Recent ProAm Campaigns: Be stars, COROT and others

TL;DR

The paper discusses the resurgence of professional-amateur collaborations in astronomy, highlighting how modern amateur equipment and efforts contribute to scientific research, data collection, and long-term observational campaigns.

Contribution

It highlights recent ProAm campaigns, emphasizing the role of amateurs in scientific data collection and collaboration with professionals in modern astronomy.

Findings

Amateur astronomers now produce scientifically valuable data.

ProAm collaborations enhance long-term observational campaigns.

Technology democratization enables amateurs to contribute significantly.

Abstract

The ProAm effort in modern astronomy and astrophysics is now a reality. The achievements of amateur astronomers throughout the early history of astronomy are well known. However, during the 20th century, the high specialisation and the technology required for dealing with the astronomical issues of that epoch, forced a natural separation of the professional activities from the amateur ones. Nowadays, technology has become much cheaper. Amateur astronomers have equipment capable of producing scientific results within their reach. Good equipment pushes some amateur astronomers to learn more, recovering their dialog with professionals. ProAm activities may be fruitful in data mining, in database feeding, in long-term campaigns and even in casual observations.