Berto Monard-First Magnitude Amateur Astronomer

I couldn't help but notice this summer that South African amateur astronomer, Berto Monard, had an amazing string of supernovae discoveries. The IAU Circulars seemed to be announcing another Monard supernova every week. So I contacted the one-man-southern-hemisphere-supernova-factory, and asked if he would grant an interview to tell us how he does it. Berto graciously accepted, and I think you'll like getting to know him as much as I did. He is in a word, remarkable.

Mike: Hi, Berto. Thanks for granting this interview. We’ve never met face to face but I’ve known you through the Internet for many years now. I’m anxious to learn more. Tell me a little about yourself.

Let’s start with where you live, and what do you do for a living.

Berto: Thanks, Mike, for the opportunity and indeed I am involved with astronomy for quite some time now.

I live with my wife, Brigitte on a small holding 35km ESE of Pretoria, the capital of the republic of South Africa. On top of the Bronberg mountain ridge we have an unobstructed view to the N and E horizons with little light pollution and beautiful sunrises. A hill behind the house cuts out 10 degrees from the other horizons, shielding the worst part of the immense light pollution of the Highveld agglomeration (Johannesburg-Pretoria) and the airfield OR Tambo Airport.
Together with the other owners around here we have established a conservancy area and we now live amidst game of the plant eating kind.

I am on pension since 2008, but still work part-time as a consulting metrologist at NMISA (National Measurement Institute of South Africa). Mainly involved with mentoring young scientists in the laboratory of Photometry and Radiometry, I still have full responsibilities in UV radiometry and spectroradiometry. NMISA is similar to NIST (USA), NPL (UK) and PTB (Germany).

Being trained as an electro-mechanical engineer (Energy conversions) / M Sc Eng, Louvain, Belgium 1974, the choice to enter into the field of optical radiometry at the time of my immigration to South Africa in 1981 was distinctly influenced by latent interests in astronomy.

Most of my free time is taken up by astronomy related tasks. Any spare time is used to do clearing work in our wattle forest and I also fancy a game of golf twice a month. We have three children and two grandchildren.

Mike: Where is Bronberg Observatory located? Is it on your home property, or is it at a remote site you have to travel to?

Berto: The Bronberg Observatory is situated 90m from the house amidst large rocks and indigenous plants. The coordinates are 25° 54’ 32 S, 28° 26 18 E and the altitude is 1590m above sea.

Mike: How did you get started in astronomy, and what led you to the study of variable stars in particular?

Berto: From a young age I had admiration for the night sky and wondered what was going on there in the distance. I grew up in Belgium, a country with lots of light pollution and grey skies (with rain in the morning and showers in the afternoon, as the weather forecasts mostly went). Not much came from my interests even after buying a small telescope in 1976. But I did read books on astronomy and even studied pocket book atlases. I was especially impressed by Betelgeuse, and an awkward large star named epsilon Aurigae, of which not much was known....

I had taken that small scope with the flimsy equatorial mount into S. Africa but started only using it in 1990. Together with two work colleagues we intended to track satellites and I used that scope and a couple of star charts to do that. One of those colleagues had been involved with the organization of the Moonwatch team (late 1950s) in the Pretoria region. To that effect he had gotten lots of charts and also a set of converted apogee telescopes with 5" lenses. That's what I used from 1990 until 1996 to do variable star observing. It's a heavy and sturdy steel constructed refractor telescope that requires a firm alt-az mounting.

Initially it was interesting to wait for and spot the passage of those satellites through the 2.4 degree FOV of the apogee, but those satellites became rather boring as they had predictable orbits. Instead, I started observing R Centauri and other bright variables shown on those charts. That's how I got hooked.

Mike: What instruments do you employ at the observatory?

Berto: At the moment a 30cm (12") telescope Meade RCX 400, with reducer 0,62x and CCD camera ST7-XME, giving an effective f/5. An old filter wheel is squeezed in between the camera and the reducer, providing a firm fit onto the scope. This instrumentation is mounted on a pier, polar aligned and the images show on the screen with North up and East left. In addition to simple and straightforward observing software (I stick to CCDOPS) I use Scopedriver (S. Hutson, ADP) for driving the scope. Keypads run out of life-time eventually.

Mike: Do you still do any visual observing? If so, what do you observe?

Berto: After our move to the Bronberg I mounted the old apogee scope on the terrace there with the intention to observe bright stars and novae, but instead I now look at the impalas, wildebeest (gnus), zebras, springbuck, etc.; or at distant thunderstorms during summer. CCD cameras are dangerous things to ever start with...

Mike: I know you best from your activities observing cataclysmic variables for the Center for Backyard Astrophysics. How long have you been collecting data on cataclysmic variables (CVs) and sharing it with Joe Patterson and the gang at CBA?

Berto: CVs became my main visual observing targets since 1992, but it would be another 10 years before I joined CBA and started contributing CCD observed data.

I really enjoyed visual observing and I made quite a large number of CV observations mainly through a 32cm Dobsonian which I acquired in 1997. Constraints at that time would have made it difficult to go into CCD observing.

I am now an active CBA member since 2002 and CBA Pretoria has made significant contributions to the CBA cause, mainly during our wintertime with more than 90% of open skies. I know Professor Joe Patterson is quite pleased with my long runs on Milky Way bulge CVs. CBA is a great initiative.

Mike: Has your activity with CBA led to you co-authoring any scientific papers?

Berto: CBA observers get to share co-authorship on publications that they contribute data to. This is the going standard. CBA Pretoria has therefore co-authored several CBA publications since 2002. Besides CBA, I also contributed to VSNET campaigns with resulting publications. It's all about cataclysmic variables, how they behave during active phases and why.

I have co-authored publications resulting from my other observing activities: for instance on the interesting transient in NGC 300 which was 5 magnitudes short of what a SN would peak at. Some astronomers graduate with theses made on such objects.

Just to make sure I have publications, I write annual reports on the Bronberg Observatory / CBA Pretoria activities which are then included in the Monthly Notices of the Astronomical Society of S Africa. These reports include a list of the publications that I co-authored in that year. That's my way of documenting them.

Mike: You also make a point of following up on interesting transient objects like novae, and gamma-ray bursts. Tell us a little about chasing after GRB afterglows. It is a difficult quest, but a few amateurs, including you, have succeeded in imaging these elusive short-lived phenomena.

Berto: I have always loved to follow up on alerts. Most often it concerns faint and even undetectable objects like counterparts of X ray transients. I have been doing them since 2002, after CBA Pretoria became operational.

GRBs were another such challenge. I remember GRB 030329 which was quite bright and I was very excited to follow up on that one right from the beginning and provided some good light curves. Then there followed a period that I went after GRB alerts just to spot or even discover the counterparts and with success. It can be quite a demanding endeavour at times and a matter of fighting the sleep during such observing nights. But in fact it’s just hard routine.

I stopped GRB afterglow chasing in 2005 but still follow up on satellite-detected transients. There are a number of INTEGRAL detected magnetic CVs that are since added to my CV observing program.

Mike: The thing that got me to write you about doing this interview was your incredible success recently at discovering supernovae. I may have lost count, but I think you have discovered at least a dozen in 2009 alone! How do you do it, and how many have you discovered now altogether?

Berto: SN hunting is very much what I always wanted to do. It's the most time consuming of my projects because of the additional efforts in processing and the image inspection. SNe cannot be forced to appear, they have to happen in the galaxies surveyed and that was the case this year: six finds in July and three in August. In view of the increased competition in the southern hemisphere this is a good score. My total of SN discoveries now stands at 84. This is larger than my best golf score, therefore I am in need of another milestone ;-), perhaps reaching 100.

There is a lot of work and sophistication behind these discoveries. Enthusiasm is a great help to get started but there must be an adequate target selection to get maximum results from the time spent. Not every galaxy is a good candidate for SN production and it also doesn't help to image distant galaxies so that SNe will not be visible outside their peak brightness. It took regular efforts over three years to compose an efficient search list of around 2000 galaxies. Executing that list on a routine basis has to lead to discoveries.

Mike: What are your plans for the future? Are you planning to acquire a bigger telescope, or more telescopes? Or perhaps hiring an assistant to help you keep up the prodigious amount of work you are doing?!

Berto: I have a bigger scope, an RCX400 35cm, which is kept safely packed in the house and with it an ST8 CCD. They will be used again shortly, I hope. Break-ins in 2007 urged me to empty one of the observatories.

Our main plan now is to move to the Little Karoo in the Western Cape and to build an observatory there. That will probably take place end of 2010. We have our Bronberg property on the market but hope we can organize to still have access to the observatory there for winter campaigns. One of the reasons for our move is the bad weather over the Highveld in the period October-March with very few clear skies at night.

The best possible assistant I can imagine is a fully supportive spouse, which I have. And we both believe that if you want something done properly, you do it yourself.

Mike: Are there any other types of astronomical phenomena you would like to observe, like exoplanet transits or asteroids?

Berto: Observations of exoplanet transits were stopped in 2007, but I still monitor on an ad hoc basis faint CVs, mainly magnetic ones, around magnitude 18.5. Then I observe the southern symbiotic stars, once or twice per month depending on each star's 'merit'. This is such an exciting project, which will probably outlast all the others. Each month there is another star that tends to do something.

There are also many exciting observations I made the last few years and that are still sitting on my PC. Certain objects show unique light curves that are amazing to watch. They need publishing and I need time for that. Just look at the light curve below. These are time-series with an unfiltered CCD. The eclipse depth in V is expected to be even larger.


Since 2006, I have also joined uFUN (Microlens Follow Up Network), which is lead by Prof. A. Gould from Ohio State University.

They coordinate observations of members in different time zones. The intention is to detect exoplanets around distant stars in the Milky Way bulge. This is done by continuously monitoring microlenses that are expected to go high magnification in the hope of detecting signatures of planets orbiting the lens star. Some of these lenses remain very faint and the star density in the Milky Way requires good quality imaging.

In structure this organization is similar to Joe Patterson's CBA, but there are more professional observatories involved and a lot of mathematical modeling is required to decipher the observed anomalies.

Those uFUN projects can be very exciting and I am grateful to have been requested to get involved with these. A couple of publications on recent events will come out soon and there will also be an Sky and Telescope article on one of them.

Three years ago, I had plans and concepts to conduct a nova search. I believe a number of not so bright novae might be missed and I wanted to pick up most of those. This project was shelved in 2007.

And I would like to find comets too, but that's for in another life...

Mike: Everyone is motivated for different reasons. What keeps you working so hard night after night, and what gives you the most personal satisfaction?

Berto: I am just very excited with the possible outcome of a night's observing. Things happen and the universe is changing all the time. You never know what you will find. The excitement is in the anticipation of the unknown. That's the answer.

Mike: What advice can you give to amateurs who would like to contribute to science but may not know exactly what to do, or where to start?

Berto: Every amateur astronomer has his/her own specific range of interests in astronomy and related hobbies and some never get or want to observe. But they may get excitement out of studying observing data, optimizing instrumentation, popularizing astronomy, reading about history, etc... It's difficult to therefore give general advice, except that there must be a drive to do it and fun while doing it. This also has to apply to observing.

More specifically for variable star observers, I would suggest them trying to get at least a superficial understanding of all known mechanisms that lead to star light variations. In other words, get to know the different types of variable stars and then to perhaps observe those types that excite them most. AAVSO has a large list of traditional and more recent stars, some of them in need of observations. If those stars appeal, do them. But there are so many star and star like systems that are very interesting and nobody observes them.

It is not necessary to acquire large and expensive instrumentation to be a good observer. An adequate target selection is all that's needed.

I have always been prepared to help people out. It doesn't mean they will be successful. I have genuinely assisted individuals and groups with SN searching. It didn't always produce results. In a time where team efforts are praised as the all-encompassing means to success, I still believe in the potential of a focused and well equipped individual. If he knows how to utilize or explore existing voids in scientific fields, he/she will have major advantages over professionals. As amateur astronomers we have the privilege of an exciting and unlimited hobby, which will always distinguish us from 'normal' people.

Mike: Thank you, Berto. It has been great getting to know you. I hope we can meet in person one day and share even more.

Berto: Yes, sure. Why don't you come and visit us.

Mike: That sounds like an excellent idea! Thank you for the invitation.

Answering the Call

This morning at 3:20AM I nearly fell off my chair in the observatory...literally.

Most of you know by now that I am a variable star observer. I have a 12-inch telescope in a dome I use to monitor several hundred cataclysmic variables for outbursts visually, and another 12-inch telescope in a roll off roof observatory that has a CCD camera doing photometry, more or less automated.

The visual monitoring program is sort of the astronomical version of a Chinese fire drill. I start in the east and work my way west through the night going from one variable star to the next as fast as I can. I make an observation in 60-90 seconds, log it, and move on. The reason for the rush is, it's a numbers game.

Most cataclysmic variables are too faint to be seen at all in a 12-inch scope when they are quiescent, not in outburst. Only when they erupt do they become visible. Most of the stars I follow outburst brighter than 15th magnitude, typically in the 13's or 14's. Some, like SS Cygni, get a lot brighter in outburst, and can be seen with binoculars.

Outbursts can last days or weeks depending on the star, but the thing is, they are totally unpredictable and they do not wait for anyone. If you miss a rare outburst, you may not get another chance for years, or decades. In some cases, never again.

On any given night only a handful of these stars may actually be active, out of the hundreds known. So the only way to be sure to catch them as they go into outburst, and to increase your chances of catching that rare find, is to observe as many of them each clear night as possible. I try to do at least 100 observations per night.

The majority of visual observations I log in a night are negative detections. In other words, I didn't see the star. It's not in outburst, or it's too faint for me to detect yet. When I log the observation I note the name of the star, the time to the nearest minute and the magnitude of the faintest comparison star I can see. For me, the limiting magnitude is usually between 14.8 and 15.2. On moonlit nights or under hazy skies that may drop to 14.5 or less, and on really fine, clear, dry nights I may occasionally glimpse a 15.5 comp star briefly.

When I report the observation it is written as 'less than the magnitude of the faintest comp star' (<14.8). So it's easy to tell the quality of a night by the typical limiting magnitude as you slew from one area of the sky to the next. The fainter you can see, the better the night, basically. In the morning, I type out my report and submit it to the AAVSO and several other email lists that track CV activity.

So, back to my story.

Around 2:30 I start observing in Andromeda, which is just about straight overhead. The star dots have shrunken down to fine points and the seeing has obviously improved a lot. As I examine the field of V402 And I'm stunned to see the 15.8 comp star plain as day. I've seen it on CCD images before, but never in the eyepiece. I move to the next field, LL And and I can see the 15.9 comp star easily with averted vision. I would have to image this field for 60 seconds with a CCD and V filter to measure a 15.9 star, and yet here it is in my Mark I eyeball! The sky has literally opened up for me and I am seeing things in the eyepiece I have not even glimpsed before. I log more than a dozen more record magnitudes over the next 45 minutes and also manage to catch several CVs in outburst.

It's just me, the telescope and the Universe sharing an exceptional night together when suddenly the peace is shattered by -- RING-RING...RING-RING...RING-RING!

My very loud cell phone is ringing at 3:20AM. The obnoxiousness of it startled me so much I nearly fell off my chair. As I fumble to find it in one of my pockets in the dark, terrible thoughts start to run through my head. Did someone fall ill, get rushed to the hospital or die? Is it Mom? Maybe something happened to Dad. I answer the phone with my flashlight still in my mouth.

"Hewowe?"

"Mike, is that you?" It's my brother Doug, and the first thing that pops into my head as I take the flashlight out of my mouth is 'he's in jail and needs me to come get him.'

"Yea" I say rather irritated.

"I'm surprised you answered".
"I'm surprised you called. What's wr..." I never get the rest out because Doug is in full blown talking mode now. It's a one-way street. His mouth opens up and his ears shut down.

"I'm outside looking up at the most incredible sky I've ever seen." (Tell me about it.)
"Mars is talking to me, I can see Pluto and that little-dipper-like-thingy" (the Pleiades) "and oh my God, it's just beautiful, Mike."

I try to tell him the name of the cluster and that Pluto can only be seen with a telescope, but he'll never remember. My brother is drunk dialing at 3:20 in the morning and I was stupid enough to answer the cell without looking at the caller ID. Crap!

So after a few more 'I love you, mans' we hang up and its me and the morning sky alone again. I made a note in my log, DOUG CALLED!, and proceeded back to the business at hand. After my nerves calmed down a bit I started to chuckle to myself, because he was right. It was a beautiful sky, he knew I'd be out there at the telescope, and he just wanted to share the moment with me, bless his heart.

I took a little time to get lost in the Orion Nebula in his honor, and debated with myself if it was worth trying to chase down the Horsehead Nebula. I quickly came to my senses and got back with the program. I was rewarded for my efforts with three Orion CVs in outburst in a row, CN Ori, V1159 Ori and BI Ori--the Trifecta! This really was a great night!

I finished up in Auriga and Gemini about an hour before dawn and came in to warm up, eat breakfast and submit my reports. Out of 116 CV observations, 20 were active or in outburst. The rest are hiding away, biding their time, waiting to present themselves on another fine night.

Note to self:
Turn the cell phone on 'vibrate' when out at the telescope.

Elephant Trunks in Space

I love it when astronomers come down to earth and create terms we can all understand to explain strange astronomical phenomena that very few of us understand. My new favorite- Elephant Trunks.

Massive stars are born in dense molecular clouds in the universe. As the nuclear furnace inside them begins to burn, they generate huge quantities of radiation which heats and ionizes the surrounding gases. The pressure and wind from the star forces these regions to expand.

This doesn't happen in a perfectly symmetrical manner, but instead, the expanding gases form clumps and bubbles. Some of the denser clumps may actually be the seeds for elongated structures astronomers now refer to as 'elephant trunks.' You've seen pictures of these elongated structures, like the famous Hubble Space Telescope image of the 'Pillars of Creation.'


Looking at this image it's easy to see the elephant trunk shapes. There is even a nebula called the Elephant Trunk Nebula.

Image credit: Gerhard Bachmayer

Several papers have come out recently describing attempts to model this process using computer simulations. Search results from astro-ph at arXiv brings up some very interesting papers, if you're into stellar evolution...or circus animals.

The Angular Momentum of Condensations Within Elephant Trunks

Star Formation in the Eagle Nebula

Properties of protostars in the Elephant Trunk globule IC 1396A

And my favorite mixed metaphor and acronym paper of all time-

The Eagle's EGGs: fertile or sterile?

The Eagle here refers to the Eagle Nebula. EGGs are Evaporating Gaseous Globules, and the authors want to know if the EGGs are sterile or fertile, in other words, will stars be born here? C'mon, this is fun stuff!

All you really need to know is there are still no flying monkeys in space, but we now have elephant trunks. They come in all sizes and shapes. And what do astronomers find in these trunks?

The only thing cuter than baby elephants, baby stars.

Free Admission to the Adler Planetarium!

Run!- don't walk, to the Adler Planetarium today through Friday. Admission is free, thanks to Charter One Discount Days. The Charter One Foundation sponsors these free events frequently throughout the year. Click here for a full calendar.

The Adler is a place you and the kids can spend the whole day marveling at the shows and exhibits. Don't tell the kids it's educational and good for them. Just share a glorious day with them and you'll all learn something!

Australian Amateur Spots 'Outburst of the Year'

Yesterday, Australian amateur astronomer, Rod Stubbings, sent out notification to several cataclysmic variable email lists that VX Fornax is in outburst. This is one of those objects that effectively hides from astronomers for decades and then suddenly brightens by several magnitudes, prompting amateur and professional astronomers to aim their telescopes and satellites at it while it is showing off for us.

How rare is this? The last time anyone saw VX For in outburst was in 1990. It was discovered by famed nova hunter, William Liller, of Vina del Mar, Chile on October 25th, 1990 at photographic magnitude 12.5. An exposure taken one week prior showed nothing down to blue magnitude 19, so this was a very faint system that suddenly brightened by 7 or 8 magnitudes in the visual bands. Spectra taken later that week indicated it was not a classical nova, but more likely a dwarf nova.

Determining what type of CV this actually was stumped astronomers the first time around, so this eruption is potentially important. Joe Patterson, of the Center for Backyard Astrophysics explains.

"This star zoomed to 12.6 from about 20.5 in 1990, and stayed bright for many weeks (declining at ~0.1 mag/day). The spectra made it pretty clear it was an erupting dwarf nova, and even in 1990 it seemed very, very likely that the star would flash superhumps."

[Superhumps are a characteristic variation in the light curve of SU UMa and WZ Sge type CVs when they have a brighter than normal outburst known as a 'superoutburst'.]

"But I studied it for 7 straight nights at Cerro Tololo, and found only small and apparently aperiodic wiggles in the light curve. Basically a very high-quality nothing. Then my run ended... and I've always wondered what this star is.

Now it's 2009, and we know a lot more about the WZ Sge syndrome among dwarf novae. The most extreme of these stars generally take quite a long time to sprout actual superhumps; WZ Sge itself takes 10 days. So that's a pretty good conjecture - that it's quite extreme even among the WZ Sge class... and that had I taken over that 0.9 m telescope and refused to leave, I would eventually have seen those telltale superhumps.

We don't yet know much about this eruption, but if it's a superoutburst (and odds are decent), then this is the glamor object of the year for dwarf novae."

This is another example of how amateur astronomers can contribute to astronomy. Many of them keep tabs on these obscure objects night after night, for sometimes decades, before anything interesting happens. Professional astronomers can't use valuable telescope time waiting for something to happen, so this area of discovery is left almost entirely to amateurs.

Now all eyes, telescopes and CCDs in the southern hemisphere are pointed at VX For and will be until this eruption fades and the star is a faint, 20th magnitude binary, building up accreted material at a leisurely pace in preparation for the next rare outburst, which may be twenty years from today.

Congratulations to Rod on his detection of this rare cataclysmic variable outburst. His patience and persistence have paid off again.

Carnival of Space #120

This week's Carnival of Space #120 is hosted by Music of the Spheres, the blog described as being about space flight, simulators, astronomy, flying, music, science, education: whatever the obsession of the moment might happen to be.

Author, Bruce Irving, has done a very nice job organizing the articles this week into sub-categories-Hubble, Education and Observation, The Future, Art, Multimedia, and catch-all, The Rest.

There are some really good articles in this week's carnival, but my favorite was All About Sunspots, Are They Good or Bad? on Weird Warp.

If you are a Windows user, check out the Universe Sandbox and let me know if it is as cool as it looks. I could download it onto my IBM laptop, but I'm feeling lazy and overwhelmed this morning as I look down my very long To Do list. No time to play with gravitational simulators.

This One's For You--Thank You

Sometimes, after researching and writing a blog for hours or days, I finally post it and then basically...nothing happens.

There is no applause, a paycheck doesn't arrive, no one slaps my butt on the way back to the huddle and says "good one, man." It just silently goes out there for the world to read- if they can find me, and if they like it.

Well, it looks like you've found me, and you like it. My feedback loop is a website hit counter and the number of references to the blog now being found on the Internet.

The number of visitors and page views to the blog has grown steadily over the past twelve months, with several humongous spikes in August and now again in September. We already have as many visitors in September as we had on average in May, June and July this year.

In July, Simostronomy cracked the Top 100 science blogs on Wikio. In August, we climbed up to number 32, and have been holding our spot in the top 40 since then. Wikio tracks blogs by the references and back links to them, so that means not only are people visiting but the articles are being linked and referenced all over the web. Many of you are sharing the blog through your own links, blogs and Facebook pages. Simostronomy has been the #1 astronomy blog on Facebook's Networked Blogs for all of 2009.

The thing that has become obvious from the numbers is, the more I write the more you come. If you take out the steady growth trend, the graph of visitors mirrors the number of posts per month almost exactly. It's like the line in 'Field of Dreams', "If you write it, they will come." I will keep writing, and I'll try to keep a steady flow of interesting stellar astronomy pieces coming. Your loyalty is my reward, and I will try to deserve it every month.

The numbers don't lie. You've voted by coming here and staying long enough to read a page or more each time something new goes up. Thank you, all of you.

Now, publishers like National Geographic, NOVA and Arizona University Press are even sending me comp astronomy books and DVDs to review. Sure, if you want me to read it, send a free one!

So, thank you to all of you who have found me, heard my voice and keep coming back for more. I am flattered, and will try to keep earning your readership.

There are some individuals to whom I owe a special thanks (pulls out Academy Award list):

Pamela Gay, for encouraging me to give this a try in the first place by pushing me into the Web 2.0 pool and yelling "swim!"
Fraser Cain, for including me in the Carnival of Space and allowing me to host the Carnival several times.
Aaron Price, for gentle nudges, hints and encouragement along the way (even if he still calls it Simo-astronomy).
Slackers, Michael Koppelman and Doug Welch for reminding me every time I am with them that I'm not the only one who thinks astronomy is serious, but also seriously fun!

And to the other astro-bloggers I've come to know and admire, and who inspire me to pick up my game, particularly Ray Villard, C.C. Petersen, Kurtis Williams, Ian O'Neill, Nicole Gugliucci, Jennifer Ouellette, and Amanda Bauer.

And last but not least- thank you Google, for making Blogger so user friendly and simple even I can do it.

Thank you, thank you, thank you...

Seriously,
Thank you.

Carnival of Space #119-Wag of the Finger!

Blogger, Emily Lakdawalla, at the Planetary Society Blog has done a fantastic job of pulling together a collection of astronomy and space offerings for this week's Carnival of Space #119.
There are two variable star related pieces in this week's Carnival. Variable by Nature from a new friend and AAVSO member "AstroSwanny", and the Simostronomy piece on a gorgeous astrophoto from John Chumak, Epsilon Aurigae the Beautiful.

TIP OF THE HAT
We have to give a 'tip of the hat' to the AARTScope Blog. He's really come on and done a fine job. Not just because he's another blogger who does variable stars and writes about them, but he's keeping it real, factually and actually.

WAG OF THE FINGER
This week we have to give a 'wag of the finger' to the Chandra blog. They only publish a blog entry once per week on average, and someone is getting paid to do that. I understand that a lot of what Chandra is doing today we won't find out about until the astronomers working with the data publish it or release the embargo. But, to publish a paltry three paragraphs with a boring picture of an object that has been well-studied since the 60's when you have a whole week to come up with something is pretty lame.

Cygnus X-1 is an amazing and crazy system with a black hole and a blue supergiant star in orbit around each other. I'm inspired to write a 'rest of the story' kind of piece just because they did such an excellent job of not telling you all about this first-of-its-kind-to-be-discovered binary. Here is an interesting artists interpretation of this fascinating pair of objects-


But for one of NASA's most important space telescope missions to publish a blog with the table of contents title "supernovas" really is disappointing and irritating. What's even worse, in my opinion, is the link from this listing points to a whole page called 'taxonomy/term/five' with all their articles on SUPERNOVAS and supernova remnants. I find it disturbing that NASA has begun to imitate our public school system in its lackadaisical attitude towards correct terminology. Either someone in charge doesn't know the correct term is supernovae, or they've made a conscious effort to dumb it down for public consumption. I find both objectionable.

A lot of terms in astronomy seem archaic and unnecessarily difficult, but part of science is learning to speak the common language of whatever discipline you are engaged in. As someone who is working hard all the time to inspire young people to become all they can be, and to pique their interest in astronomy and space science, I assure you I am not working that hard hoping they will grow up to be scientists and engineers who can't spell or use the proper terminology for the branch of science in which they choose to work. I find it hard to believe the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics thinks its okay to have the word supernovas plastered all over the Chandra blog.

If you're going to publish a blog under the domain of dot edu, and have pages titled taxonomy, then you ought to make sure you are edu'ing the public with the correct terminology.

There have been several well known science bloggers and publishers railing against the state of science journalism in the new Internet age, and as much as I resist engaging in political or social discussions here, I think you can be sure Simostronomy will be weighing in soon.

Restless Universe- Cataclysmic Variables!

Our next to last AAVSO Podcast is now up on the 365 Days of Astronomy podcast site. Today we discuss my favorite type of variable stars, cataclysmic variables!

Most CVs are close binary pairs containing a white dwarf (a collapsed star with the mass of the Sun squeezed into the volume of the Earth), and a red dwarf, about the size of our Sun, but redder and less massive. This pair of stars is so close together that they orbit each other in just a few hours.

The gravitational pull of the white dwarf causes the red star to be stretched out of shape as its atmosphere is stripped off and falls towards the white dwarf. Because the infalling gas can't stream directly onto the surface of the white dwarf, it forms an accretion disc, with the white dwarf at its center. The accretion disc usually outshines both the red star and the white dwarf in visible light.

As if this stellar cannibalism weren't enough, what really makes this interesting is that occasionally, and we never know when it will happen for sure, this accreted material becomes unstable and crashes down onto the very hot surface of the white dwarf. Tremendous amounts of energy are released in an outburst, and the system may brighten by thousands of times its normal quiescent level.

CVs come in many flavors- novae, dwarf novae, and magnetic binaries known as polars and intermediate polars. We give an overview of all the critters in the cataclysmic variable zoo in this episode, so pop on over to the 365 Days of Astronomy website and check it out.

If you'd like to learn more, or keep up on the latest developments in CVs, you can check out the AAVSO Cataclysmic Variable Section website, or check out these previous postings on CVs, or these two previous Slacker Astronomy podcasts, where I interview several leading astronomers in the field.

Avoiding Bias: Simonsen's Rules for Variable Star Observing

There has been some recent discussion on the Citizen Sky website about looking at the light curve or checking the quick look data of a star you are observing. The main concern revolves around observers having too much information, or a preconceived notion, before making an observation. We call this bias. The term biased is used to describe an action, judgment, or other outcome influenced by a prejudged perspective. In variable star observing, or any scientific investigation, bias is a bad thing.

Half the fun of variable star observing for me is precisely the fact that I don’t know what my favorite variable star is doing at any given moment for sure. It’s why I climb out of bed in the middle of the night in the winter to go observe them. I can’t wait to see what they are up to. If I already knew, or thought I knew, there would be no reason to lose sleep.

So the first part of my advice is simple- don’t look at the light curve or recent data on a variable star you plan to observe before you observe it. You risk biasing your observation, and you’re missing out on the fun. The science is usually the reason people start doing this, and the fun they discover along the way is why they keep doing it for years and years. To risk either is, well…stupid!

By all means, when you are done, and have reported your observation, go look at how it compares to other observers’ data and see where it fits in the light curve. This is valuable feedback, you’re probably going to be quite happy with your result, and you can be proud of your contribution to science for the night.


If your observation looks different than other observers, don’t worry too much about that either. Don’t assume the other guy is a better, more experienced, more correct observer than you, even if he used a CCD or the Binford 9000 photometry device. He could be a half-blind, one-eyed village idiot for all you know. The other guy or gal might not even have been looking at the same star you were.

I was taught some basic rules for observing (a very long time ago) when I started out. These rules have been passed down from generation to generation, so they are not specifically mine, or necessarily original, but we shall hereby refer to them as ‘Simonsen’s Rules for Variable Star Observing.’

Rule #1- Be sure you are measuring the right star. Always be very conscientious when identifying the variable. There is nothing more useless than an observation of the wrong star!

Rule #2- Report exactly what you see, not what you think you should be seeing…period.

Rule #3- Bias is your enemy; avoid it. (see rule #2)

This may be difficult for some people, so here are some tips for overcoming your preconceived notions.

If you see the observations of some other observer(s) beforehand-
1. Assume they are lying to deceive you!
2. Know they are bad observers, so their opinion is worthless!
3. They could be, and probably are, completely crazy. How many variable star observers have you met? I rest my case.

If the bias is some personal belief, based on your own preconceived notion, realize that-
1. You are lying to yourself! (and now you are talking to yourself…hmm)
2. You are a bad observer (you should know!) and your opinion is worthless.
3. You are obviously schizophrenic – you are in fact crazy!

Rule #4- We never know for certain what a variable star will do from moment to moment. Therefore, you can never be certain what your star is doing at any given moment, that’s why we do this. This can be added to the reasons bias should be avoided.

Rule #5- Make every observation as if you are the only one looking at your star at this moment. You may not have to pretend. The number of variable star observers worldwide is so small this is often the case. You are special; don’t forget that.

Rule #6- Have fun.
For astronomers, the universe is our laboratory. It’s beautiful, mysterious, impressive, awe-inspiring, and humbling, and it’s ours. Enjoy it.

Epsilon Aurigae the Beautiful

Monday an image was sent to the AAVSO email account and forwarded to the staff. It was a picture of epsilon Aurigae and the surrounding star field taken by John Chumack, an AAVSO member and as it turns out, a professional astrophotographer.

I was so impressed by the image I emailed John and asked him if he would grant me an interview so I could learn more about him, his connection to the AAVSO and his obvious love for the night sky.


As it turns out, John has been sharing his work with the AAVSO and the world for twenty years now. Shortly after embarking on his new career he got involved with AAVSO assisting with the educational program 'Hands On Astrophysics' in the 90’s.

“ I was the astrophotographer for it. At the time (1993-1996) I worked with Dr. Janet Mattei on the project. I think there were 52 other astrophotographers that put in proposals, but out of all of those they chose me. That was my first grant, so that was awesome.

I started in ‘89, working on NASA’s Ulysses Project, which was to image comets to measure the comets’ ion tail, and then correlate that data with the Ulysses spacecraft."

So how does one become a professional astrophotographer?

"It got started as a hobby, but I’ve been doing it for a living for the last twenty years. I designed my own 16-inch telescope, a big fork-mounted equatorial, and the drive system for it, using a tape measure and a 1-horsepower motor. I took that to Astrofest in Chicago, three days after I finished it, and won an award for the design. I took it home and the local newspaper did a write up on my award. I started shooting the night sky with the telescope after that.

I started sending in photographs to Astronomy magazine, getting published in Astronomy and Sky and Telescope as well. About a year after my start, a stock photography company out of New York contacted me, they saw my images in the magazine, and wanted to represent me here in the US. Now I have agents in 35 countries selling my work world-wide.”

I asked John what inspired him to do an image of epsilon Aurigae.

“Well I’ve done shots of that part of the sky before, constellation images of Auriga and that area. I’ve got over 35,000 images. I image the sky prolifically; I’m constantly out there. Now I have an entire observatory complex in Yellow Springs, Ohio, where I have multiple scopes running at the same time.

I remembered reading about this mysterious variable that’s been stumping astronomer since 1821 or something like that, so I thought let me go take a shot of this star. I know I have wide-field images of it, but I don’t have any close up shots of it. So I took about a total of 45 minutes exposures, several images stacked, they’re about 5 minutes apiece.

Once I had the picture I was looking at the field of view there and I noticed that the stars are evenly distributed across the entire field, except for the one quadrant. If you look at the image, from about 3 o’clock to 6 o’clock, it’s devoid of stars. So that tells me right there that there is a large dark molecular cloud blocking the light from background stars.

Anyway, I thought it’s a nice picture of the star and if the AAVSO is trying to encourage people to do observations of this thing, so we can figure out what’s going on with it, well, we need to get a pretty picture of it. I’ll send it to them, maybe they can use it.”

John’s excellent website is called Galactic Images.com. You can find examples of his work and a schedule of art fairs and shows he will be exhibiting at this year. After talking with John for a while, and looking at pictures of him at his observatory, I realized we’d met before at Arts, Beats and Eats in Pontiac, Michigan a few years ago. I remembered him telling me about his 16-inch telescope and ogling his fantastic images. Small world, eh?

Sometimes we get so wrapped up in the science, we forget just how stunningly beautiful many of these subjects are. Thanks for the picture, and the reminder, John.

Simple, Exquisite Beauty

Making naked eye and observations for the Citizen Sky project has put me back in touch with the night sky on a level I didn’t realize I was missing.

Image credit: Rob Beaird http://robsreflections.wordpress.com/

On a typical clear night, I’ll spend anywhere from two to eight hours racing from one variable star field to another with the visual scope, under the protection of an observatory dome, or at the controls of my CCD telescope slewing and centering targets and watching images download on a computer screen from inside a warm room. I only see a small portion of the sky through the dome slot, eyepiece or on the monitor.

When a bright meteor flashes through the sky I rarely see it, unless I happen to be standing outside taking a break. I often don’t even know the weather is changing until the images in the eyepiece or on the screen start to deteriorate. Then I walk outside and look up to see if it’s a total wash out or just a passing cloud or two.

Now I find myself taking longer breaks from the telescope and spending some quiet time alone with the Universe. Just me and the night sky I fell in love with long ago. I’ve come to appreciate the simple majesty of those bright stars shining down on Earth just as they have for thousands of years. And over the course of the last year I’ve become familiar with several naked eye variables that I now keep track of.

I’ve followed an eclipse of Algol through the course of an evening. The first time I ever did it was at the AAVSO spring meeting in Nantucket, on the night we had the star party and tour of the Maria Mitchell Observatory. It was already halfway to minimum when I first noticed it, but I was able to follow it every half hour or so as it faded to minimum and then rose back to maximum. Clouds rolled in over the island in the early morning hours, so I didn’t get to see it back at full strength until the following night, but it made a lasting impression on me.

I’ve begun tracking the changes of delta and mu Cephei. Delta Cephei is the prototype of an entire class of astronomically significant variables. Cepheid variables are used to calibrate distances to far off stars and galaxies. Mu Cephei is also known as Herschel’s Garnet Star. It’s an orangish semi-regular variable that has been observed by variable star observers for over one hundred years.

As autumn approaches, the winter constellations are beginning to make their presence known again before dawn. I’ve spent a lot of time admiring the fiery bright winter constellations of Orion, Taurus, Gemini, and Auriga as they rise to fill the pre-dawn sky. I find myself fixing my gaze on eta Geminorum, Betelgeuse, Algol and epsilon Aurigae now, instead of racing from sideways ‘Y’ of Taurus, through the Pleiades, up the curve of stars that is Perseus’ lower branch through Auriga and on to Cassiopeia. Now I have little rest areas along the way.

A calmness and sense of satisfaction comes over me when life slows down and fills these moments with the perfect silence that is 5 o’clock in the morning. The sound of a hoot owl in a nearby tree reminds me I am not alone, and we share the view as dawn begins to break in the east. Swiftly and silently, a meteor streaks across the sky and I smile to myself, because I didn’t miss that one.

It Just Keeps Going, and Going...

In February I sent a message into space via a large radio dish. This is a commercial endeavor called Sent Forever.com, but it has a certain appeal to me. I won't buy a star name or property rights on the Moon because that's not something you can actually do, no matter who takes your money.

But, my message, which I wrote and submitted, has been traveling through space now for about 6 months, and as promised, Sent Forever just sent me an update as to how far my message has gone.

"Hi Mike, just to let you know that the message we transmitted from you for Irene on 20 Feb 09 is about to pass another key milestone. Tomorrow, it will have travelled 5,000,000,000,000 kilometres (approximately 3,107,000,000,000 miles) from Earth on its journey into eternity. To see your message and precisely how far it has travelled, enter your tracking number xxxxxxxxxxx in the Track your Message box on our website's home page."

First, is there one 'l' or two in traveled? Hmm...I hope I did a spell check on my message.

Next, I wonder how long it will be before they absolutely have to convert this distance into some other unit. This is a perfect demonstration of why astronomers use light years and parsecs. Can you imagine how many zeros will be in the next message?!

Another thing I'm beginning to wonder is how long they will be able to continue this. I'd rather enjoy a message from them 10 years from now telling me my message has just passed Vega or some bright star within 10 light years of us.

But most of all, I wonder how many planets around stars with life on them we will know about by then, and if we'll be any closer to telling whether there is anyone out there who may actually get my message some day.

"Hello, is anybody out there?"