The S.O.S. and its members have a sustained interest in outreach activities.
Discovery of a SN at shock breakout by amateur astronomer Víctor Buso
Amateur astronomer Víctor Buso was testing his newly-purchased CCD camera at his 40-cm telescope installed in his terrace in Rosario when SN 2016gkg literally exploded in his face. In an unprecedented observation he obtained about one hundred 20 second exposures during one hour and a half while the SN appeared and started to quickly rise in brightness. With a one in one hundred million chance, he saw what the astronomical community had searched for years using a battery of high-technology instruments: the shock breakout emission. This is the very intense flash of radiation that first escapes the exploding star’s surface even before the material start to expand into the outer space. S.O.S. members led the analysis of Víctor’s observations showing with hydrodynamical simulations that the detection indeed corresponded to the shock breakout emission. The analysis was published in Nature with large impact in the astronomical community and among the press and general public.
Here are some of the press articles and activities related with showing Víctor’s unique discovery to the world.
Other topics:
Article in Spanish, magazine “Desde la patagonia, difundiendo saberes”, 2016.
Exposition at Bariloche, Argentina, 2015.
