1. October 1, 2007 - March 31, 2008 Annual (Adult) : 50 Associate: 1 Sustaining: 2 Honorary: 1 (Tom Droege) ======================= Members from US: 34 Members from Canada: 6 Members from abroad: 14 (from 11 countries) ======================= Total New Members: 54 New Member Summary

2. In Memoriam Members, Observers, Colleagues, and Friends of the AAVSO Tom Droege Batavia, IL Tom Droege spent 25 years as a Fermilab engineer and is best known for Droege Supplies," orange NIM high-voltage power supplies in use all over the world. Droege built and operated several CCD-based telescopes from an observatory that he built onto his house. He founded The Amateur Sky Survey, an international collaboration organized to record and analyze images of the night sky using a technique he invented and incorporated into his telescopes. He received honorary lifetime membership in the AAVSO for his work on TASS. Walter R. Moos Koniz, Switzerland A devoted solar observer since 1997, Walter regularly contributed his sunspot observations to the AAVSO Solar Observing Program.

3. William Douglas Hodgson (HWD) Chidlow, Australia A longtime observer and Sustaining member of the Association since 1988, Doug contributed ____ observations to the AAVSO. An engineer by trade, Doug was a member of the AAVSO infrared photometry group. He also donated his time as part of the comp star database working group. Doug dabbled in nova hunting, too, spending several years as a proud member of the UK Nova Patrol. Many AAVSOers had the pleasure of meeting Doug in 2002 at the 91st Spring Meeting in Hawaii.

4. Upcoming Meetings Sept/Oct 2008: AAVSO HQ May 2009: SAS Big Bear, CA Oct 2009: MMO April 2010: Argentina

5. Northwoods Resort

6. Northwoods pub

7. Northwoods meeting space

8. Grants John Menke $13K. Miscellaneous, Cohen observatory, Eggen GUI, BAA travel HST ~$15K remaining on two proposals SWRI - $25K for Mt. John refurb Spent rest of Validation extension

9. Submitted Grants NSF: SS Cyg analysis (Price, Henden) NSF: Mt. John usage (Terrell, Henden) NSF: IYA2009 Citizen Science Mt. Cuba: telescope refurbishment 2 more HST proposals

10. Report to Council April 26, 2008 Arne Henden Director, AAVSO arne@aavso.org

11. Robotic Observatories SRO –168 nights used out of 203 (83%) –2 nights lost due to mechanical failures –25235 images specifically for AAVSO ($0.02/image) –BVRI calibration of LPV, RR Lyr, cepheid, novae, GRB and other fields –Monitoring for Bill Dillon, Bart Staels, Jim Bedient –Personal research including novae monitoring

12. Sonoita Research Observatory 35cm robotic telescope Used 300 nights/year Southern Arizona USD$30,000+

13. Z UMi - a circumpolar RCB Real value of SRO is for long-term monitoring of many fields. Note near complete BVRI coverage (dropouts due to summer monsoon) of this circumpolar object. 15:02:01.3 +83:03:49

14. Z UMi in multiple colors

15. University of Canterbury Collaboration Begun August 2006 (IAU/Prague) John Hearnshaw, Director MJUO Refurbish Optical Craftsman 61cm telescope AAVSO gets 2/3 time for 10 years Refurbishment under way; first visit in March 2008

16. Mt. John University Observatory -43d59.2m south, 170d27.9m east, 1031m elevation

17. Lake Tekapo

18. MJUO Optical Craftsman 61cm Installed in 1970 Refurbished 1979 Computerized 1991 f/16 Classical Cass

19. First trip Jerry Foote (Scopecraft) - motor control Dirk Terrell (SWRI) - computers Arne Henden - instruments Nigel Frost (MJUO) mechanical Steve Barlow (MJUO) IT/electronics March 2007, basic telescope control and inspection

20. Schedule Purchase remaining components to automate dome, focus Install cloud camera, engineering data (labjack) Replace CCD camera Test (June?) Available to membership in Fall 2008

21. Cohen-Menke Observatory Lou Cohen donated his 12 LX200, ST8, Pro- Dome John Menke (retired owner of Technical Innovations) donated funds to refurbish system, volunteered to get system working Sending to Doc Clay for refurbishment Install somewhere at HQ for support, testing, robotic access

22. Lowell 24-inch Donated to AAVSO Need 40K to refurbish (submitting Mt. Cuba grant) Need site (negotiating with NMSU) Need to move it from exhibit hall soon

23. In Steele Visitors Center

24. Ellijay Observatory Tim Puckett has given us access to his 5 f/5.2 wide-field telescope Apogee U9000 (3kx3k) CCD camera, gives 3.2x3.2 degree FOV BVRI filters Fully robotic Will be used for all-sky calibration

25. Upcoming GUI interface for observing proposals Automated dispersal of images GUI for retrieval of FITS images Database of calibration photometry

26. Australia Trip March 2008 Goals –Arrange for distribution of Doug Hodgsons telescopes and AAVSO SSP-4 –Talk to amateur societies about citizen science –Meet with observatory directors about collaborations –Meet with AAVSO members

27. Distribution of Hodgson Equipment 12 LX200, ST4 guider, SSP3, etc. going to Deniliquin as public observatory (schools) 8 LX200, ETX125 going to ASWA to be given to young astronomers Books given to Perth Observatory library SSP-4 at Tom Richards house; to be loaned to another Australian amateur

28. Talks ASWA (Perth) Astrocamp star party ASV (Melbourne) monthly meeting Deniliquin club formation NACAA Workshop (Sydney) NACAA Plenary (Sydney) NACAA Roundtable VS discussion

29. Tom/Lyn Richards Chris Stockdale

30. Peter Nelson

31. Peter Nelson 2

32. Rod Stubbings

33. Perth 60cm

34. Perth/Lowell 1m

35. Univ. Tasmania 1-meter Cassegrain config Coude room New fiber fed spectrograph

36. Mt. Stromlo

37. Siding Springs 16-inch, 24-inch mothballed 40-inch soon to be mothballed 3.9m probably mothballed ~2012 UK Schmidt being used for RAVE, no plans after this Skymapper 1.3m (Bessell) under construction All funds channeled towards Gemini, GMT, space missions

38. Australia Notes Very active amateur scene, but not many people into variable stars NEED DIRECTION. No southern variable- star organization. Australia has been discovered. More educational groups, advanced northern deep sky enthusiasts, setting up robotic scopes Professionals involved in PLANET, microFUN followups when Bulge up (April-Sept); pretty open to collaboration otherwise Very little spectroscopic capability in Oz outside of AAO

39. Recent HQ News VSP released with Tycho/UCAC for bright fields (A-scale available) VSD updated with 22K reliable stars with photometry New standardized observing formats announced for both visual and CCD. Will be required in future; no ongoing support of vendor-specific formats Scion Journal issue shipped Several-session Futures meeting with staff

40. VSD/CompDB Currently proofing new photometry update - will release to community around April 25. Includes discrepant stars, new SRO calibrations, transforms from CMC14, 2MASS, UCAC and SDSS May 1 admin tool for ease of updating VSD June 1 revise photometry, some sequences, but then freeze VSD; send out chart CDs to organizations July 1 require use of new sequences and photometry VSP updates for batch download, fix bugs by June 1

41. Zapper Simplified version of internal AAVSO tool to inspect database observations Observers will soon be able to highlight bad observations for staff inspection, helping us validate Java based Note: observers do *not* change actual database

43. House Renovation Slow progress. Building permit not issued until January. NSTAR still has not connected electricity. Expected finish end of May Changes: separate utilities, raised ceiling 2nd floor, doubled rafters, extra insulation Current expenses $160K; expected total around $200K No showstoppers

44. Upcoming Campaigns May - HST/SDSS May, Dec - RS Pup June - eta Aur June - Supernova Special project: comparing vendor photometry

45. RS Pup 41.4day period 6500 +/- 90 Ly 08:13:04.2 -34:34:43 Courtesy ESO/Kervella

46. Eps Aur 27.1 year period, V=3.2 Next eclipse: 2009-2011 IYA2009 Citizen Science Target 05:01:58.1 +43:49:24

47. HOA2 == VSA Variable Star Astronomy HOA manual converted to PDF, slides scanned, videos digitized On Web within a few weeks Software in process of conversion to modern language (Kate)

48. Wait, Theres More! Import of last 200K RASNZ obs Negotiations with BAAVSS for use of its database - Aaron to UK in June Education webpage update, speakers bureau IAU unpublished archives being scanned Olin Eggen data online this summer Annual report released