We have started a project to search for symbiotic stars using the data from IPHAS, the Hα survey of the Northern Galactic plane. Candidates are selected from the IPHAS photometric catalogue based on their colors, combined with the information in the near-infrared from 2MASS. So far, follow-up spectroscopy allowed us to discover 14 new symbiotic

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How will quasar studies be pursued in the near future? Starting from a summary of past achievement, we ask questions on expected instrumental and computational advancements that can shape quasar research in a foreseeable way. There is excitement due to the planned large new-generation telescopes, ground-based and in space. New surveys will lead to

Considering Galaxy spectra as multidimensional vectors, we use the k-means algorithm and the minimum spanning tree to show that the data in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey do not fill the entire space but are confined to a manifold with very low dimensionality. More precisely, all the spectra can be described in terms of only two degrees of freedom

The CHilean Automatic Supernova sEarch (CHASE) project began in 2007 with the goal to discover young, nearby southern supernovae in order to (1) better understand the physics of exploding stars and their progenitors, and (2) refine the methods to derive extragalactic distances. During the first four years of operation, CHASE has produced more than

Comparison between microlensing on quasars observed and simulated makes it possible to draw conclusions about physical parameters such as source size, quasar brightness profile, mass distribution of the lens, abundance and mass of microlenses, and relative transverse velocity between source and lens. By simulating magnification maps for different