AmatuerStargazer Posted August 21, 2017 Share Posted August 21, 2017 Hello, I was wondering what kind of jobs there are that focus on astronomy. What do you guys do if your job is related to astronomy? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
valleyman Posted August 21, 2017 Share Posted August 21, 2017 Bank Robber to pay for it all Pat Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ronin Posted August 21, 2017 Share Posted August 21, 2017 If you are doing "Astronomy" then it is almost certain that you are at a University doing research into one aspect or another. Another way to put it is Astronomers do not look (or rarely) through scopes. Not easy to observe the 2 big things these days of Dark Matter and Dark Energy. At one observatory I visited the person who "did it all, knew it alll and worked on it all" was looking after the liguid nitrogen cooling required for the various sensors. As the place was an arm of elsewhere all he knew was that some of the scopes would be aimed at X at time T and could he confirm the sensors were working and operating correctly. He had specialised in Low Temperature Physics at Uni. He did have a great job. Think about it, they are large mechanical items that use computers. When something starts to seize someone has to replace it, do all the motors operate, are they in specification, who is going up there to replace it. Any good at computer networks? Systems Engineering, even project management. One person from SGL landed a post of Project Managing one of the big scopes. If you are thinking of "observing" then how many have looked through an eyepiece on Hubble? Gaia is collecting data at L2 (I think L2), the JWST will get launched and that also will sit at L2, Spitzer and Chandra are the same. Not a single person has or will. Astronomers book time on a scope and if allocated then the scope is aimed at the object/coordinates specified, they do not need to be there, just the engineers that run it all and collect the data and send it half way round the world to who requested it. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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