A r A S N e w s
N E W S L E T T E
R OF
THE
ARMENIAN ASTRONOMICAL SOCIETY ( A r A S )
No. 12 (
Editor: T.Yu.Magakian, tigmag@sci.am
The ArAS Newsletter in the
INTERNET: http://www.aras.am
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CONTENTS:
1) Collaboration between the Russian and
2) 75th Anniversary of Prof. Elma Parsamian
3) In the Memory of Armen Oskanyan
4)
5) ANSEF Announces 2005 Grants
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Collaboration between the Russian and
A new agreement was signed
between Armenian National Academy of Sciences and the Southern Center of
Russian Academy of Sciences. Astrophysics has been nominated among the main
directions of cooperation between two scientific systems. At the turn of
November the Armenian members of the working group for this cooperation had a
meeting in the Russian city of
Director of BAO H.Harutyunian as a member of this
coordination group participated in the discussions as well. Particularly the
perspectives of joint projects in astrophysics were discussed with the director
of the Special Astrophysical Observatory (SAO) Yu.Balega and head of laboratory S.Dodonov. Their attention was concentrated especially on the
problem of reconstruction of BAO 1m Schmidt telescope. The sides mentioned that
this legendary telescope which had been one of the most fruitfully operated
wide-field telescopes in the world could give new astronomical results even
nowadays and should be reconstructed for this purpose. They agreed to focus
their efforts for obtaining the necessary finances both from Armenian and
Russian sources.
New plans on establishing a
joint laboratory have been discussed as well. Further joint plans were
corroborated by a bilateral agreement on intentions between BAO and SAO.
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75th anniversary of Prof.
Elma Parsamian
Prof. Elma Parsamian, famous Armenian woman
astronomer, celebrated her 75th anniversary.
Elma Parsamian was born in
Prof. Parsamian's main
research fields are variable and non-stable stars, galactic nebulae and archaeoastronomical
studies.
Parsamian actively
participated in the long-term Byurakan studies of flare stars in stellar
clusters and associations and personally found many tens of them, including not
easy detectable slow flares. She also found many variable stars of other types
as well as many tens of stars with H-alpha emission. With E.Chavira she
prepared a catalogue of emission-line stars in Orion association. Several
papers of Parsamian are dedicated to the study of so-called subfuors - stars
with drastic long term changes in the luminosity level.
Among other works of Prof.
Parsamian should be mentioned spectral and photometric studies of nebulae as
well as widely known to astronomical community catalogues of the cometary
nebulae.
Another field of activity of
Elma Parsamian is represented by archeological and archaeoastronomical studies.
Actually she was the first researcher who described the probable astronomical
purpose of pre-historic megalithic complexes of Metzamor and Karahunj in
For many years Prof.
Parsamian worked in close collaboration with Mexican astronomers, including
famous Prof. G.Haro and published many joint papers.
Prof. Parsamian published
more than 140 scientific papers and about 20 popular articles. She is a member
of Editorial board of "Astrofizika" journal. She is a member of BAO
Scientific and Specialized Councils, member of IAU (1976), EAS (1998),
On behalf of the Armenian
Astronomical Society we wish Prof. Parsamian good health, success and new
scientific achievements.
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In the memory of Armen Oskanyan
In a tragic twist of events
an Armenian teacher and his student perished in
After studying for two years
in the school No.19, in Yerevan, Armen Oskanyan was admitted in the faculty of
physics in the Yerevan State University in 1968, where he got Lenin
scholarship, obtained his diploma under supervision of Prof. Victor
Ambartsumian, fulfilled his military service in the Soviet army, and started
working at the Byurakan Observatory, where he defended his thesis.
Most likely he would continue
to live a usual life of our present day researcher, doing only research works,
if he did not start teaching at the college "Quantum". It was here
where his real talent in the very responsible work of educating gifted adolescents
was discovered. His colleagues from Byurakan knew very well that responsibility
for his work was expressed very strongly, to even incomprehensible for some
people extent of extremity in him. Nevertheless, no one could imagine how self-denyingly
and vigorously he would devote himself to his apprentices and to his task of
educating them.
There can be no doubts that
the medals that have been won in the international competitions by our
teenagers in the recent years would not have entered the country had not the
students had the honor of being taught by Armen Oskanyan. He knew his students'
strong and weak sides, their aspirations, but his own greatest dream was to see
them years later working as specialists in Byurakan. That is why he was always informing
his colleagues in Byurakan which one of his students had been admitted in the
faculty of physics of
One last act of devotion and
self-sacrifice brought his life to end at the age of only 55. He threw himself
into the sea in order to save the endangered lives of his students. He managed
to save one of them, but could not help the second one. This became the very
reason of Armen Oskanyan's death, as his loyal heart was not able to endure the
pain of this dreadful loss.
The memory of a man and a
scientist so modest, so willing to help his fellow men and so faithful to the
ones who were close to him will forever remain in the heart of everyone who
knew him. The Teacher, devoted to his profession and to his apprentices
demonstrated with the way he lived, and even with the way he passed away, that
he was worth his honorable title.
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Lusine
Sargsyan, junior research associate, Byurakan Astrophysical Observatory, was
announced the first winner of the ArAS Annual Prize for young astronomers in
2004. A certificate and a sum of USD100 donated by Prof. Yervant Terzian just for this occasion were handed to Lusine
on Monday, December 27 in Byurakan.
Lusine Sargsyan, 26, has
graduated from the
We congratulate Lusine with
this success and wish her future scientific achievements.
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ANSEF announces 2005 grants
The Armenian National Science and Educational Fund (ANSEF) announced
recently new research awards for 2005. This year only one project from the
Byurakan Observatory has been approved. The project headed by Dr. Ruben
Andreasyan, "The 3-D structure of
the magnetic field of the Galaxy" was awarded the Mesrobian Memorial Award in frame of ANSEF.
ANSEF grants are active since
2001. Altogether, 11 projects from the Byurakan Observatory have been awarded
ANSEF grants, USD 5000 each. The previous winners were:
2001
Khachikian E.Ye., Radio and Optical Investigations of
Extragalactic Objects
Mickaelian A.M., Study of Starburst/AGN/Interaction Phenomena
in IRAS Galaxies
2002
Hovhannisyan M.A., The Investigation of the Extended Radio
Galaxies
Magakian T.Yu., Searches and Detailed Studies of Outflows
from PMS Stars
Mickaelian A.M., Digitization of the First Byurakan Survey
(FBS)
2003
Movsessian T.H., Multi-Component Investigation of
Extragalactic Radio Sources
Zalinian V.P., Updating the Control of the Telescope
ZTA-2.6
2004
Andreasyan R.R., The Distribution of Free Electrons in the
Galaxy
Hakopian
Ter-Kazarian G.T., An Activity of Galactic Nuclei and
Superdence “Protomatter” Sources in the Universe
ANSEF grants are significant
support for the Byurakan astronomers giving possibility for active research in
the most important areas.
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