EE Barnard: A pioneering 18th-19th astrophotographer whose astrophotos still wow us!

Presenter(s): John Drummond

Affiliation(s): Royal Astronomical Society of New Zealand

Session details: Sunday, 2020-04-12 03:30:00, SUN

Abstract

Edwin Emmerson Barnard was a famous 18th – 19th Century American astronomer who, through careful observational and astrophotography skills, discovered a wide range of celestial objects, some of which helped astronomers redefine the structure and make-up of our Milky Way Galaxy. Barnard has been described as ‘the greatest visual observer who ever lived’ (Bakich 2004). John will be presenting comparison photos that he took of selected Barnard regions/photos.

Biography

John Drummond is a keen astrophotographer and contributor to astronomical research. John’s photos have been used in many overseas books and magazines – and were used on two NZ stamps. He was the director of the Royal Astronomical Society of New Zealand Astrophotography Section for thirteen years until 2018. John has a range of telescopes up to 0.5 metres in diameter. He regularly images and gets astrometry of comets, asteroids and NEOs which are sent to the IAU Minor Planet Section. In 2018 he got 466 observations (the 2nd highest number of observations taken in New Zealand – Mount John being the most). He has also confirmed several comets. His Possum Observatory code is E94. John has also co-discovered about 20 exoplanets in collaboration with the Ohio State University – including the unusual 2-Earth-massed planet orbiting a binary star which helped astronomers rethink planetary formation models. This was published in Science. John is listed as an author in over 60 journal publications. He is also a contributing editor for the Australian Sky and Telescope magazine (there’s an article about him in the latest issue – Nov/Dec 2019, Issue 121). John Drummond was the President of the Royal Astronomical Society of New Zealand from 2016-2018 and is currently that Society’s Executive Secretary. In 2016 John received his Master of Science (Astronomy) from Swinburne University. In 2019 he was made a Fellow of the Royal Astronomical Society of New Zealand.