Posts Made By: Anthony Ayiomamitis

Dear group,

I would like to extend the native focal length of my original Tak FSQ for some terrestrial work I have in mind involving the rising and setting sun and moon.

Is the Tak Extender-Q the only means to this end ... and only at 1.6x?

Ideally I would like something between 2x and 2.5x but will settle on the Tak Extender-Q if that is the only means to achieving a greater effective focal length.

Thanks in advance.

Anthony.

Dear group,

I sat down last night to pursue the 175-minute transit of the exoplanet HAT-P-5b in the constellation of Lyra. The parent star, GSC 2634:1087, is characterized with a magnitude of 11.950 (v) and, with a transit depth of 13 mmag (ie. 11.950 pre-ingress and 11.963 mid-transit), I was very apprehensive about a successful capture of the associated light curve. To make matters worse, my target was relatively low in the sky, for my pre-ingress sequence was with the parent star at 30 degrees altitude and a further five degrees higher at the onset of ingress.

Of course, my thoroughbred (aka AP160) showed its rich pedigree to its fullest and made child's play of the challenge at hand: http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Photometry-HAT-P-5-20080528.htm .... and all of this is with a first-generation (and noisy) ST-2000XM camera.

I have another transit involving the exoplanet WASP-3b, also in Lyra, for this Saturday with a depth of 12.9 mmag and I hope to have results immediately therafter. I must sit down and identify an even more challenging target for my thoroughbred for this evening as well as tomorrow evening.

Thanks to Rolando and company for these incredible instruments!!!

Anthony.

Dear friends,

Last night I was blessed with very good transparency as well as good seeing which was a godsend, for I sat down to pursue the transit for exoplanet HAT-P-7b in Cygnus and whose depth is a meagre 7 mmag. With a magnitude of 10.460 for the parent star (GSC 3547:1402) before first contact, we have a new magnitude of approximately 10.467 during the four-hr transit.

I am very happy to present you with the resultant light curve and which is available at http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Photometry-HAT-P-7-20080603.htm comprised of 413 data
points (first light curve) and 84 five-point medians (second light curve). The dynamic duo, my AP160 and AP1200GTO, came through once again in a most impressive fashion and in spite of the fact that the five-hr session started with my target below 40d.

This result is somewhat of a letdown in the sense that my next target in a few days will be for a target with a 10 mmag depth and which should be a relative breeze.

Clear skies!

Anthony.

Dear group,

One of the latest and most unorthodox exoplanet discoveries involves CoRoTExo-2b in the constellation of Aquilla. CoRoT is the French-led mission in orbit around earth and whose one of the primary purposes is to follow 12,000 stars per session over 30- and 150-day periods. CoRoTExo2b is the second exoplanet discovery from this mission, announced in the spring of 2008, and the attached light curve is THE FIRST AMATEUR (and groundbased?) RESULT of this most eccentric exoplanet whose mass and radius do not conform with any current models of planetary formation.

This exoplanet transits its parent star over the course of 125 minutes, at a depth of 3.5% (mag 12.57 pre-ingress and mag 12.605 during transit) and requires less than 42 hrs to orbit its sun. All of this is at a distance of 930 light-yrs away.

The result from last night's four-hr session is available at http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Photometry-CoRoTExo2-20080606.htm

Weather-permitting, back for another strange new world this evening with results to follow tomorrow.

Clear skies!

Anthony.

Dear group,

One of the latest exoplanet announcements involves WASP-3b in Lyra and which requires 160 minutes to transit its parent star and at a depth of 11.4 mmag. Given its proximity to its parent star and relatively high mass (1.76x that of Jupiter), WASP-3b is one of the largest and hottest Jupiter-like finds so far.

The ten-day old moon was a problem during the four-hr session last night and thankfully my Baader Infrared Pass filter did a wonderful job in helping improve contrast while minimizing the mitigating effects of the lunar light (pollution).

The results from last night's session are available at http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Photometry-WASP-3-20080613.htm .

All systems are go for Sunday evening and a visit to another foreign world but this time in Ursa Major.

Clear skies!

Anthony.

Dear group,

I had the opportunity last week to pursue an additional two exoplanet transits. To be more specific, the first catch was TrES-2b in Draco whose orbit is almost certain to be decaying given the shortening of the transit duration from the initial 90 minutes at discovery to the current 76-80 minutes and which is quite visible in my light curve as well.

The second catch involves HD189733b in Vulpecula. This exoplanet is less than 0.30 degrees from the beautiful planetary nebula M27 and I recall reading a recent article surrounding the suggestion that water may be present on this exoplanet!

For further details, I kindly direct you to:

(1) http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Photometry-TrES-2-20080626.htm
(2) http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Photometry-HD189733-20080627.htm

July promises to be a very busy month and there will be lots of material becoming available to share with everyone.

Clear skies!

Anthony.

Dear group,

I am delighted to present you with three sample results of last week's total solar eclipse and which I was fortunate to view and photograph from Novosibirsk (Siberia). With over 10,000 visitors from all over the world, it was an event that had all the elements of a Greek tragedy. I personally arrived in Novo very early Wednesday morning and my fears surrounding the bad weather based on the weather predictions were confirmed. This bad weather would literally continue into Friday, the day of the eclipse, and I came very (!) close a day earlier leaving for a long drive south and towards Mongolia were the weather had been pristine.

As luck would have it, the skies cleared about two hours before first contact and remained perfectly clear until 60 minutes after the eclipse and at which point the dense clouds arrived once again. For those who did head south, there were major problems with Chinese officials and who confiscated a lot of equipment and levied fines (the weather also degraded during the eclipse).

The first sample result documents the complete eclipse and includes the partial phases taken very ten minutes, the two diamond rings which announced the arrival and termination of totality and, of course, totality itself. The second sample photo is the stunnning corona itself and which is always an impressive sight! The third and final sample result is the same corona with slightly more aggressive processing using a technique commonly employed for cometary images.

For those interested, I kindly direct you to the following links :

(1) http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Eclipses-2008-08-01d.htm
(2) http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Eclipses-2008-08-01.htm
(3) http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Eclipses-2008-08-01c.htm

I also looked for the SOHO sun-grazing comet that was supposedly two degrees to the southwest of the eclipsed sun but no luck. However, Venus was an easy and as always impressive sight.

Anthony.

Dear group,

I was wondering if Steve White is still the field rep for TeleVue? I have sent an email to him but it bounced.

Thanks.

Anthony.

Dear group,

I used the opportunity last night to pursue the transit of exoplanet HD 209458b in Pegasus.

This exoplanet is particularly interesting since it is the first discovery using the transit method - its initial discovery in the 1990's was via the radial method - and it has been confirmed to have water in its atmosphere (similar to the exoplanet HD 189733b in Vulpecula - http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Photometry-HD189733-20080627.htm ).

Photometry for this exoplanet was somewhat challenging since the best comparison star within my 25'x35' field of view was nearly one magnitude dimmer and of a different spectral type. To add insult to injury, the comparison star is dimmer by yet another one magnitude.

Also, seeing last night was uncharacteristically quite poor but I am quite happy with the light curve which ensued. For a result based on 4.5 hours, I kindly direct you to http://www.perseus.gr/Astro-Photometry-HD209458-20080902.htm .

Anthony.

Anyone notice the surge in volume (154,000 shares) and price (+18% at 32 cents) ....

Anthony.