Blog

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News

BRIEF’s Executive Director elected to the AAVSO Board

In November 2022 Pat Boyce was elected to a three-year term on the Board of the American Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO). He founded BRIEF, a non-profit, in 2013 to introduce students to the scientific community through research in astronomy. He and his students have been active participants in the AAVSO and its programs.

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News

BRIEF to support SDSU on new NSF grant

The National Science Foundation (NSF) awarded a three-year grant to the San Diego State University (SDSU) Astronomy Department in September 2022. The grant, “Comprehensive Analysis of Period Changes in Eclipsing Binaries as a Probe of Stellar Astrophysics” will use changes in the orbital periods of eclipsing binary stars to measure their interior structure.

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News

A new student research tradition

In June 2022 BRIEF joined InStAR to conduct a two-day student research experience at Mt. Wilson Observatory (MWO). Twenty Boyce-Astro students performed speckle interferometry observations of binary stars using MWO’s 60” telescope, the world’s largest just over a century ago.

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News

BRIEF receives new observatory from the Downing Family Operating Foundation.

The Downing Family Operating Foundation generously donated a PlaneWave CDK17 research grade telescope to BRIEF in May 2022. Located at Sierra Remote Observatory (SRO), the telescope, mounted on a PlaneWave L-500 mount and equipped with a QHY600 camera, will serve as a platform to advance robotic speckle interferometry and astrometry as well as extend the Boyce-Astro exoplanet observation program.

CCD Imaging

Bad Image Examples

This lesson provides multiple examples of poor-quality images and explains both the reasoning behind the results and some of the specific cases in which they may still be of use.

CCD Imaging

Seeing

Seeing is an important concept that describes how clear an image's subject is when viewed through the Earth's atmosphere.