AAVSO: American Association of Variable Star Observers
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105th Annual Meeting of the AAVSO

Thursday, Nov. 10 – Saturday, Nov. 12 2016

Current list of attendees

Registration

Registration for this meeting is closed.


AAVSO 105th Annual Meeting will be held November 10-12, 2016 at the Boston Burlington Marriott

Please note: You must be logged into your AAVSO web account in order to register.

QUICK LINKS:

Updates Transportation
Description of Events Registration/List of Fees
Schedule Abstract Submission
Accommodations Deadlines to Remember

 

UPDATES!

The silent auction items have been posted online. To view them and read a description click here.

AS OF OCTOBER 7, ALL THE SPEAKER OPENINGS HAVE BEEN FILLED.

WE ARE STILL ACCEPTING POSTER PRESENTATIONS ON A FIRST COME BASIS.

 

Speakers Slated To Present-

Keynote addresses by Joey Rodriguez (CfA) and David R. Ciardi (Caltech/NExScI)

Invited speakers include George Djorgovski (CRTS), Charles Alcock (CfA, Lucas Macri (Texas A&M)) and Zeljko Ivezic (Univ. Washington)

The theme of this year’s meeting is The AAVSO's Role in the Age of Large Surveys. 

Friday’s schedule includes a keynote address followed by paper sessions until lunch. Another keynote address is scheduled for the afternoon which will again be followed by paper sessions the remainder of the day.

Saturday will include the AAVSO Membership meeting in the morning, from 9:00am - 10:30am. Saturday afternoon will feature a panel of scientists representing LSST, Kepler-2, KELT, TESS, and Evryscope. They will be discussing the role of the AAVSO in the era of multi-wavelength, all-sky photometric surveys. The meeting concludes with afternoon paper sessions. Saturday night is the Closing Banquet.

This year we are adding a silent auction to the slate of events. The proceeds go directly to the general fund and support critical AAVSO operations. 


BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF EVENTS

Paper Sessions:  Paper sessions on variable star topics as well as large surveys, data-mining, collaborative research, and AAVSO's future opportunities will be held all day on Friday, and Saturday afternoon, after the panel discussion. Posters will be hung on Friday and can remain posted through Saturday. 

Membership Meeting: All attendees are invited to this gathering, which will be held Saturday morning. The purpose of this meeting is to inform attendees of the activities of the Association. The Director’s Report as well as reports from the Secretary and Treasurer will be included.  All portions of the membership meeting will be broadcast free to members online via GoToWebinar.  To register for the webinar go to: https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/3286258113002193668

We will leave plenty of time for Q&A and will be taking questions from both in-person and online attendees.

Continental Breakfast Buffet: Sliced fresh fruit, a variety of fresh baked muffins, breakfast pastry and deli style bagels, cream cheese, butter, preserves, coffee and tea, water, orange, grapefruit, tomato and cranberry juices.

Closing Award Banquet: The Closing Banquet (buffet) will be held at the Boston Burlington Marriott on Saturday evening. The banquet will be preceded by a cash bar and include several special award presentations, a silent auction, trivia game and raffle. As this is a buffet dinner, no entree selection is required during registration.  You are welcome to select any entree you wish from the buffet - or some of each!


PRELIMINARY SCHEDULE

Times listed are local time EST. Add 5 hours for UT.

 

Thursday, November 10th

8:00am- 5:00pm AAVSO Council Meeting (council members only)

5:00pm- 6:00pm First Time Attandees and New Members Get Together

 

Friday, November 11th

8:00am Registration Opens

8:00- 8:45 Breakfast

8:45- 9:00am Welcome - Stella Kafka

9:00- 10:15 Paper Session 1

9:00- 9:35 Keynote-The Crucial Role of Amateur-Professional Networks in the Golden Age of Large Surveys - Joey Rodriguez 

9:35- 9:55am The Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite - Ryan J. Oelkers

9:55- 10:15 Photometric Surveys (and Variability Studies) at the Observatorio Astrofísico de Javalambre - Alessandro Ederoclite

10:15- 10:45 Coffee Break

10:45- Noon Paper Session 2 

10:45am-11:20 The role of small telescopes in the upcoming era of the Giant Magellan Telescope and other extremely large telescopes - Charles Alcock (CfA)

11:20- 11:40 Big Software for Big Data: Scaling Up Photometry for LSST - Meredith Rawls

11:40-12:00pm The Galactic Plane Exoplanet Survey (GPX) Amateur Designed Transiting Exoplanet Wide-Field Search - Paul Benni

12:00 - 12:20 The AAVSO Photometric All-Sky Survey (APASS) at Data Release 10 - Steve Levine

12:20- 2:00 Lunch Break

1:15- 1:45 SidDataGrabber Training Workshop - George Silvis

2:00- 3:30 Paper Session 3

2:00- 2:35 Keynote-Kepler and K2: Spawning a Revolution in Astrophysics from Exoplanets to Supernovae - David R. Ciardi

2:35- 3:10 Exploration of the Time Domain (Remote talk) - George Djorgovski 

3:10- 3:30 Clear sky forecasting for variable star observers - Frank Dempsey

3:30- 4:00 Coffee Break

4:00- 6:00 Paper Session 4 

4:00-4:20 Cepheids and Miras: recent results and prospects for the era of large surveys - Lucas Macri 

4:20-4:40 Gravitational Radiation in ES Ceti  - Joseph Patterson

4:40-5:00 Observing the low states of VY Scl stars  -Linda Schmidtobreich

4:45-5:05 Advances in Exoplanet Observing by Amateur Astronomers -Dennis Conti

5:05-5:40 The Impact of Large Optical Surveys on Stellar Astronomy and Variable Star Research- (Remote talk) -Zeljko Ivezik

5:40-6:00 Engaging AAVSO members in Stellar Astrophysics follow-up from The Evryscope data - Octavi Fors

  

Saturday, November 12th

8:00 -9:00am Breakfast

8:30 Registration opens

9:00 -10:30 Membership Meeting

10:30- 11:00 Coffee Break

11:00 - 12:30pm Panel -Role of the AAVSO in the era of multi-wavelength, all-sky photometric surveys 

Meredith Rawls
Octavi Fors
David R. Ciardi
Ryan J. Oelkers
Joey Rodriguez (CfA)
Alessandro Ederoclite

12:30 -2:30 Lunch Break

2:30 -3:40 Paper Session 5

2:30 -3:00 Using AAVSO Tools to Calibrate Secondary Standard Stars - Mike Joner

3:00 -3:20 Using the SSP-4 photometer to collect solar infrared data for the J and H bands - Rodney Howe

3:20 -3:40 Variations in the Orbital Light Curve of the Magnetic Cataclysmic Variable Star QQ Vulpecula - Sanaea Cooper Rose

3:40 -4:00 Coffee Break

4:00 -4:30 Paper Session 6

4:00 -4:20 Coast-to-Coast Photometry: A Study in Consistency - Tom Calderwood, Jim Kay 

6:00- 7:00 Cash Bar

7:00-10:00 Banquet, Trivia, Silent auction, Raffle

 

 

ACCOMMODATIONS

Sleeping rooms have been reserved at the Boston Burlington Marriott for AAVSO meeting attendees at a special group rate of $129 plus tax. (Hotel address is: One Mall Road, Burlington, MA 01803) Please make your reservations online to get the AAVSO group rate, or by calling the hotel at 888-855-7741 before October 10, 2016.  

YOU MUST BOOK YOUR ROOM BY OCTOBER 10 TO GET THIS SPECIAL RATE.

We are obligated to fill our room block or pay for unused rooms, so please be sure to book online or through the hotel and be sure to mention that you will be participating in the AAVSO meeting when making room reservations. 

Roommate matching assistance will be available for those who would like to lower costs by sharing a room - just complete the appropriate section of the registration form.


TRANSPORTATION

  • For those driving or renting cars - onsite parking is free.
  • From the airport:
    • Black Tie Limo (shuttle and limo service)– 800 624 9990
    • Cab ride is approximately $60.00 (one way)
    • Public transportation: Please consult the MBTA website to plan your route 
     

REGISTRATION

Registration: You can complete this form online at the top of this page (you must be logged into the AAVSO website) or you can call the AAVSO (617-354-0484) to request that a paper copy of the registration forms be mailed to you.  After October 10, 2016 registration will be more expensive. Note that the registration fee includes coffee breaks throughout and a continental breakfast on Friday & Saturday. 

Family Registrations are available for educators wishing to bring students and attendees wishing to register their significant others.

Students: Educators bringing students to the meeting are welcome to use the family rate to register themselves and up to 2 students (additional students will be $30 each).  Educators with larger groups or students who would like to attend on their own should contact us for more information. Individual students can register for $60 each please contact us for more information. 

Spouse/Guest Networking: We encourage attendees to bring spouses, family members & other guests to the meeting, but we know that some guests may not wish to attend all of the sessions.  You can check with the Marriott Concierge upon arrival for information regarding local destinations, historical sites, shopping and transportation.

Virtual Registration: We are offering the option of registering for the meeting as an online attendee and virtually attending all paper sessions.  We will be using a webinar service to broadcast the meeting.  Video will consist primarily of the presenter's PowerPoint presentation and audio. If you will not be traveling to Boston, but would like to attend the meeting online, please visit the AAVSO Store to purchase access. Prior to the meeting, you will receive an email containing links for each session. (All non-member rates include membership through 2017.) To see an example of our much improved webinar capabilities, you can watch Horace Smith's invited talk and other presentations from the 2016 spring meeting here

List of Fees: 
In Person Meeting Registration (member): Single early - $199, Family early - $259, Single late - $239, Family late - $299
In Person Meeting Registration (non-member): Single early - $260, Family early - $320, Single late - $300, Family late - $360 (includes membership through 2017)
Virtual Meeting Registration (member): $100
Virtual Meeting Registration (non-member): $150 (includes membership through 2017)
Banquet buffet: $75


ABSTRACT SUBMISSION

Abstracts will be accepted on a space-available basis.  We encourage attendees to submit abstracts by October 10, 2016 for the best chance at securing a time slot.  You can complete this form online (strongly preferred) or you can call the AAVSO (617-354-0484) to request that a paper copy of the abstract form be mailed to you. NOTE: The abstract form will not appear until you have registered for the meeting.

Meeting attendees are permitted to submit up to 2 abstract forms. (This can be 2 posters, 2 oral presentations or one of each.) Abstracts are limited to 500 words. 


DEADLINES TO REMEMBER

• October 10, 2016 - Early Registration Deadline 
• October 10, 2016- Hotel Reservation Deadline & Early Abstract Submission Deadline


Please feel free to contact us with any questions you may have about the meeting.

We hope to see you in November!