Marino Fonovic (Fonovich)
(Rijeka,
1964. - )
Croatian
astronomer world known observer
of variable
stars, astrophotographer, science
publicist and
journalist
(from
wikipedia)
As part of an
The American Association of Variable Star Observers
(AAVSO) observing program,
since 1990 from owen
astronomical observation in Plominsko
Zagorje
(Istria-Croatia) he
performed 30.000 visual and CCD photometric obervations of
variable stars.
Through the telescopes of 20, 25 and 35 cm from
night to night, visually and with CCD he observes around 800
variable stars,
compare
their brightness with nearby comparison stars.
There are remarkable
observations of the novae and dwarf
novae type
U Geminorum (1800 observations
of star SS Cygni ), lacertide, variable star type
R CrB and supernovae in other
galaxies. All observations are included in the
AAVSO International Database.
Besides
photometric observations of
variable stars he involves between
1990 2000 intensively
in astrophotography
especially
shooting of deep sky objects. He presented his photos of distant
nebulas and galaxies to croatian and international public
thru the many magazines (among
others, in
Astronomy and
Sky and
Telescope).
Unfortunately, the
light pollution
on the Istria area disable
astrophotography with long
expositions.
He
engaged
in
popularization of
astronomy, he
published more
then 100 works and scientific and popular articles. His thematic
articles are being published in Croatian magazine
Nature,
Polaris, Urania etc. Abroad he
publishes in Slovenian astronomy magazine
Spika (Ljubljana),
Astronomia
UAI
(University in Padova, Italy),
Vasiona and
Astronomy (Astronomical observatory Belgrade, Novi
Sad).
For
his work
and
achievements he
has been
awarded in Croatia and
abroad:
Croatian Society for Natural Sciences,
AAVSO for
his observation
etc.
Since 1988 he has been involved in professional
journalism.
Between
1988 2000 he
was
a main editor of the
mining
magazine
The Miner (ISSN
1334-1731)
in Labin. He is in associate with many daily news and week news.
He is the author of
monography of
Istrian
mines
(ISBN
953-98100-1-9).
He
translated
into croatian a Herman Potocnik Noordung's book of
astronautics:
Das Problem der Befarhung des Weltraums
from the year 1929.
His new comprehensive book of astronomy:
To the Stars and
Beyond will be published in 2007. |