I was browsing posters; there were so many but the acronym ANOVA couldn’t miss my eyes. I decided to take a look. The poster was made by an education graduate student who designed experiments on children and performed a statistical analysis (ANOVA) with collected data to find a factor that affects children (testing the significance of a factor via the F-test). Frankly, I didn’t read it through but was desperate to know the occasion in astronomy where ANOVA can be utilized. I was half excited because ANOVA appeared in the AAS meeting and half disappointed because ANOVA was not performed as a part of astronomical research. A train of thoughts, nonetheless, came along.

ANOVA or statistical methods from design of experiments may be of no use in astronomical experiments (collecting data by observations, i.e. collecting random incidents seems to not allow experiment designing stages). However, these methods can be used in evaluating proposals, summaries of projects’ quality, standardizing decision making processes, improving usages of instrument times, and so on. These statistical experiment design tools could be a servant to improve the procedures of collecting data and allocating time slots, and could amplify already tremendous efforts of renovating/creating expensive instruments.

Experiment design has never been of my interest because I could not see any chance of using them in astronomy. Upon finding ANOVA at the AAS, my second thought combined with my experience at CfA is now quite opposite to my first thought. There are plenty of rooms where well sought experiment design can be adopted in the astronomical society.