*** USET Groups *** Values in the USET sunspot group catalog are
derived from the solar drawings obtained by the Uccle Solar Equatorial
Table (USET) facility that is located at the Royal Observatory of
Belgium. The USET sunspot group catalog covers 82 years of
observations in 2021, and is updated every day. A home-made software
(DigiSun) written in Python is used to derive quantities such as
location and areas from the sunspot drawings.
For the classical Cepheid U Sgr, we have constructed an O-C diagram spanning a time interval of 144 years. The O-C diagram has the shape of a parabola, which has made it possible to determine for the first time the quadratic light elements and to calculate the rate of evolutionary increase in the period, dP/dt=0.39(+/-0.10)s/yr, in agreement with the results of theoretical calculations for the third crossing of the instability strip. The available data reduced by the Eddington-Plakidis method reveal small random period fluctuations that do not distort the evolutionary trend in the O-C residuals.
We present a case study in which we used a novel method to identify red supergiant (RSG) candidates in NGC 6822 based on their 1.6um H-bump. We collected 32 bands of photometric data for NGC 6822 ranging from the optical to the mid-infrared (MIR), derived from Gaia, PS1, LGGS, VHS, UKIRT, IRSF, HAWK-I, Spitzer, and WISE. Using the theoretical spectra from MARCS, we demonstrate that there is a prominent difference around 1.6um (H-bump) between targets with high and low surface gravity (HSG and LSG). Taking advantage of this feature, we identify efficient color-color diagrams of rzH (r-z versus z-H) and rzK (r-z versus z-K) to separate HSG (mostly foreground dwarfs) and LSG targets (mainly background red giant stars, asymptotic giant branch stars, and RSGs) from crossmatching of optical and near-infrared (NIR) data. Moreover, synthetic photometry from ATLAS9 gives similar results. We further separated RSG candidates from the remaining LSG candidates as determined by the H-bump method by using semi-empirical criteria on NIR color-magnitude diagrams, where both the theoretic cuts and morphology of the RSG population are considered. This separation produced 323 RSG candidates. The simulation of foreground stars with Besancon models also indicates that our selection criteria are largely free from the contamination of Galactic giants. In addition to the H-bump method, we used the traditional BVR method (B-V versus V-R) as a comparison and/or supplement by applying a slightly aggressive cut to select as many RSG candidates as possible (358 targets). Furthermore, the Gaia astrometric solution was used to constrain the sample, where 181 and 193 targets were selected with the H-bump and BVR method, respectively. The percentages of selected targets in the two methods are similar at ~60%, indicating a comparable accuracy of the two methods. In total, there are 234 RSG candidates after combining targets from the two methods, and 140 (~60%) of them are in common. The final RSG candidates are in the expected locations on the mid-infrared color-magnitude diagram with [3.6]-[4.5]<~0 and J-[8.0]~1.0. The spatial distribution is also coincident with the far-ultraviolet-selected star formation regions, suggesting that the selection is reasonable and reliable. We indicate that our method can also be used to identify other LSG targets, such as red giants and asymptotic giant branch stars, and it can also be applied to most of the nearby galaxies by using recent large-scale ground-based surveys. Future ground- and space-based facilities may promote its application beyond the Local Group.
This catalog is a special subset of the Eichhorn et al. (1970) Pleiades catalog (see <I/90>) updated to B1950.0 positions and with proper motions added. It was prepared for the purpose of predicting occultations of Pleiades stars by the Moon, but is useful for general applications because it contains many faint stars not present in the current series of large astrometric catalogs.
The catalog provides positions and proper motions at equinox and epoch J2000.0, on the FK5 system, for stars in the magnitude range 4-10, lying within 16 degrees of the ecliptic and north of declination -30 degrees. In order that references to earlier catalogs can be made, the B1950.0 positions and proper motions are given in both the FK5 and the FK4 systems. Other useful information, such as visual magnitudes and spectral types, is also provided. Stellar identification is strictly by Durchmusterung number, and the catalog is ordered by J2000.0 right ascension. It is important to understand that the present catalog does not cover the entire zodiacal zone, since stars south of zone -29 degrees could not be observed from the Washington site. These will be observed from the USNO Black Birch station in New Zealand commencing in 1991.
This table contains the metadata for the plates that went into USNO-B
1.0 as best as we can reconstruct it (i.e., largely those that also
make up the Digital Sky Survey DSS). Most of the source files were
obtained from http://www.nofs.navy.mil/data/fchpix/, some additional
contributions came from Dave Monet.
Accurate positional measurements of planets and satellites are used to improve their orbits, our knowledge of their dynamics and to infer the accuracy of the planet and satellite ephemerides. In the framework of the European FP7 ESPaCE program, we provide the positions of Mars, Phobos, and Deimos taken with the U.S. Naval Observatory 61-inch astrometric reflector and 26-inch refractor from 1967 to 1997. 425 astrophotographic plates were measured with the digitizer of the Royal Observatory of Belgium and reduced through an optimal process which includes image, instrumental, and spherical corrections using the UCAC4 catalog to provide the most accurate equatorial (RA, DEC) positions.
The U.S. Naval Observatory CCD trigonometric parallax program is described in detail, including the instrumentation employed, observing procedures followed, and reduction procedures applied. Astrometric results are presented for 72 stars ranging in apparent brightness from V=15.16 to 19.58. Photometry (V and V-I on the Kron-Cousins system) is presented for the parallax stars and for all 426 individual reference stars employed in the astrometric solutions. Corrections for differential color refraction, calibrated to the observed V-I colors, have been applied to all astrometric measures. The mean errors in the relative parallaxes range from +/-0.0005" to +/-0.0027" with a median value of +/-0.0010". Seventeen of the 23 stars with V_tan_>200km/s form a well-delineated sequence of extreme subdwarfs covering 11.5<M_V_<14.5 in the M_V_ vs V-I diagram. The transformation to the M_bol_ vs log T_eff_ plane is presented and the results are compared with various model interior computations. Within the limitations due to the uncertain T_eff_ scale for cool dwarfs and subdwarfs, the coolest members of the extreme subdwarf sequence appear to be near the hydrogen-burning minimum mass limit for stars with metallicities of [M/H]~-2.
