Motivation

In recent years we are seeing a revolution in our understanding of the Milky Way Galaxy ecosystem, thanks to a new generation of facilities, instruments and surveys, that are enabling quantum leaps in sensitivity and spatial resolution over existing datasets, and over several decades in wavelengths, from the Gamma Ray to the Infrared and the Radio.

A new generation of Galactic Plane surveys is indeed assembling a brand new Multiwavelength Milky Way that unlocks an unprecedented view over a large number of science topics. The large fields of view and sensitivity of instrumentation on board INTEGRAL, SWIFT, AGILE, FERMI and HESS allowed for a much better knowledge of the sky on different time and energy scales. These observations, together with devoted pointed observations with RXTE, XMM, Chandra and Suzaku have improved our knowledge of sources population in the plane of our Galaxy. Transient phenomena on all time scale and energies have been investigated and in turn accretion physics have been studied. Ground based surveys in optical, H_α and near infrared with IPHAS/VPHAS+ and UKIDSS represented a major advance in characterising circumstellar environments of stellar population in the Galaxy from young pre-Main Sequence to AGB stars.

SPITZER and, more recently, HERSCHEL are delivering unprecedented opportunities to study the cold dust and gas in the Galaxy from the Galaxy-wide structure of the stellar and diffuse Interstellar Medium components, to the formation of dense molecular clouds and filaments and the conditions for the onset of star formation, down to the late stellar evolution (evolved stars and SNRs) and the Galactic Center environment.

The new spectroscopic and continuum surveys in millimeter and radio wavelength (Planck, VLA, H-RRL) are keeping up with the pace of improvement in terms of sensitivity and spatial resolution, revealing hints of missing barionic matter and exotic dust components.

The main aim of the Symposium is then to bring together Communities active in different topics and different ranges of the electromagnetic spectrum in Galactic Astronomy, to create synergies and maximize the power of multi-wavelength and multi-mission research to boost knowledge advancement.

We acknowledge support from