International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics

The International Olympiad on Astronomy and Astrophysics (IOAA) is an annual astronomy and astrophysics competition for high school students. It is one of the international science olympiads.[1]

IOAA 2012 at Rio Planetarium, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil

The Olympiad was founded from a dissidence inside the International Astronomy Olympiad, in order to increase the scope of the organization.

History

  • The first Olympiad was held in the city of Chiang Mai (Thailand) from November 30 to December 9, 2007. The International Council, consisting of team leaders, elected a president (Dr. Boonrucksar Soonthornthum, Thailand) and a secretary general (Dr. Chatief Kunjaya, Indonesia) for a five-year term.[2]
  • The second Olympiad was held in 2008, from August 19 to 28, in the city of Bandung (Indonesia). It was attended by representatives of 22 countries.
  • The third Olympiad was held in 2009, from October 17 to 27, in Tehran. An observation tour was conducted in the desert. Representatives of 20 countries took part in the Olympiad.
  • The fourth Olympiad was held in 2010, from September 12 to September 21, in Beijing. 114 participants of the Olympiad came from 23 countries.
  • The fifth Olympiad was held in 2011, from August 25 to September 4, in the Polish cities of Katowice, Chorzów and Kraków. For the first time the Olympiad was held in Europe. Representatives of 26 countries took part in the Olympiad. In Poland, the International Council elected a new president (Dr. Chatief Kunjaya, Indonesia) and a secretary general (Dr. Greg Stachowski, Poland). Regional coordinators were also elected (Dr. Thaís Mothé Diniz, Brazil, for America and Dr. Aniket Sule, India, for Asia).
  • The sixth Olympiad was held in 2012, from August 4 to 13. For the first time the Olympiad was held in America in the Brazilian cities of Rio de Janeiro and Vassouras. Representatives of 28 countries took part in the Olympiad.
  • The seventh Olympiad was held in 2013, from July 27 to August 4 in the Greek city of Volos. The competition was attended by 39 teams from 35 countries, including for the first time teams from the USA, New Zealand, Canada, Malaysia, Armenia, the Republic of Macedonia and Cyprus.
  • The fourteenth Olympiad was supposed to be held in Bogotá, Colombia. However, due to the COVID-19 pandemic, the competition was moved to an online format and Colombia was moved to 2021. This competition was not named IOAA, but GeCAA (meaning Global e-Competition on Astronomy and Astrophysics) and did not count as the 14th IOAA. It was held 23rd September 2020 to 23rd October 2020. Estonia was the host country.

Summary

NumberYearHost countryHost cityAbsolute winnerCountries RepresentedWebsite
12007  ThailandChiang Mai  Thailand Suwun Suwunnarat21* 1st IOAA, 2007
22008  IndonesiaBandung  India Nitin Jain22* 2nd IOAA, 2008
32009  IranTehran  India Nitin Jain20* 3rd IOAA, 2009
42010  ChinaBeijing  Poland Przemysław Mróz23* 4th IOAA[dead link], 2010
52011  PolandChorzów / Katowice / Kraków  Czech Republic Stanislav Fořt26IOAA 2011
62012  BrazilRio de Janeiro / Vassouras  Lithuania Motiejus Valiūnas28IOAA 2012
72013  GreeceVolos  Romania Denis Turcu35* 7th IOAA Archived 2013-05-15 at the Wayback Machine, 2013
82014  RomaniaSuceava / Gura Humorului  Romania Denis Turcu42
92015  IndonesiaMagelang / Semarang  Indonesia Joandy Leonata Pratama41
102016  IndiaBhubaneswar  India Ameya Patwardhan42IOAA 2016
112017  ThailandPhuket  Slovenia Aleksej Jurca44IOAA 2017
122018  ChinaBeijing  Russia Stanislav Tsapaev39IOAA 2018
132019  HungaryKeszthely & Hévíz  Vietnam Nguyễn Mạnh Quân46IOAA 2019
N/A[a]2020  Estonia[b]N/A  Canada Zhening Li40GeCAA
142021  ColombiaBogotá (online)  Russia Maksim Permiakov48IOAA 2021
152022  GeorgiaKutaisi  Romania Vlad Ștefan Oros45IOAA 2022
162023  PolandChorzów / Katowice  Slovenia Peter Andolšek52IOAA 2023
172024  BrazilVassourasTBD

The 1st IOAA-Jr, for the students under 16 years of age was held in Romania from 30th October to 7th November 2022. The 2nd IOAA-Jr was held in Volos, Greece from 24th to 30th September 2023, and its age restriction was lowered to students under 15.[3]

Participating Countries

Source: https://www.ioaastrophysics.org/participating-countries/

Results

Source: https://www.ioaastrophysics.org/results/

Prize winners

High-scoring participants

The following table lists multiple (triple and more) gold medal winners of IOAA with their ranks and corresponding years.

NameTeam(s)Years
Denis TurcuRomania2013 (1st)2014 (1st)
Stanislav FořtCzech Republic2010 (8th)2011 (1st)2012 (2nd)
Peter KosecSlovakia2010 (5th)2011 (4th)2012 (5th)
Daniil DolgovRussia2016 (8th)2017 (3rd)2018 (11th)
Jindřich JelínekCzech Republic2016 (9th)2018 (5th)2019 (7th)
Peter AndolšekSlovenia2021 (29th)2022 (10th)2023 (1st)

Note: Several countries (e.g. India, Indonesia, Iran, Thailand) do not allow their students to contest in IOAA more than two times, even if they are eligible. Thus, statistics from those countries is not included in the table above.

References

External links