BOSS Project

Blazar Optical Sky Survey (BOSS) Project is an optical monitoring program, initiated on April 2013 by Dr. Kosmas Gazeas at the University of Athens. It aims at monitoring the optical variability on active Blazars, in parallel with other multi-wavelength observations obtained from space and ground-based observatories.

Blazar variability timescales are often divided into three categories: the intra-day variability (IDV) which ranges between a few minutes up to one day (Wagner & Witzel 1995), the short-term variability (STV) which ranges between a few days to a few months and the long-term variability (LTV), which covers all variations longer than a few months, up to several years (Gupta et al. 2004).

BOSS Project utilizes the 0.40 m f/8 robotic and remote controlled telescope at the Univerity of Athens Observatory, which is equipped with a ST10 XME CCD camera and a UBVRI filter set. The data acquisition provides multicolour imaging in optical wavelengths.

The Univerity of Athens Observatory is a member of the Whole Earth Blazar Telescope (WEBT) Network, exchanging information and data among the largest telesopce facilities in the world on blazar research.