
The National Institute for Astrophysic (Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica – INAF) is a governmental research organization with 16 research centres geographically distributed over the Italy, plus the “Galileo” observing facility located in La Palma, Canary Islands.
INAF promotes, realizes and coordinates, also within programs of the European Union and international organisms, research activities in many astronomical fields, such as optical/infrared astronomy, radio astronomy, X and γ ray astronomy, particle astrophysics and cosmic physics, both in collaboration with Universities and with other public and private, national and international agencies. INAF is a major partner of the astrophysics-related ESFRI projects, having actively participated in their definition since the initial phases; it has furthermore important participations in several other world class projects, both ground-based and space-borne.
Participation in the ESFRI projects allows INAF to focus on their real needs in terms of infrastructure, and the experience from previous and current projects increases the feasibility of the planned facilities.