News from the Society for Astronomical Sciences
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News from the Society for Astronomical Sciences January, 2011 30th Anniversary of the Call for Papers 2011 Keynote Speaker: Society for Astronomical Papers are now being accepted for the Dr. Petrus Jenniskens Sciences SAS 2011 Symposium on Telescope Science. Topics on the full range of "The impact and recovery The 2011 Symposium on Telescope th small-telescope science are wel- of 2008 TC3" Science will mark the 30 anniversary comed: pro-am collaboration, science of the Society for Astronomical Sci- education, evaluation of recent profes- On October 7, 2008, a small 3-4 m ences. The enthusiasm of the partici- sional results on relevant targets (e.g. sized asteroid was discovered to be on pants for small-telescope science has small solar system bodies, planets, a collision course with Earth, the first not changed over those three dec- variable stars), and special uses of time an asteroid was seen coming in. ades. The growth in the size and par- astronomical data. Now called "2008 TC3", astronomers ticipation by both amateur and profes- studied the asteroid's lightcurve and sional astronomers bear witness to the Please send the abstract of your pro- reflection properties. Twenty hours important roles that the Symposium posed paper to the Program Commit- later, it crashed in the Nubian desert of plays: tee at [email protected]. Northern Sudan. When satellites saw it explode at an unusually high altitude • An opportunity for non-professional Deadlines are: of 37 km, many thought that was the researchers to present their projects Abstract submission: March 12, 2011 end of the story. and results, and learn from other backyard scientists. Final Papers due: April 16, 2011 Dr. Peter Jenniskens, however, trav- eled to Sudan in December at the invi- • The privilege of receiving research Abstracts may be submitted in plain tation of Dr. Muawia Shaddad of the advice from professional astrono- text or MS Word format. The format- University of Khartoum, and together mers. ting requirements for final papers -- with students and staff of the Univer- including an MS Word template – will • sity succeeded against all Continuing education on methods, soon be posted on the SAS website results, and opportunities for pro-am (www.SocAstroSci.org). collaboration in small-telescope as- tronomical research. • Venue for informal networking among the small-telescope research community, both amateur and pro- fessional. The Program Committee has been th busy, to ensure that the “30 Anniver- sary” 2011 Symposium is both useful and memorable. The Symposium will be held on May 24-25-26, 2011 at the Northwoods Resort in Big Bear, CA. The agenda will feature two half-day Workshops, two full days of technical papers, evening banquet and keynote lecture. Both oral paper presentations and poster papers are being solicited. We look forward to seeing you there! Dr. Jenniskens in the Nubian Desert (Sudan) strewn field of 2008 TC3. Society for AstronomAstronomicalical Sciences Newsletter Volume 9, Number 1 expectations: they ended up collecting Epsilon Aurigae at the AAS If you would like to help in this respon- over 600 fragments and slightly more sibility, please contact the SAS Com- than 10 kg of meteorites. We are pleased to report that two good mitte at [email protected]. friends of the SAS – Dr. Robert The strewnfield is unlike any other, Stencel and Jeff Hopkins – will be at with many different meteorite types the podium presenting papers at the found. Dr. Jenniskens will report on his January 2011 meeting of the American Correspondents Wanted travels to Sudan, the results of re- Astronomical Society in Seattle, WA. search on these meteorites, and the The last newsletter posed a couple of remarkable asteroid 2008 TC3. Dr. Stencel is the chair of the Special questions, but we haven’t heard an- Session on “Emerging Results on the swers from any of you. We would still Dr. Peter Jenniskens is a senior re- Extreme Binary, Epsilon Aurigae”. He appreciate your letters on those topics! search scientist with the SETI Institute. will present “Interferometric Imaging of They were: He is an expert on meteor showers Epsilon Aurigae”. and author of Meteor Showers and • How to translate asynchronous B- their Parent Comets, a 790 page book Jeff Hopkins, one of the longest- and V-band lightcurve data into a plot by Cambridge University Press avail- participating members of SAS and of color index vs. time. able through Amazon.com. Bring your owner of the Hopkins Phoenix Obser- • How to catalog and search an ar- copy for Dr. Jenniskens to sign! vatory, will present “Photometric Moni- toring of Epsilon Aurigae in Eclipse”. chive of FITS images, by their header’s RA, Dec coordinates. Epsilon Aurigae poster papers are also Richard Kowalski: being presented by other friends of the We also have new request. Some of Discoverer of 2008 TC3 SAS, including: Dr. Arne Henden, you are probably going to attend the Olivier Thizy, and Stan Gorodenski. American Astronomical Society meet- Richard Kowalski – the discoverer of Congratulations to all of you! ing in Seattle (January 2011), and the 2008 TC3 – has been invited to attend Lunar and Planetary Conference the SAS-2011 Symposium. He will be The abstracts of these and other pa- (March, 2011 in Houston). We’d ap- able to tell us more about the discov- pers being presented in the Epsilon preciate a letter describing what you ery of 2008 TC3 along with the past, Aurigae Session are available at the saw, heard, and learned, along with a current and future NEO operations at AAS website (www.AAS.org). couple of photos for use in the next newsletter. Catalina Sky Survey and the Catalina Special thanks to Gene Lucas for Real Time Optical Transient Survey, bringing this news to our attention. the latter being a new opportunity for pro-am collaboration, in which ama- teurs help professional astronomers by participating in a network of follow-up Help Wanted observations of very recent transient SAS is in need of an assistant web- events, e.g., supernovae, gamma-ray master. Yes, we do have a website, bursts, etc. and yes, it is functional and informa- tive. Alas, it is also quite pedestrian, it was written with a tool that has been SAS 2011 Workshops described as “#@^&%$ beyond all imagination” and as a result, it is a In keeping with our long tradition, we pain to maintain. If you understand a plan to include workshops on topics of bit about websites and HTML code, current special interest on the first day and can volunteer a little time to your of the 2011 Symposium (May 24, Society, we would very much like to 2011). One workshop topic has been hear from you. confirmed. The principal responsibility of the web- “Developing and Using Your Remote master will be to handle the periodic Observatory”, by Tom Krajci and Tom maintenance of the site. This includes Smith. This workshop will cover prac- updating news, uploading files, adding tical aspects of automating your ob- pages and moving content among servatory so that you can run your pages as needed. In general, this is a telescope and instruments from the once-a-month task, possibly less fre- Modern cosmological principles warmth of your home, be it 100 feet or quently in summer and fall. 10,000 miles away. Our two present- notwithstanding, it turns out that the ers have a wealth of experience in this The assistant webmaster will probably Center of the Universe is on Van- subject. want to translate the current website to couver Island (British Columbia, Canada), on the grounds of the Do- a more familiar publishing tool and will The topic for the second workshop has be called on to offer advice related to minion Astrophysical Observatory. not been finalized yet. our anticipated migration to a new photo: Bob Buchheim More information on the workshops, host. including pricing and schedule, will be distributed as it becomes available. 2 Society for Astronomical Sciences Newsletter Volume 9, Number 1 Asteroid (596) Scheila An Evaluation: Dr. Richard Miles (SAS would gradually fall back onto the sur- and BAA) highlighted the unusual na- face. The rotation period of Scheila is In early December, the Minor Planet ture of (596) Scheila. This object is around 15.9 hr, i.e. long enough for the Mailing List was a-twitter with reports quite a rare type of asteroid. It is of the material to fall back largely onto the of unusual goings-on at asteroid (596) 'T' type class as detailed in the Bus- same hemisphere. We may therefore Scheila, which had suddenly devel- DeMeo catalogue. expect Scheila to show some sort of oped a comet-like coma. CBET 2583, color change or modification of its rota- issued on 2010 Dec. 12, announced Of 371 objects described in Bus- tional lightcurve if a large blemish has the discovery of a spiral like structure DeMeo, only 4 belong to this 'T' classi- been created in the region of the dis- around main belt asteroid (596) fication of which (596) Scheila is one. rupted surface. The fresh material, laid Scheila by Steve Larson of the Cata- The nearest related class is the 'D' down in this way, may also exhibit a lina Sky Survey (CSS) on images from type which is regarded as the most like different phase-magnitude relationship 2010, Dec. 11.4 taken through the a comet nucleus as evidenced by the to that of the normal surface.” Catalina 0.68-m (27-inch) Schmidt observations of Comet C/2001 OG108 telescope,. It was quickly confirmed [see Abell, et al, "Physical characteris- Scheila reaches opposition about Feb- by quite a few small-telescope observ- tics of Comet Nucleus C/2001 OG108 ruary 3 at a phase angle of 6.2 ers.