National Astronomy Meeting (NAM) 2025

Image credit: Durham University

The Royal Astronomical Society is proud to present the next National Astronomy Meeting, NAM2025, at Durham University from Monday 7th July to Friday 11th July, 2025. It is organised in conjunction with Durham University's Centre for Extragalactic Astronomy, the Centre for Advanced Instrumentation, the Institute for Computational Cosmology, the Institute for Particle Physics Phenomenology, and the Department of Mathematical Sciences.

NAM2025 covers the full range of astronomy research in the UK, including the instrumentation and astro-particle communities, as well as other key issues relevant to the UK astronomy community. Beside the UK’s astronomy community, the meeting includes the UK Solar Physics (UKSP), and the Magnetosphere Ionosphere and Solar-Terrestrial (MIST) communities.

It is centrally located in the modern purpose-built Teaching and Learning Centre (TLC) and the opposing Ogden Centre West (OCW) building which hosts the majority of the astronomy research at Durham University.


Image credit: Durham University

NAM2025 is a hybrid conference but where the majority of participants are expected to attend in person. By using a hybrid model we aim to allow as many people as possible to experience the conference and learn about the exciting astronomy and space science research being conducted around the UK and further afield.

The theme for NAM2025 will be "community" to reflect our broad engagement programme, with extensive schools, outreach, art, heritage, and industry elements, in addition to the regular scientific and professional practice sessions. The theme of community also broadly reflects the need for us to work together to achieve greater things, particularly during these challenging times both within the UK and across the globe.

The organisers of NAM2025 have made sustainability a high priority, and will aim to minimise waste produced during the meeting and highly encourage delegates to use public transport when travelling to Durham in the UK and to car share when driving is required.

Latest news:

26/06/25: Release of Zoom access details (links, meeting codes, passcodes) will take place on Sunday 6th July. They will be visible to all registered participants on your webpage. Please ensure you're logged in on our webpage, and the email address of your account matches the email address provided during registration/payment processs (more on that on our FAQ page).

17/06/25: Due to the large demand to present scientific posters at NAM2025, all posters must be printed in A1 (841mm x 594mm; 33.1" x 23.4") and in a landscape orientation. Any posters which do not conform to these size and orientation constraints cannot be displayed.

17/06/25: A Presenter (talks and posters) Guide and Session Organiser Guide have been produced to aid in the smooth running of the parallel and lunchtime sessions. We encourage all presenters and session organisers to read the guides prior to the start of NAM2025.

05/06/25: The Royal Astronomical Society have announced a Carer's Grant to support those with caring duties over the week of NAM. The application form can be found on our Accessibilty page and must be returned to awards@ras.ac.uk. The deadline is 17:00 BST on 4th July 2025.

05/06/25: NAM will host a 3-minute thesis competition on Thursday 10th July at 6pm with a total prize of £100 (1st £60, 2nd £25, 3rd £15, in Amazon vouchers). If you are a student or early-career researcher attending NAM, this is a fantastic opportunity to hone your communication skills, gain visibility, and engage with the broader community. Sign up now by filling in this form before 14:00 BST on 15th June 2025: 15 candidates will be selected to present. The selected candidates will be provided with help and support to prepare for this inspiring event.

23/05/25: We are pleased to announce the release of the full conference timetable. We are finalising some of the timetable details and will keep updating it in the run up to NAM2025. Note for presenters where your name is not visible for your talk in the schedule - this is quickly and easily fixable in your "Contribution", see our FAQs for information.

15/04/25: For those participants presenting at NAM (giving either a talk or a poster), the registration deadline is 6th June, 2 weeks earlier than the regular participant deadline. We need to set this earlier presenter deadline as there are many programme-related details that need to be sorted out well in advance of the start of NAM.

15/04/25: We are pleased to be able to support a small number of fee waivers for those in greatest need who do not have alternative funding options. The deadline for applications is 14th May 13:00 BST.

15/04/25: The deadline for booking a room at the Radisson Blu using our NAM block booking is 1st May.

06/04/25: The block schedule showing the days and times for all of the parallel and lunchtime sessions has been published.

02/04/25: Following the deadline for the NAM2025 Call for Abstracts, we have generated two plots illustrating the submission trends. These plots show the number of abstracts submitted over time, the green line shows the cumulative numer while the red line illustrates the daily rate:

We received ~900 abstracts in total, with ~800 requests for talks and ~100 requests for posters: thank you all for your fantastic response to NAM2025! The individual session organisers will now assess the abstracts submitted to their sessions and decide on the selected talks and posters, following the session organiser guidelines, with a deadline of 25th April.

04/02/25: The selected parallel and lunchtime sessions have been published.

See below for key dates including the participant registration deadline to attend NAM2025.

Key dates:

Parallel session proposal submission: 14th October-6th December
Announcement of participant registration: 4th February
Announcement of parallel sessions: 4th February
Abstract submission: 4th February-31st March
Announcement of block schedule: 6th April
Announcement of full conference timetable: 23rd May
Registration deadline: 6th June (poster and talk participants), noon (12:00 BST) 20th June (regular participants)
Release of Zoom access details: 6th July

Welcome reception: 6pm on 6th July
Start of conference: 8am on 7th July
End of conference: 4pm on 11th July