The Extreme Sky - Seven Years of INTEGRAL

Abstract

Seven years of successful observations of the sky have been completed within the INTEGRAL mission, in the transition regime between X-rays and gamma-rays from ~10-8000 keV. Initially-agreed mission goals have been pursued, and both high-resolution images of point sources and high-resolution spectra of nuclear lines have been obtained. New discoveries have been made, such as X-ray emission from embedded binaries, hard emission tails from AXPs and 60Fe radioactivity lines; these stimulated both theoretical and observational studies, and now make INTEGRAL a valuable asset for the astronomical survey of high-energy sources across the sky. This contribution summarizes the situation after seven years of the mission, and concludes the 7-year anniversary workshop "The extreme sky" held in Otranto, Italy, in Oct 2009.