Career Profile: Astronomer to Web Editor for Sky & Telescope

The AAS Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy and the AAS Employment Committee have compiled dozens of interviews highlighting the diversity of career trajectories available to astronomers. The interviews share advice and lessons learned from individuals on those paths. Below is our interview with Monica Young, an astronomer turned web editor for Sky [...]

Guide to Developing an App for iOS

This is the second guest post by Jonathan Gagné at Université de Montréal. Jonathan is a graduate student under direction of René Doyon and David Lafrenière. His research topics include the search for young brown dwarfs in the solar neighborhood and the development of methods for direct exoplanet imaging. In his first post, he told [...]

How much does a typical astronomy paper cost taxpayers?

About $20,000. That’s one of the take-home messages from Jim Davenport’s light-hearted analysis of the last ten years of NSF AST grants. Want to know which paper in the last ten years is the most efficient (in terms of number of papers published vs. size of grant)? Read more about his analysis right here!

Presentations on iPad v2 [Ask AstroBetter]

We’ve covered this topic of iPad presentations before, but with an emphasis on Keynote for iPad pros and cons. While Keynote for the iPad now supports actions and is probably still the best app for creating presentations on the iPad, it’s not the best solution if you create presentations in PowerPoint or want to make [...]

This guest post from Keivan Stassun originally appeared as a message on the aas_panchromatic email list. Keivan is a Professor of Astronomy at Vanderbilt University. In addition to researching star formation, Keivan is actively involved with several initiatives to engage minorities in astronomy and space sciences. The aas_panchromatic list is an online discussion forum sponsored [...]

Career Profiles: Astronomer to Video Game Programmer

The AAS Committee on the Status of Women in Astronomy and the AAS Employment Committee have compiled dozens of interviews highlighting the diversity of career trajectories available to astronomers. The interviews share advice and lessons learned from individuals on those paths. Below is our interview with Amy Nelson, an astronomer turned software engineer.  She writes [...]

Wiki update: interview questions

For most folks, it’s the job season is over and as you revel in finally knowing where you’re going to be in the Fall, why not spend some time preparing clear, concise responses to some of the most frequently asked interview questions? We’ve updated the wiki page on interview advice, courtesy of Alison Coil. In [...]

New on the wiki: How to Observe

Do you have your first observing run coming up and wondering about what to expect? What should you bring? How should you prepare? What happens if a pack of wild javelina surrounds the telescope (a true story from your Content Manager…)? Amanda Kepley–an NRAO postdoctoral fellow in Green Bank, WV–has written up a fantastic wiki [...]