Astronomical Yearbook
The "Astronomical Yearbook" had been published since 1921 by the Russian Academy of Sciences. It contains the ephemerides of the Sun, the Moon, major planets, and stars computed with the maximum precision in the accordance with the resolutions approved by the International Astronomical Union (IAU). From AY-2016 the ephemerides EPM2011/m developed at IAA RAS was used as a ephemerical basis for the calculation of ephemerides of the Sun, the Moon and major planets with accuracy adequate to DE ephemerides. The IAU2006/2000 precession-nutation model is introduced into practice. The sidereal time is calculated from Earth rotation angle and by formula of Equation of the Equinoxes accepted by "IERS Conventions 2003". Fundamental catalogue FK6 was used at calculation of star' ephemerides, and the ephemerides of the stars which were not including in this catalogue, are based on use of catalogue HIPPARCOS.
Since issue for the year 2007 in the "Astronomical Yearbook" along with classical ephemerides the data for reckoning in accordance with the new Celestial Intermediate Reference System (CIRS) are published.
The "Astronomical Yearbook" contains the data on sidereal time, barycentric coordinates and velocities of the Earth, rotation matrix of precession and nutation, reduction values, osculating orbital elements of the major planets, ephemerides for physical observations of the Sun, the Moon, the major planets and Saturn's rings.
Together with mean places of stars the apparent places are given with the 10 sideral interval for 732 stars used in Pevtsov's and Zinger's methods and the daily apparent places of 47 circumpolar stars are tabulated also in AY. The tables for latitude determinations from observations of Polaris and tables of altitude and azimuth for Polaris are given.
In the "Astronomical Yearbook" a great deal of information is also given on various astronomical phenomena such as the phases of the Moon, planetary configurations, occultations of planets by the Moon, rises and sets of the Sun and Moon, etc.
Yearbook contains detailed data on solar and lunar eclipses, transits of Mercury and Venus over the disk of the Sun. Basic circumstances and Besselian elements of eclipses, table of path of the central eclipses and eclipse map are given. If the eclipse could be observed in Russia, the additional table of local circumstances for some towns of Russia and observations over world are published. For lunar eclipses and transits of planets the basic information are given only.
Explanation including examples describes the used algorithms and helps to calculate various ephemerides for any place of observation. In 2004 the Transactions of IAA of RAS, issue 10) containing "The Explanatory Supplement to the Astronomical Yearbook" was published. The descriptions of the algorithms used by AY was included in it. Moreover the description of new modern theories of the motion of major planets, the time scale of ephemeris astronomy, the precession-nutation models and new concept of the Celestial Intermediate Origin (CIO) are also presented. The "Astronomical Yearbook" can serve as an ephemeris standard in any work.
Alongside with the printed original of AY the electronic version is offered. It includes archived files of data in DOS-format for appropriate year.
Editors
- N. B. Zheleznov, Ph.D. (editor-in-chief) znb@iaaras.ru
- M. V. Lukashova, Ph.D. (deputy editor-in-chief) lmv@iaaras.ru
- V. I. Skripnichenko, Ph.D.
- G. A. Kosmodamianskij