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Measurements in the infrared wavelength domain allow us to assess directly the physical state and energy balance of cool matter in space, thus enabling the detailed study of the various processes that govern the formation and early evolution of stars and planetary systems in the Milky Way and of galaxies over cosmic time. Previous infrared missions, from IRAS to Herschel, have revealed a great deal about the obscured Universe, but sensitivity has been limited because up to now it has not been possible to fly a telescope that is both large and cold. Such a facility is essential to address key astrophysical questions, especially concerning galaxy evolution and the development of planetary systems. SPICA is a mission concept aimed at taking the next step in mid- and far-infrared observational capability by combining a large and cold telescope with instruments employing state-of-the-art ultra-sensitive detectors. The mission concept foresees a 2.5-meter diameter telescope cooled to below 8 K. Rather than using liquid cryogen, a combination of passive cooling and mechanical coolers will be used to cool both the telescope and the instruments. With cooling not dependent on a limited cryogen supply, the mission lifetime can extend significantly beyond the required three years. The combination of low telescope background and instruments with state-of-the-art detectors means that SPICA can provide a huge advance on the capabilities of previous missions. The SPICA instrument complement offers spectral resolving power ranging from ~50 through 11000 in the 17-230 µm domain as well as ~28.000 spectroscopy between 12 and 18 µm. Additionally, SPICA will be capable of efficient 30-37 µm broad band mapping, and small field spectroscopic and polarimetric imaging in the 100-350 µm range. SPICA will enable far infrared spectroscopy with an unprecedented sensitivity of ~5x10-20 W/m2 (5σ/1hr) - at least two orders of magnitude improvement over what has been attained to date. With this exceptional leap in performance, new domains in infrared astronomy will become accessible, allowing us, for example, to unravel definitively galaxy evolution and metal production over cosmic time, to study dust formation and evolution from very early epochs onwards, and to trace the formation history of planetary systems.

The Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array(ALMA) Band 1 receiver covers the 35-50 GHz frequency band. Development of prototype receivers, including the key components and subsystems has been completed and two sets of prototype receivers were fully tested. We will provide an overview of the ALMA Band 1 science goals, and its requirements and design for use on the ALMA. The receiver development status will also be discussed and the infrastructure, integration, evaluation of fully-assembled band 1 receiver system will be covered. Finally, a discussion of the technical and management challenges encountered will be presented.

Fullerenes are a particularly stable class of carbon molecules in the shape of a hollow sphere or ellipsoid that might be formed in the outflows of carbon stars. Once injected into the interstellar medium (ISM), these stable species survive and are thus likely to be widespread in the Galaxy where they contribute to interstellar extinction, heating processes, and complex chemical reactions. In recent years, the fullerene species C60 (and to a lesser extent C70) have been detected in a wide variety of circumstellar and interstellar environments showing that when conditions are favourable, fullerenes are formed efficiently. Fullerenes are the first and only large aromatics firmly identified in space. The detection of fullerenes is thus crucial to provide clues as to the key chemical pathways leading to the formation of large complex organic molecules in space, and offers a great diagnostic tool to describe the environment in which they reside. Since fullerenes share many physical properties with PAHs, understanding how fullerenes form, evolve and respond to their physical environment will yield important insights into one of the largest reservoirs of organic material in space. In spite of all these detections, many questions remain about precisely which members of the fullerene family are present in space, how they form and evolve, and what their excitation mechanism is. We present here an overview of what we know from astronomical observations of fullerenes in these different environments, and discuss current thinking about the excitation process. We highlight the various formation mechanisms that have been proposed, discuss the physical conditions conducive to the formation and/or detection of fullerenes in carbon stars, and their possible connection to PAHs, HACs and other dust features., Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures. Proceedings of "The Life Cycle of Dust in the Universe: Observations, Theory, and laboratory Experiments". Taipei, Taiwan 18-22 November 2013. Editors: A. Andersen, M. Baes, H. Gomez, C. Kemper, D. Watson

ISO [C II] 158 micron, [O I] 63 micron, and H_2 9 and 17 micron observations are presented of the reflection nebula Ced 201, which is a photon-dominated region illuminated by a B9.5 star with a color temperature of 10,000 K (a cool PDR). In combination with ground based [C I] 609 micron, CO, 13CO, CS and HCO+ data, the carbon budget and physical structure of the reflection nebula are constrained. The obtained data set is the first one to contain all important cooling lines of a cool PDR, and allows a comparison to be made with classical PDRs. To this effect one- and three-dimensional PDR models are presented which incorporate the physical characteristics of the source, and are aimed at understanding the dominant heating processes of the cloud. The contribution of very small grains to the photo-electric heating rate is estimated from these models and used to constrain the total abundance of PAHs and small grains. Observations of the pure rotational H_2 lines with ISO, in particular the S(3) line, indicate the presence of a small amount of very warm, approximately 330 K, molecular gas. This gas cannot be accommodated by the presented models., 32 pages, 7 figures, in LaTeX. To be published in ApJ