Princeton University Thunch Talk

Even in the modern era, only human eyes survey the entire optical sky for the violent, variable, and transient events that shape our universe. To change this, we have built and implemented the All-Sky Automated Survey for Supernovae (ASAS-SN). This is a long-term project designed to monitor the extragalactic sky down to V~17 mag every 2-3 days using multiple telescopes, hosted by LCOGT, in the northern and southern hemispheres. Our telescopes consist of commercially available telephoto lenses and CCDs, so future expansion is straightforward. The primary focus of the survey is to find bright nearby supernovae (SNe) and other transient sources. We began running our real-time search for variable sources in April 2013 with our first unit, "Brutus", and in May 2014 we have deployed "Cassius" in Chile. ASAS-SN has already found 50+ bright nearby SNe and outbursts from 200+ cataclysmic variable stars, many M-dwarfs, young stellar objects (YSO), AGN and a tidal disruption event 200 Mpc away. ASAS-SN is an ongoing survey which, judging by its current success and future expansion, promises to be innovative and prolific for years to come.