About ASRU

Our purpose

Astronomy has produced an enormous public record of the sky, from glass plates exposed more than a century ago to the images that amateur astronomers take every clear night. Much of it has only ever been looked at once, for one purpose.

ASRU exists to help people look at these images again, more carefully. We develop open computational methods, including machine learning, to find, measure and classify what is in astronomical images. We publish everything we make, explain how it was made, and report honestly where it fails.

We also want to make this kind of work open to people who are not professional astronomers. Most of our members are not. They are students, engineers, teachers and amateur observers who like the sky and are good at something useful.

How the Union is organized

ASRU is governed by its bylaws, which the members adopted at the Founding Assembly on November 7, 2026. The General Assembly of all members is the highest decision-making body and meets at least once a year. Between assemblies the Union is run by an elected Council of 5, four of whom live in Portland. Each research program is led by a Council member; the other members take part in whatever interests them, in their spare time.

Members who live nearby meet every other week in Portland, and everyone else joins by video call. ASRU has no paid staff and no office. Members pay their own way to events, and the Union’s small running costs are covered by voluntary contributions from members.

Independence

ASRU is not affiliated with any university, observatory or government agency. When this site mentions other organizations, it is to credit public data or images we use, or to describe places we have visited. None of them endorses ASRU or its work.

One Council member, Mareike Schulte, works on professional astronomy projects in Germany. She supports ASRU in a personal capacity, with technical advice and help finding professional tools and public data. ASRU has no agreement with her employer.