Mark Trueblood

Mark Trueblood was born in Cincinnati, Ohio in 1948. He became interested in astronomy when his parents took him out into the night to show him auroras, Echo balloon satellites, lunar eclipses, and other nighttime phenomena. He read Texereau's book on telescope mirror making when he was 11, and when he was 12, he ordered a mirror making kit from Edmund Scientific Company and ground, polished, and figured a 6-inch f/8 mirror for a Newtonian telescope. He then made the telescope using parts purchased from the Edmund catalog using money from his allowance and from mowing lawns. The mirror was overcorrected into a hyperbola, but with the help of the local amateur astronomy club and a commercial firm, the mirror was finally done before he was 14. Mark got the telescope working, but lost interest in telescope making and astronomy until graduate school, where he met Andrew J. Tomer at Wesleyan University.

It was Andy, with the encouragement of Irv Winer, who got Mark interested in telescope building and astronomy again. Andy introduced Mark to Sky & Telescope magazine, to using arc welders, vertical milling machines, and lathes, and to many of the practical aspects of telescope design and construction. Once hooked on this part of amateur astronomy, Mark became interested in astrophysics, optics, and other aspects of astronomy and instrument building that took him to a Master's Degree in astronomy and his present job of overseeing the design and construction of instruments for the 8-m Gemini telescopes in the US. Mark's educational and career highlights are summarized below.

In May 2001, the International Astronomical Union honored Mark by naming asteroid number 15522 'Trueblood' upon the recommendation of the asteroid's discoverer, Charles W. Juels, MD of Fountain Hills, Arizona. Dr. Juels discovered the asteroid on December 14, 1999 whereupon the Minor Planet Center gave it the provisional designation 1999 XX136 and announced the official name in Minor Planet Circular 42675. When the orbit was known with sufficient accuracy that it was unlikely to be lost, it was given the number 15522 and Dr. Juels was given the right for the next 10 years to propose a name. Mark is honored that he chose to name his discovery after him. To see a diagram of the orbit of 15522 Trueblood, please click here.

Education:

• AB-ScB Physics (cum laude), Brown University, 1971
• (no degree), Wesleyan University, 1972
• MS Astronomy, University of Maryland, 1983

Affiliations:

• Member 1990 - present, Tucson Amateur Astronomy Association (TAAA)
• Member 1999-2002, Sonoita Astronomy Club
• Member, American Astronomical Society
• Member, Friends of MIRA (Monterey Institute for Research in Astronomy)
• Life Member, International Amateur-Professional Photoelectric Photometry
• Member 1988 - present, International Dark-sky Association
• Member 1977-2003, International Occultation Timing Association (IOTA)
• Member 1987-1989, American Institute for Aeronautics and Astronautics, Technical Committee on Space Science and Astronomy

Awards and Honors:

• Executive Director's Award, International Dark-Sky Association
• Naming of minor planet 15522 'Trueblood' by the IAU

Research Interests:

• Near Earth Objects (asteroids whose orbits bring them near the Earth)
• Minor Planet Astrometry (refining the orbits of asteroids)
• Minor Planet Photometry (brightness and color of asteroids)
• Minor Planet Occultations (timing the disappearance of asteroids behind the Moon)
• Epistemology and the Problem of Consciousness

Positions Held:

• 1983-, Winer Observatory, Scientific Director
• 1990-, Association of Universities for Research in Astronomy
  • 1994-, Project Engineer, NOAO Gemini Science Center, overseeing US instrument development for the 8-m Gemini telescopes
  • 1990-94, Senior Scientific Programmer, National Solar Observatory, developing the data archive for the Global Oscillation Network Group project
• 1981-1990, Ford Aerospace Corporation
  • 1990, Program Manager, opportunity manager for a $100 million, 200 person contract for operations at NASA/GSFC
  • 1988-1990, Program Manager, GOES I-M Telemetry and Command System (GIMTACS) contract project manager
  • 1987-1988, Section Supervisor, assigned to the Systems, Engineering, and Analysis Support (SEAS) contract at NASA/GSFC
  • 1985-1987, Program Manager, Hubble Space Telescope control center (PORTS) contract program manager
  • 1984-1985, PORTS Deputy Program Manager, Hubble Space Telescope control center (PORTS) contract
  • 1983-1984, POCC Applications Support System (PASS) Program Manager
  • 1981-1983, Senior programmer/analyst responsible for the PORTS Virtual Interface Processor software
• 1979-1981, General Electric Space Systems Division, Analyst/Computer Applications, Landsat D ground system
• 1974-1978, The Dilks Company, Senior Programmer Analyst, instrument data acquisition and display system for airport control towers for the FAA
• 1974-1978, Computer Sciences Corporation, software engineering for NASA/GSFC and EPA projects
• 1974-1983, Consultant to LeSchack Associates, Ltd., software engineering of remote sensing geophysics applications
• 1972-1974, Smithsonian Institution, metrology lab technician
• 1971-1972, Wesleyan University, teaching assistant in the Physics Department
• Summer 1971, Environmental Protection Agency, worked in Water Quality Office on oil spill reporting
• Summer 1970, Brown University, Department of Physics, NSF research grant working on Josephson junctions
• Summer 1969, University of Massachusetts, Department of Physics, NSF research grant working on P-N junction diodes as low temperature thermometers
• Summer 1968, Sheridan Associates, programmer, small business management information system
• Summer 1967, Procter and Gamble, programmer, researched critical path algorithms for project management
• Summer 1966, Procter and Gamble, programmer, multiple regression studies of market testing techniques for advertising

Books:

• Trueblood, Mark and Genet, Russell Merle, Telescope Control, Willmann-Bell (Richmond: 1998)
• Trueblood, Mark and Genet, Russell M., Microcomputer Control of Telescopes, Willmann-Bell (Richmond: 1985)

Papers and Articles:

• Pepper, Joshua; Pogge, Richard, W.; DePoy, D.L.; Marshall, J.L.; Stanek, K.Z.; Stutz, Amelia M.; Poindexter, Shawn; Siverd, Robert; O'Brien, Thomas P.; Trueblood, Mark; and Trueblood, Patricia, 2007, "The Kilodegree Extremely Little Telescope (KELT): A Small Robotic Telescope for Large-Area Synoptic Surveys", PASP, 119, 858, pp. 923-935.
• Smith, R.C.; Dickinson, M.; Lowry, S.; Miller, C.J.; Trueblood, M.; and Valdes, F., 2007, "The NOAO End-to-End Data Management System: An Overview" in "Astronomical Data Analysis Software and Systems XVI ASP Conference Series", Vol. 376, proceedings of the conference held 15-18 October 2006 in Tucson, Arizona, USA. Edited by Richard A. Shaw, Frank Hill and David J. Bell, p. 615.
• Pepper, J.; Pogge, R.; DePoy, D.L.; Marshall, J.L.; Stanek, K.; Stutz, A.; Trueblood, M.; and Trueblood, P., 2007, "Early Results from the KELT Transit Survey" in "Transiting Extrasolar Planets Workshop ASP Conference Series", Vol. 366, Proceedings of the conference held 25-28 September, 2006 at the Max Plank Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, Germany. Edited by C. Afonso, D. Weldrake, and Th. Henning. San Francisco: Astronomical Society of the Pacific, p. 27.
• Trueblood, M., 2006, Book Review: "Killer Rocks from Outer Space: Asteroids, Comets, and Meteorites; by Steven N. Koppes", Meteorite, 12, 2, 40.
• Crawford, Robert W. and Trueblood, M., 2004, "Statistical Properties of a Two-Stage Procedure for Creating Sky Flats" in "Proceedings for the 23rd Annual Conference of the Society for Astronomical Sciences", Mais, D., Kenyon, D. A., and Warner, B. D., eds., 151-161.
• Pilachowski, C. and Trueblood, M., 1998, "Telescopes of the 21st Century", Mercury, 27, 5, 10.
• Trueblood, M., Erdwurm, W., and Pintar, J.A., 1995, "Storing and Distributing GONG Data", in Astronomical Data Analysis Software and Systems IV, Shaw, R.A., Payne, H.E., and Hayes, J.J.E., eds., ASP Conference Series Volume 77, p. 185.
• Trueblood, Mark, 1995, "Avoiding Clouds: GPS Keeps Astronomers Under Clear Skies", GPS World, 6, 6, 32.
• Trueblood, Mark, 1994, "Call for Amateur HST Observing Proposals", IAPPPC, 54, 28.
• Trueblood, Mark, 1993, "In the Shadow of the Asteroid", GPS World, 4, 11, 22.
• Boyd, L.J., Epand, D., Bresina, J., Drummond, M., Swanson, K., Crawford, D.L., Genet, D.R., Henry, G.W., McCook, G.P., Neely, W., Schmidtke, P., Smith, D.P., and Trueblood, M., 1993, "Automatic Telescope Instruction Set 1993", IAPPPC, 53, 23.
• Trueblood, Mark, 1992, "The Case for Automatic Photoelectric Telescopes Using High Speed Photometers", in Automated Telescopes for Photometry and Imaging, Adelman, Saul J., Dukes, Jr., Robert J., and Adelman, Carol J., eds., ASP Conference Series Volume 28 (San Francisco: 1992), p. 149.
• Trueblood, Mark, "Reduction, Storage and Distribution of Helioseismic Data for the GONG Network", IAPPPC, 45, 45.
• Genet, Russell M.; Genet, David R.; Talent, David L.; Drummond, Mark; Hine, Butler P.; Boyd, Louis J.; and Trueblood, Mark, 1991, "Multi-Use Lunar Telescopes" in "Robotic Telescopes in the 1990's; Proceedings of the Symposium 103rd Annual Meeting of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific", University of Wyoming, Laramie, June 22-24, 1991 (A93-36457 14-89), 289-303.
• Trueblood, Mark, 1991, "Linear Position Transducer Helps Mobile Observatory Focus On The Stars", manuscript circulated privately.
• Tomer, Andrew J., and Trueblood, Mark, 1989, "A Motorized Cassegrain Secondary", Telescope Making, 45, 6.
• Tomer, Andrew J., and Trueblood, Mark, 1989, "Anaheim Automation Helps Focus on the Stars", Anaheim Automation NEWS, 7,1,1.
• Trueblood, Mark, "A New Facility for Remote Location Astronomy", poster paper presented at the January, 1989 AAS meeting, listed in the Bulletin of the AAS, Volume 20, p.952, September 1988.
• Trueblood, Mark, and Genet, Russell M., 1988, "Real-Time Control", Sky & Telescope, 76, 5, 537.
• Trueblood, Mark, and Genet, Russell M., 1988, "Where Is the Telescope Mounting Headed?", Sky & Telescope,76,5,565.
• Trueblood, Mark, 1987, "In the Shadow of an Asteroid: High Resolution Graphics Help Control a Mobile Telescope", manuscript circulated privately. Rewritten by Deborah Hotteling, 1988, "The Mystery of Asteroids", Computer Graphics World, October, p. 88.
• Trueblood, Mark, 1987, "A High-Speed Photometer Interface for the MicroVAX Q-Bus", p. 325 in Hayes, D.S., Genet, D.R., and Genet, R.M., eds., New Generation Small Telescopes, Fairborn Press (Mesa)
• Trueblood, Mark, 1987, "Special Halley Issue", Letter to the Editor, Sky & Telescope, 73, 6, 581.
• Trueblood, Mark, 1986, "Highlighting Halley's: Inexpensive Image Processing Helps Astronomers Unlock the Universe", Computer Graphics World, September.
• Trueblood, Mark, 1986, "Use of Navigation Receivers at the Winer Mobile Observatory", manuscript circulated privately.
• Trueblood, Mark, 1985, "Image Processing at the Winer Mobile Observatory", manuscript circulated privately.
• Trueblood, Mark, 1985, "Winer Mobile Observatory: Mid-1985 Progress Report", IAPPP Communications, 22, 14.
• Genet, Russell M., Boyd, Louis J., and Trueblood, Mark, 1985, "Stepper Motor Control of Small Telescopes", Sky & Telescope, Part I (April, 69, 4, 350), Part II (May, 69, 5, 448)
• Trueblood, Mark, "The Space Telescope Payload Operations Control Center" in Genet and Genet, eds., Microcomputers in Astronomy - II, Fairborn Observatory (Fairborn: 1984), 11.
• Boyd, Louis J., Genet, Russell M., and Trueblood, Mark, 1984, "Telescopes for Microcomputer Control", Telescope Making, 22, 28.
• Trueblood, Mark, "Three Components Make Stable Crystal Oscillator", EDN Magazine, July 1972.

Minor Planet Circulars

• 51593, 1 (2004); Trueblood, M.
• 52502, 11 (2004); Trueblood, M.
• 56161, 8 (2006); Schwartz, M; Merlin, J.-C.; Ory, M.; Holvercem, P.R.; Trueblood, M.; Crawford, R.

Last modified: April 18, 2008.