Galaxies have a history. This has become clear from recent sky surveys which have shown that distant galaxies, formed early in the life of the Universe, differ from the nearby ones. New observational windows at ultraviolet, infrared and millimetric wavelengths (provided by ROSAT, IRAM, IUE, IRAS, ISO) have revealed that galaxies contain a wealth of components: very hot gas, atomic hydrogen, molecules, dust, dark matter ...

A significant advance is expected due to new instruments (VLT, FIRST, XMM) which will allow one to explore the most distant Universe. Three Euroconferences have been planned to punctuate this new epoch in galactic research, bringing together specialists in various fields of Astronomy.

A revolution similar to that brought by CCDs to visible astronomy is still ahead in IR and submillimeter astronomy. There is certainly no wavelength range which has, over the past several years, seen such impressive advances in technology: large-scale detector arrays, new designs for cooling in space, lightweight mirror technologies. Scientific cases for observing the cold universe are outstanding. Observations in the FIR/Submm range will provide answers to such fundamental questions as: What is the spectrum of the primordial fluctuations? How do primeval galaxies look? What are the first stages of star formation? Most of the international space missions that have been triggered by these questions are presented in detail here. Technological issues raised by these missions are reviewed, as are the most recent achievements in cooling and detector technologies.

A revolution similar to that brought by CCDs to visible astronomy is still ahead in IR and submillimeter astronomy. There is certainly no wavelength range which has, over the past several years, seen such impressive advances in technology: large-scale detector arrays, new designs for cooling in space, lightweight mirror technologies. Scientific cases for observing the cold universe are outstanding. Observations in the FIR/Submm range will provide answers to such fundamental questions as: What is the spectrum of the primordial fluctuations? How do primeval galaxies look? What are the first stages of star formation? Most of the international space missions that have been triggered by these questions are presented in detail here. Technological issues raised by these missions are reviewed, as are the most recent achievements in cooling and detector technologies.

Galaxies have a history. This has become clear from recent sky surveys which have shown that distant galaxies, formed early in the life of the Universe, differ from the nearby ones. New observational windows at ultraviolet, infrared and millimetric wavelengths (provided by ROSAT, IRAM, IUE, IRAS, ISO) have revealed that galaxies contain a wealth of components: very hot gas, atomic hydrogen, molecules, dust, dark matter ...

A significant advance is expected due to new instruments (VLT, FIRST, XMM) which will allow one to explore the most distant Universe. Three Euroconferences have been planned to punctuate this new epoch in galactic research, bringing together specialists in various fields of Astronomy.

The first one, held in Granada (Spain) in May 2000, addressed the observational clues. The second one took place in October 2001 in St Denis de la Reunion (France) and reviewed the basic building blocks and small-scale processes in galaxy evolution. The third one will take place in July 2002 in Kiel (Germany) and will be devoted to the overall modelling of galaxy evolution. This book contains the proceedings of the second conference. It is suitable for researchers and PhD students in Astrophysics. "