The International Year of Astronomy 2009 (IYA2009) is a global effort initiated by the International Astronomical Union (IAU) and UNESCO to help the citizens of the world rediscover their place in the Universe through the day- and night-time sky, and thereby engage a personal sense of wonder and discovery.

On 9 January 2010, the International Year of Astronomy 2009 formally ended during a closed meeting in Padua, Italy. Read more about all the activities that were organised in the Netherlands: IYA2009 in the Netherlands.

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ASTRON & IYA 2009

During 2009, ASTRON organised and participated in regional, national and international activities:

• 3 April: live webcast during the international cornerstone project 100 Hours of Astronomy

The 100 Hours of Astronomy Cornerstone Project was a worldwide event consisting of a wide range of public outreach activities, one of which was the live 24-hour research observatory webcast on 3 April. ASTRON participated in this event with the Westerbork Telescope and LOFAR. People worldwide could follow, live on the internet, what astronomers at ASTRON do in Dwingeloo, what interesting topics they are researching and how radiotelescopes actually work. More about this event: http://www.100hoursofastronomy.org/program/75-live-24-hour-research-observatory-webcast.

• 4 and 5 April 2009: over 7500 people visited the Weekend of the Stars in NEMO, Amsterdam 

7570 people interested in astronomy visited the science centre NEMO, Amsterdam on 4 and 5 April 2009.  During this Museum weekend, the event called 'Be seduced by the stars' was organised for the International Year of Astronomy 2009.

All weekend NEMO was freely accessible,for everyone to enjoy a heavenly programme. People could listen live to pulsars made by ASTRON's Westerbork Telescope. The signals could also be seen on big screens. Astronomers of ASTRON showed visitors LOFAR, the new telescope of ASTRON. With live observations people could see the spectacular research that can be done with LOFAR.

Another popular activity was the workshop 'Knutselpulsars', in which children could make their own pulsar and personalise it. The success of this workshop could be seen by the large number of kids walking around with a 'knuteslpulsar' in their hand! Besides this, ASTRON also organised its famous Pretlab (or Electrolab), where children made their own electronic packages, sometimes even helped out by the director of ASTRON.

Honorary guest of ASTRON this weekend was Hanny van Arkel, a school teacher from Heerlen and also amateur astronomer. She discovered Hanny's Voorwerp. She explained visitors how to search for objects in the universe and classify them themselves in the GalaxyZoo project!

For very small kids there was also enough to do. On Sunday, the Spacegirls organised a drawing contest. These seven girls, from the Nassau College in Assen, are participating in the national CanSat project, where they have to make a satellite out of soda can. In NEMO, the most beautiful colourings were awarded chocolate bunnies, chocolate eggs and a soda can!

'Be seduced by the stars' was organised by the NAC, NWO, KNVWS, NOVA and NEMO.

• On 23 April, ASTRON & JIVE organised their second Girls Day

On Thursday 23 April, 33 girls from the 4th year of the high school Nassau College in Assen attended Girlsday 2009 organised by ASTRON & JIVE. Girlsday is one of the initiatives that the Diversity Committee is taking to help promote science and technology among young women.

For ASTRON, this day also coincided with ASTRON's 60th anniversary, so the girls kicked off the day in the best possible way, with cakes that were especially made for this occasion!
The programme of the Girls day included five different activities to show the girls what is happening at ASTRON and JIVE. The girls had the opportunity to visit the JIVE correlator, learn about the astronomical research done, visit the optical/IR lab and see the antenna's and receivers activities. Besides this, CAMRAS, the amateur radio astronomer group that fixed, and now uses the Dwingeloo Telescope, gave tours in the telescope. The girls also had the opportunity to ask the international ASTRON/JIVE female staff questions about their work and career.

The day ended with a presentation by the Spacegirls, seven girls from the same Nassau College who are participating in the national CanSat project. In this project they have to make a satellite out of a soda can, which also has to perform two missions: the CanSat must determine its height during its flight and it will have to land safely. For this the girls are designing an airbag. ASTRON is sponsoring the seven girls, who are also the only all girls team participating in the project.
With all the great help and efforts of ASTRON's Diversity Committee, several people from CAMRAS and the Spacegirls, it was a very successful day for everyone and hopefully we will see some of these girls back as scientists!

• In 2009, ASTRON celebrated it's 60th anniversary

Although this is not a special 50th or 75th anniversary moment, with IYA2009 in mind we have marked the occasion with some special colloquia. First up on our list of speakers was the ever-popular Prof. Vincent Icke, professor of theoretical astronomy at Leiden University and a frequent guest on various national TV shows. Prof. Icke was a particularly apt choice for our first event, being a PhD student of Profs. Jan Oort and Henk van der Hulst. Jan Oort, together with Marcel Minnaert and Jaap Houtgast formally registered the 'Stichting Radiostraling van Zon en Melkweg', the forerunner of ASTRON, as a foundation under Dutch law on the 23 April 1949. As many of you know, Henk van der Hulst was the first person to predict spectral-line radio emission from neutral Hydrogen - the most ambudant element in the Universe. The rest, as they say, is history.

The second colloquium organised in honour of ASTRON's birthday presented Prof. Harry van der Laan as speaker. For 60 minutes, Prof Harry van der Laan riveted a spell-bound audience with reminiscences of his 20 years (1967-1987) at the helm of our Foundation, or rather of Dutch astronomy.

• During 2009, ASTRON sponsored a very special project: the Spacegirls & the CanSat

Seven girls of the Dr. Nassau college in Assen, the Netherlands, also known as the Spacegirls, participated in a Dutch contest called CanSat. In this competition, organised by the Technical University Delft and space agency ISIS (Innovative Solutions In Space), teams from high schools from all over the Netherlands made a satellite out of a soda can, a 'CanSat'. This satellite, or cansat, had to perform two missions: the CanSat had determine its height during its flight ánd it had to land safely. For this second mission the girls designed an airbag. ASTRON sponsored the seven girls, who are also the only all-girls team (including two twins!) participating in the project and who won the contest. This was celebrated with a party at ASTRON. More information about these girls can be found on: http://www.astron.nl/about-astron/press-public/news/spacegirls-win-dutch-space-competition/spacegirls-win-dutch-space-com and http://spacegirls.webs.com.

• ASTRON & education

During 2009, ASTRON decided to give more attention to education. Starting off with the Girls Day in April, in May, we invited classes from primary schools to visit ASTRON and let kids experience the wonders of the universe in Dwingeloo and at the telescopes in Westerbork. This visit will be organised again in October.

Besides sponsoring the Spacegirls, ASTRON also sponsored the Dutch Astronomy olympiad and the Dutch Physics olympiad, in which high school students compete against each other in these areas. In the astronomy olympiad, the winner got a trip to La Palma and observing time on the telescope there. ASTRON sponsored both competitions financially and invited the students over for a visit to Dwingeloo.

Another sponsoring event was the Robocup World Championship in Graz this year. Four students from a high school in Hoogeveen participated in this competition and ended up on the 19th place, a great achievement as the competition, especially from Japan and Taiwan, was exceptionally strong!

• From Earth to the Universe

With one of it's most eye catching and beautiful images, ASTRON participated in the cornerstone project From Earth to the Universe. With images taken from both ground- and space-based telescopes, From Earth to the Universe (FETTU) showcases the incredible variety of astronomical objects that are known to exist. The exhibit also shows how these objects look when viewed across the electromagnetic spectrum, from the ultraviolet and visible light to infrared, X-rays and gamma rays.

FETTU is being shown in non-traditional public venues such as parks and gardens, shopping malls, metro stations and airports in major cities across the world. The FETTU images have been selected for their stunning beauty to engage members of the general public who might normally ignore or avoid astronomy. With short, but informative captions on each panel, FETTU introduces some basics of the science involved once an individual has been drawn to the image. The picture shows the image ASTRON submitted, galaxy ngc6946 in Bolivia (above) and Slovenia (below).

The worldwide response to the FETTU project continues to be astounding. As of May 2009, over 55 countries around the world have signed to host FETTU exhibits in more than 200 separate locations ranging from Brazil to Bulgaria and from Uruguay to the United States. The most current list can be found at: www.fromearthtotheuniverse.org.

In the Netherlands, many activities are being organised to celebrate IYA2009. For an overview of all the activities, go to http://www.jaarvandesterrenkunde.nl. Of course, worldwide many countries participate in the International Year of Astronomy 2009. You can find everything about the international activities and events on http://www.astronomy2009.org.