While one of the IAU's missions is to “serve as the internationally recognized authority for assigning designations to celestial bodies and surface features on them” (†), the participation of the public in the naming of celestial objects has been a little-known, but decade-long tradition of the IAU.

The simultaneous photometric and spectroscopic observations of the spotted G dwarf AP149 in the young open cluster α Persei are analyzed here. We reconstruct the observed light curves with a two-starspot model by means of a light curve modeling technique, and find that the active regions shift oppositely along longitude on a time scale of one day. Combining with the observational data obtained by other groups, we discuss the evolution of spotted regions in the photosphere, and find that its starspots evolve not only on a short time scale but also on a long time scale. The pure chromospheric emissions for Ca IIHK and H β lines are derived by using the spectral subtraction technique. The variation of Ca IIHK lines' excess emission is spatially correlated to the starspot regions. There is no clear rotational modulation for the H β line's excess emission, probably due to the contamination of prominence emission.

The IAU Division C Commission 55, Communicating Astronomy with the Public, played an active role in Union affairs within Division C, Education, Outreach and Heritage. The International Astronomical Union (IAU) vested considerable responsibility for its public outreach efforts in Commission 55 (C55), Communicating Astronomy with the Public. This article briefly recounts the origin and history of C55 over the past decade, and describes the work of C55 until it became Division C Commission C.C2 in 2015. As stated on our website, http://www.communicatingastronomy.org, C55 was founded on the principle that “it is the responsibility of every practising astronomer to play some role in explaining the interest and value of science to our real employers, the taxpayers of the world.” While this was true a decade ago, when the Working Group that eventually became C55 first took shape, it is even more true today, when funding for the astronomical sciences (and science more generally) is under threat on nearly every continent.

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Since 2003, the Communicating Astronomy with the Public (CAP) Conference has facilitated the exchange of ideas and best practices among professionals in the field. This paper reports on the latest edition, CAP 2018, organised in Fukuoka, Japan. It presents a few quantitative outcomes of the conference, the programme and a selection of ideas that were presented and discussed during the meeting. For further details, please consult the Book of Proceedings Communication Astronomy with the Public Conference 2018 2nd Edition, available at: https://www.communicatingastronomy.org/cap2018/