ASAS-SN Discovers its 50th Nearby Supernova
One of the major goals of the ASAS-SN project is to produce a complete census of bright, nearby supernovae. In the last few months, using four 14-cm diameter telescopes in Hawaii and two such telescopes in Chile (this expansion was funded mostly by CCAPP), ASAS-SN has been finding about 10 bright (V < 17) supernovae per month. That may not seem like much, compared to more than 1000 SNe found every year, but ASAS-SN is now finding more than half of the brightest SNe. On August 12, ASAS-SN discovered its 50th supernova (33rd since May 1st, 2014), which was annouced via an Astronomer's Telegram . The first author of this telegram is an amateur astronomer from France, Joel Nicolas, whose 41-cm telescope was used to confirm the presence of the supernova. In steady-state, ASAS-SN will likely discover about 100 bright supernovae per year, all of them (and their host galaxies) easily studied with relatively small, 1-4 meter class telescopes.