School of Practical Astrophysics

VI Byurakan International Summer School (6BISS) will take place at Byurakan Astrophysical Observatory on September 10-15, 2018. During the school the students will have practical tutorial sessions on spectroscopy, photometry, statistics, as well as will get acquainted with the Astronomical Surveys, Databases, Archives and Virtual Observatory tools.

The Byurakan Astrophysical Observatory is one of the main observational centers of the former Soviet Union and is an important observatory with modern facilities in the region. It was founded in 1946 by V.A. Ambartsumian and is well known for its large spectroscopic surveys: the First and Second Byurakan Surveys, undertaken by B.E. Markarian and colleagues. The Byurakan Astrophysical Observatory hosts a number of medium-size optical telescopes, the most important being the 2.6m classical telescope and 1m Schmidt telescope. The Byurakan Astrophysical Observatory holds the Digitized First Byurakan Survey (DFBS, or the Markarian survey), containing low-dispersion spectra of ~20,000,000 objects, which is the basis of the Armenian Virtual Observatory (ArVO), a member of the International Virtual Observatory Alliance (IVOA).

All local expenses for the school will be covered by the organizers. We can offer a limited number of travel grants for students from South West and Central Asia Regional Office of Astronomy for Development (SWCA ROAD) member countries (Georgia, Iran, Turkey, Tajikistan, Kazakhstan) and few more grants to other nationality students.

The school is mainly meant for MSc and PhD students in astronomy, also BSc students in the later stages.
Note that the school can accommodate 20 students.

English is the working language of the school.

The next week after the summer school the conference “Instability Phenomena and Evolution of the Universe” dedicated to Viktor Ambartsumian’s 110th anniversary is being organized. If you would like to take part also in the conference, please, follow the link to register. The participants of the school, who will have a contribution during the conference, will have priority to be waived from the local expenses during the conference week.