MONTHLY NEWS
July 1998

Japanese Amateur Astronomers Claim Big Share of Celestial Discoveries

Nearly 40 percent of all reported sightings of comets last year were made by Japanese amateur astronomers, according to a report by the International Astronomical Union (IAU), which also credited Japanese space buffs with finding more new asteroids than a leading observatory in the United States. The IAU is the internationally recognized authority for assigning names to newly discovered bodies in space.

Shuichi Nakano, the IAU's contact person in Japan, said that Japanese amateur astronomers accounted for 3,378 comet observations in 1997 out of a total of 8,960 in 117 countries.

Takuo Kojima, an amateur astronomer in the city of Tatebayashi, Gunma Prefecture, alone submitted 574 reports of comet observations to the IAU last year, the fifth highest total in the world. He is also credited with having discovered 28 asteroids.

Most asteroids range in size from around a thousand kilometers in diameter to just several meters, and they normally revolve around the sun between Mars and Jupiter. There are approximately 8,600 known asteroids, 1,221 of them discovered by nonprofessional Japanese astronomers.

Since the name of a previously unknown body can be chosen by those who discovered it, there are some asteroids named after famous people in Japanese history, including Ryoma (for late nineteenth century political leader Ryoma Sakamoto), Soseki (novelist Soseki Natsume), and Tezuka (pioneering manga artist Osamu Tezuka).

One notable recent discovery was made by Kesao Takamizawa, a 46-year-old astronomy fan in Sakuma, Nagano Prefecture, who found a nova in the constellation Ophiuchus. A nova is a star that suddenly becomes much brighter and gradually decreases in brightness over a period of weeks to years. Takamizawa's discovery was recognized by the IAU on June 18. It is the first nova discovery by a Japanese astronomer since July 1996.

Nakano said that amateur astronomers around the world play a vital role in the development of astronomy.

Photos: (Top) Takuo Kojima, shown here with his sons, constructed his own observatory in his yard ten years ago; (above) Kojima now does most of his observations through computer monitors. (Asahi Shogakusei Shimbun)