IRAP is a new Mixed Research Unity (UMR 5277) of the CNRS and the University Paul Sabatier (PRES University of Toulouse) which results from the gathering of the old laboratories LATT, CESR, from part of the DTP and from a few researchers and teachers-researchers of the LMTG (about 300 people in total). The scientific objectives of the IRAP are the study and the understanding of the Universe and its content : the Earth as a planet, its ionized environment, the sun and its planets, the stars and their planetary systems, the galaxies, the very first stars and the primeval Big Bang. With technical employees specialized in the field of conception, construction, integration and operation of ground and space instruments and laboratory experiments leading to characterize physical process, this new UMR of the UPS backing on to the CNES is one of the main poles of the ground-space astrophysics in France.