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News and Announcements
30 March Alert Notice 434: Outburst of NSV 1436

March 30, 2011: The cataclysmic variable NSV 1436 has been discovered in outburst.  This is the first bright outburst of this star observed since 1948, and followup observations are strongly encouraged.  Little is known about the nature of NSV 1436, and observations may help shed light on whether the star is an infrequently outbursting normal dwarf nova, a WZ Sge star, or recurrent nova.

28 March AAVSO Special Notice #237

NOVA SAGITTARII 2011 No. 2 = PNV J18102135-2305306
21 March Edward A. Halbach, 1909-2011

http://www.aavso.org/pipermail/aavso-discussion/2011-March/024796.html
21 March Last Chance! Help us plan for the 100th Annual Meeting of the AAVSO

Hello AAVSOers!

If you have not already completed the survey, please help us to plan for the Centennial Annual Meeting by answering these 10 questions.
20 March Alert Notice 433: Request for observations of GW Lib in support of HST observations

March 20, 2011: Dr. Paula Szkody, University of Washington, has requested our help in monitoring the cataclysmic variable GW Lib for upcoming Hubble Space Telescope observations, scheduled to be made during the week of 2011 April 7-11 UT. Dr. Szkody also observed this object with HST in March 2010 (see AAVSO Alert Notice 417).
16 March Centennial Celebration Update March 2011

We are nearing the end of the first quarter of our centennial year. This is a good time to take a look at what has transpired thus far and what is yet to come.

Observer Challenges

http://www.aavso.org/centennial-observer-challenges

The Twenty Million and Counting! Contest is over now that the database has passed this milestone. The winner, with the prediction closest to the actual day of the milestone was Christopher Watson of San Diego, California.
16 March New ejaavso preprint: "Orbital Period of Three Cataclysmic Variables" by P. Wils

ej 140: "The Orbital Period of Three Cataclysmic Variables From WASP Data" (P. Wils)

http://www.aavso.org/ejaavso140
14 March Alert Notice 432: Supernova 2011at = PSN J09285756-1448206 in MCG -02-24-27

March 14, 2011

Discovered by: Lou Cox, Jack Newton, and Tim Puckett, Ellijay, GA, in the course of the Puckett Observatory Supernova Search

Discovery Date: March 10.214 UT

Discovery Magnitude: unfiltered CCD magnitude 14.5 (limiting magnitude 19.0) taken with a 0.40-m reflector at Portal, AZ

Position: R.A. = 09:28:57.56  Decl. = -14:48:20.6 (equinox 2000.0)
SN 2011at is 20.4" east and 6.3" north of the center of PGC 26905 = MCG -02-24-27.
14 March 2nd DSLR Online Chat: March 19 at 11:00 AM ET

Members from the Citizen Sky DSLR Documentation and Reduction team will be hosting a second chat on Saturday, March 19 at 11:00 AM Eastern.  If you have questions about using your DSLR camera for photometry, or any portion of their tutorials please plan to attend.  Science questions are also welcome. More details on how to join the chat will follow this week. Click here for info on how to join the chat.
09 March Abstract Deadline TODAY 3/9!

This is a friendly abstract deadline reminder for the joint AAVSO/AAS meeting being held in Boston this May:
05 March DSLR Chat Transcript From Last Saturday at 11am ET (-5UT)

Note: This chat is over. A transcript can be found here.
05 March Charts and Sequences update March 2011

 

The following stars have new or revised sequences since Feb. 02, 2011.
If you observe any of these stars, please update your charts as soon as possible.
This batch of updates includes many stars visible from the southern heisphere only.
 

SN2011b
04 March AAVSO Special Notice #236

HST observations scheduled for SDSS074545
04 March Two new jaavso preprints...

ej 139: Recent Maxima of 56 Short Period Pulsating Stars (G. Samolyk)

http://www.aavso.org/ejaavso139

 

ej 138: The Z CamPaign: Year 1 (M. Simonsen)

http://www.aavso.org/ejaavso138
02 March View your VPHOT data with VStar!

A new version of VStar has just been released, and along with it, a plugin that will allow you to upload data to plot in the AAVSO Extended File Format. Which means... you can now view your data as output by VPHOT.

To download VStar or read more about it, please visit this page: http://www.aavso.org/vstar-overview

To read more about the VStar plugin mentioned above or download it or one of the other ones for your own use, see this page: http://www.aavso.org/vstar-plugin-library
25 February AAVSO Bulletin 74 for 2011

Predicted Dates of Maxima and Minima of 381 Long Period Variables for 2011
24 February Alert Notice 431: Request to monitor SDSS074545 for HST Observations

February 25, 2011: Dr. Paula Szkody (University of Washington) has requested our help in monitoring the cataclysmic variable SDSS074545 (SDSS J074531.91+453829.5) for upcoming Hubble Space Telescope observations. The HST observations are scheduled to be made during the week of 2011 March 7-14. Dr. Szkody also observed this object with HST in October-November 2007 (see AAVSO Alert Notice 359).
23 February Standard Stars in VSP

The 2009 Landolt UBVRI Equatorial Standard Fields are being added to VSP. Descriptions of all the fields are included in the tables below. In order to plot them you need to enter the coordinates and size of the field you want.

22 February 20 Million Observations

On Feburary 19, 2011 the number of observations in the AAVSO International Database surpassed the 20 million mark. It is fitting that this milestone was achieved during our 100th anniversary. Below is some information about the achievement.
15 February VSP Improvements


15 February AAVSO Special Notice #235

Request for archival data: V1647 Ori and McNeil's Nebula

 
14 February AAVSO Special Notice #234

Outburst of FS Aurigae
10 February 100th Spring Meeting of the AAVSO

A milestone anniversary and a joint meeting with the AAS!

May 21-26, 2011
Boston, MA

 

An archive for this meeting will be available on the AAS web site shortly.
10 February Database Errors Reported

Some observers in the chat room are reporting that their observations submitted since November 11, 2010 are not showing up in our online tools. Doc and Matt will investigate this first thing in the morning (eastern) and update this page when they know more information. We apologize for this inconvenience.
08 February MyNewsFlash Subscription Form

A new tool for adding, removing and updating your MyNewsFlash accounts is now online. You can visit it at this URL:

http://www.aavso.org/mynewsflash
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