Kamil Hornoch

Kamil Hornoch IPA2|'kamɪl 'ɦornox (born 5 December 1972) is a Czech amateur astronomer, and a member of the Czech Astronomical Society. He lives in Lelekovice, a village in the South Moravian Region, the Czech Republic. cite web
last = Grygar
first = Jiří
authorlink = Jiří Grygar
title = Úspěch českého astronoma amatéra a o českých novách
publisher = Amatérská prohlídka oblohy
url = http://www.astronomie.cz/modules.php?name=News&file=article&sid=201
accessdate = 2007-08-13 ]

Astronomy

Kamil Hornoch became interested in astronomy in 1984. One year later he started with his scientific observations of comets, meteors, the solar photosphere, variable stars, the planets and occultations.

He makes most of his observations from a small observatory in Lelekovice with a cm to in|abbr=yes|35 reflector telescope. [ cite web
title = Lelekovice astronomers homepage
url = http://astro.sci.muni.cz/lelek/
accessdate = 2007-08-13 ] Although he uses a CCD camera, he is also good in visual estimates of star luminosity, reaching an accuracy of 0.03 magnitude (confirmed by separate photoelectric measurements). He has also been acknowledged for his numerous estimates and measurements of brightness and positions of comets and variable stars, as well as position measurements of minor planets. cite web
title = 2006 ASP Annual Award Winners - Amateur Achievement Award - Kamil Hornoch
publisher = Astronomical Society of the Pacific
url = http://www.astrosociety.org/membership/awards/bios/hornoch.html
accessdate = 2007-08-13 ] In 1993 he co-discovered (with Jan Kyselý) new variable star ES UMa. [ cite web
title = Nové proměnné hvězdy objevené v ČR
url = http://var.astro.cz/newvar.php?order=objevitel&sloupec=&sloupec_value=
publisher = Czech Astronomical Society
language = Czech
accessdate = 2007-09-18 ]

Novae

In the summer of 2002, Hornoch took a series of pictures of the surrounding of the core of the Andromeda Galaxy and discovered his first extragalactic nova. Since that time, galaxy M31 has become his favourite place to observe; he has made 43 nova discoveries and co-discoveries in that region (as of May 2007). [ cite web
title = New Nova in the M31 Andromeda Galaxy Found
work = CCD cameras for astronomy
publisher = Moravian Instruments, Inc.
url = http://ccd.mii.cz/art?id=326&lang=409
accessdate = 2007-09-16 ] He also discovered two novae in the galaxy M81 in pictures taken by Czech astronomer Pavel Cagaš with his cm to in|abbr=yes|26.5 reflector telescope on 8 and 11 April 2007. No nova discovery had been made with such a small telescope in such a distance before. One of the novas, M81 2007 3, grew very luminous, reaching the quite extraordinary absolute magnitude of -10 and apparent magnitude of 17.6 six days later. It was the brightest nova ever discovered in M81. [ cite web
last = Cagaš
first = Pavel
title = Objevy nov v galaxii M81
publisher = Czech Astronomical Society
language = Czech
url = http://www.astro.cz/clanek/2755
accessdate = 2007-08-13 ] [ cite web
title = Novae discovered in M81 galaxy using G2-3200 CCD camera on 10 in telescope
work = CCD cameras for Astronomy
publisher = Moravian Instruments, Inc.
url = http://ccd.mii.cz/art?id=334&cat=1&lang=409
accessdate = 2007-09-16 ]

Acknowledgement

In 1996 Kamil Hornoch became the first person to receive the newly established Zdeněk Kvíz Award of the Czech Astronomical Society for his activities in the field of interplanetary matter. [ cite web
title = Cena Zdeňka Kvíze
publisher = Czech Astronomical Society
language = Czech
url = http://www.astro.cz/cas/ceny/kvizova/
accessdate = 2007-09-16 ] In 2001 Lenka Šarounová named the main belt asteroid 14124 Kamil in his honour. [ cite web
title = JPL Small-Body Database Browser Search: 14124 Kamil
publisher = Jet Propulsion Laboratory
url = http://ssd.jpl.nasa.gov/sbdb.cgi?sstr=kamil;orb=1
accessdate = 2007-08-13 ] In 2003 he received the Jindřich Šilhán Award of the Variable Star Observer of the Year ( _cs. Cena Jindřicha Šilhána Proměnář roku) of the Czech Astronomical Society. [ cite web
title = Cena Jindřicha Šilhána Proměnář roku
publisher = Department of Variable Star Observers of the Czech Astronomical Society
language = Czech
url = http://var2.astro.cz/cena_j_silhana.php?lang=cz&sezona=leto&parent=organizace.php
accessdate = 2007-09-16 ] In 2006 Kamil Hornoch won the Amateur Achievement Award of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific.

References

Persondata
NAME = Hornoch, Kamil
ALTERNATIVE NAMES =
SHORT DESCRIPTION = Czech amateur astronomer
DATE OF BIRTH = 5 December 1972
PLACE OF BIRTH =
DATE OF DEATH =
PLACE OF DEATH =