AGN = "Active Galactic Nuclei," which are thought to be supermassive black holes accreting at high rates in the centers of distant galaxies. Astronomy, especially AGN astronomy, is full of TLAs ("three letter acronyms"). I'll try to avoid them here.
I'm just back from a conference on Elba Island, Italy, on the topic of "Superunification of Active Galactic Nuclei," which includes quasars, Seyfert galaxies, radio galaxies, etc., which are my specialty.
In the AGN field, we've had for a couple decades the concept of unification, or so-called unified models, which use orientation effects to explain different classes of AGN (e.g., Seyfert 1 galaxies that show both broad and narrow emission lines in the spectra and Seyfert 2 galaxies that show only narrow emission lines). The field has made great progress in the last few years in discovering ways of getting at other fundamental parameters like black hole mass, spin, and accretion rate, and has also uncovered a variety of links between AGN activity and the properties of the galaxies hosting them.
In four days of meetings you hear about 40 talks and have the opportunity to read poster papers. These meetings are always a great way to catch up with results without having to read a pile of papers (it's hard to know in advance which are the important ones when they first come out). I learned a number of things that I didn't before, in particular about some new AGN dust extinction laws, new results about black hole "downsizing" (how smaller black holes are active today compared to the past), issues of reverberation mapping and mass estimation, and some possible new explanations of the radio-loud, radio-quiet AGN dichotomy.
The human element of science is not to be overlooked. The most important thing about these meetings is probably not catching up on science, or having the opportunity to synthesize new disparate results, but to talk with other astronomers. I renewed some old friendships and acquaintances, and made new ones. A couple of new collaborative projects emerged while at the meeting, and a couple more may emerge in the aftermath.
It was a really fantastic venue, a small marina/resort town on the Mediterranian. Groups of 4-8 astronomers would sit together over lunch or dinner with a carafe of the local Elba vino Bianca, talking science and other issues. It's an immersive science vacation and as inspiring to scientists as any science fiction convention.
Slide presentations and poster papers will be available on the conference website in the near future.