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TheAmerican Association of Variable Star Observers (AAVSO) is an internationalnonprofit organization. Founded in 1911, the organization focuses on coordinating, analyzing, publishing, and archivingvariable star observations made largely byamateur astronomers.[1] The AAVSO creates records that establishlight curves depicting the variation in brightness of astar over time. The AAVSO makes these records available to professionalastronomers, researchers, and educators.
Professional astronomers do not have the resources to monitor everyvariable star. Hence,astronomy is one of the few sciences whereamateurs can make significant contributions to research.[2] In 2011, the 100th year of the AAVSO's existence, the twenty-millionth variable star observation was received into their database.[3] The AAVSO International Database (AID) has stored over thirty-five million observations as of 2019.[4] The organization receives nearly 1,000,000 observations annually from an estimated amount of 2,000 professional and amateur observers, and is quoted regularly in scientific journals.[5][6][7] The International Variable Star Index (VSX) website, maintained by the AAVSO, is cataloging (as of November 2023) 2,277,999 variable stars.[8]
The AAVSO is also very active in education and public outreach. They routinely hold training workshops for citizen science and publish papers with amateurs as co-authors. In the 1990s, the AAVSO developed the Hands-On Astrophysics curriculum, now known as Variable Star Astronomy[9] (with support from theNational Science Foundation [NSF]). In 2009, the AAVSO was awarded a three-year $800,000 grant from the NSF to run Citizen Sky,[10] a pro-am collaboration project examining the 2009-2011 eclipse of the starepsilon Aurigae.[11]
The AAVSO headquarters was originally located at the residence of its founderWilliam T. Olcott inNorwich, Connecticut.
Minor Planet(8900)AAVSO is named after the organization.[12]
After AAVSO's incorporation in 1918, it unofficially moved toHarvard College Observatory, which later served as the official AAVSO headquarters (1931–1953).[13] Thereafter, it moved aroundCambridge before their first building was purchased in 1985: theClinton B. Ford Astronomical Data and Research Center.[14] In 2007, the AAVSO purchased and moved into the recently vacated premises ofSky & Telescope magazine.[15]
As of September 16, 2022, the Executive Director of the AAVSO is Brian Kloppenborg. Before he assumed this role, Kathy Spirer worked in this capacity for nine months, following the resignation of Styliani ("Stella") Kafka -who was in charge from February 2015 till the ember months of 2021. She succeededArne Henden. The previous director of the AAVSO for many decades wasJanet Mattei, who died in March 2004 ofleukemia.[16]
The AAVSO currently has over 2,000 members and observers, with approximately half of them from outside the United States. This list only consists of those with Wikipedia pages.
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