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C C D V I E W S #328
-------------------------- December 2, 2004 Table of Contents -------------------------------------------------------------------------- This issue of CCD Views is a special issue dedicated to updates on various observing campaigns of 2004. It's been a watershed year for our variable star CCD photometry program and we have much to share and be proud of. I suspect 2005 will be even more busy thanks to the launch of SWIFT and the increasing capability of our CCD observers. Stay tuned and start saving up those spousal permission units. The holiday season is a good time to stock up. Aaron -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The Transitsearch.org/AAVSO collaboration marches on. The next campaign will be a challenging one taking place over the holiday season. The target stars are HD 74156 (Hydrae) and HD 37605 (Orionis), observable from both hemispheres so everyone can be involved in this one. The combined transit window begins on December 26, 2004 and lasts until January 3, 2005. We have put online a histogram of the distribution of combined transit times at this URL: http://www.aavso.org/news/transithist.png This will be a tough campaign. Millimag photometric precision will be needed for HD 74156 while HD 37605 will be easier with an estimated transit depth of ~0.02 mag. Both stars are fairly bright so SNR should not be a problem, but scintillation will be. Read CCD Views #324 Section 4. for a good discussion of short exposure photometry: http://www.aavso.org/publications/ccdviews/324.shtml The campaign will be coordinated at this URL, bookmark it and visit often! http://www.aavso.org/news/transits.shtml Since we have two stars with overlapping windows it will be important to coordinate observing. When you begin to observe a star please post a message to the aavso-photometry discussion group (or e-mail me if you are not on the group and I will relay the message) with your target, start time (UT) and estimated stop time (UT). Chances of a positive detection are slim - an estimated 6% for the combined systems. However, as before, non detections are also valuable as they can restrain the dynamics of the system. So all data is useful! Also, the first amateur to discover an exoplanet transit is probably in for some nice publicity and exposure. How many other such opportunities ever come your way? We plan to do more of these campaigns in 2005. So what you learn here will be valuable down the road. So why not participate? ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- We are pleased to announce that "A New Cataclysmic Variable in Hercules" has been accepted for publication in the Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific December, 2004 issue. This paper details the results of the intensive Var Her 04 campaign we ran in June-July of last summer. It is available via the astro-ph preprint server: http://arxiv.org/abs/astro-ph/0411158 The paper has 33 coauthors, of which 19 are AAVSO observers. This is a true example of positive collaboration both amongst intitutions and observers. ** THANK YOU ALL for observing Var Her 04! ** It was a long campaign that required lots of late nights and recalibration of data. But thanks to you all we were able to put out a good paper on what may turn out to be a member of a very small and interesting subgroup of CVs near the period minimum. This paper isn't the end. This winter we'll take it to the next logical step in terms of research and observations to test our hypothesis further. So stay tuned... ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- While the TRES-1 campaign was not formally organized by the AAVSO many AAVSO observers did contribute to it. We are working with transitsearch.org to publish the observations of ten transits observed by AAVSO and transitsearch.org members. One paper has been submitted and is currently under review. We will post news on that paper when we hear back from referees. Note: TRES-1 is still transiting. Arto Oksanen and Nyrola Observatory observed a transit on Nov. 25. The light curve can be seen below: http://www.ucolick.org/%7elaugh/tres1.oksanen.gif And Geir Klingenberg observed the Nov. 28 transit, available here: The Hubble Space Telescope has also observed a recent TRES-1 transit. When results from that observation are released we will let you know via the aavso-photometry discussion group. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------- A paper is currently in development including results from our October campaign on IL Aqr/GJ 876. It seems we did not detect any transits, however the coverage was good enough to rule out most of the transit window and therefore constrain orbital parameters. We hope to have the paper finished by the end of December and submitted for publication in January. We will post updates as they become available. Coauthors will be sent a draft via private e-mail by the end of the month. If you do not get a draft by then, please contact us. >>>> Please Keep observing IL Aqr!!!! <<<< Sampling of IL Aqr November Activity: IL AQR NOV 30.1023 2453339.6023 10.17 JM CCDV Err: N/A IL AQR NOV 29.1135 2453338.6135 10.20 JM CCDV Err: N/A IL AQR NOV 28.1897 2453337.68971 11.03 JM CCDB Err: 0.03 IL AQR NOV 28.1885 2453337.68854 10.19 JM CCDV Err: N/A IL AQR NOV 27.1066 2453336.6066 10.18 JM CCDV Err: N/A IL AQR NOV 26.1972 2453335.69723 10.96 JM CCDB Err: 0.05 IL AQR NOV 22.2423 2453331.74233 10.187 BIQ CCDV Err: 0.002 IL AQR NOV 19.2382 2453328.7382 7.42 GBL CCDI Err: 0.06 IL AQR NOV 19.2319 2453328.7319 9.28 GBL CCDR Err: 0.05 IL AQR NOV 19.2271 2453328.7271 10.21 GBL CCDV Err: 0.05 IL AQR NOV 19.2063 2453328.7063 11.63 GBL CCDB Err: 0.05 IL AQR NOV 13.9938 2453323.4938 10.11 GKA CCDV Err: 0.01 IL AQR NOV 12.1118 2453321.6118 10.08 WDZ/XX1 CCDV Err: 0.001 IL AQR NOV 12.0590 2453321.559 10.12 GKA CCDV Err: 0.01 IL AQR NOV 10.0083 2453319.5083 10.12 GKA CCDV Err: 0.01 IL AQR NOV 07.9910 2453317.491 10.15 GKA CCDV Err: 0.001 IL AQR NOV 06.2111 2453315.7111 10.13 WDZ/DIL CCDV Err: 0.003 IL AQR NOV 05.0312 2453314.5312 10.15 GKA CCDV Err: 0.001 Observers: JM ROBERT JAMES LAS CRUCES NM BIQ RON BISSINGER PLEASANTON CA GBL BRUCE GARY HEREFORD AZ WDZ DON WELLS MISSOURI CITY TX XX1 J. DELLINGER MISSOURI CITY TX GKA KEITH GRAHAM MANHATTEN IL DIL WILLIAM DILLON MISSOURI CITY TX -------------------------------------------------------------------------- The AAVSO International High Energy Network observed the blazar BL Lac during November, with special emphasis on the weekend of November 12-14 (CCD Views #327). The mini-campaign was organized in response to recent activity reported to the GLAST Telescope Network (GTN) as part of our ongoing blazar monitoring campaign. The response from this mini-campaign request was superb! In November we receieved 1,423 V observations, 993 Ic observations, 281 Rc observations and 107 B observations. A light curve for November is available here: http://www.aavso.org/news/bllac.png Our colleagues at GTN said they are both "humbled" and "awed" at the data they received. Among the most important features that they were looking for and found were short lived dimming episodes, sort of like an anti-flare. They are currently unexplained and we received good data on them. Continue to monitor BL Lac as part of your regular campaign. If you can, get a few hours per month of time series in V and Ic as well. Also, add "3C 66A AND" to your observing program because it will likely be the subject of our next minicampaign and baseline data would be appreciated so we can help time the campaign for periods of interesting activity. -------------------------------------------------------------------------- BZ UMa is well placed for observations once again. We need monitoring of this enigmatic faint CV to look for any quiescent flaring that may occur due to possible magnetism. We may coordinate a follow up quiescent campaign to our observations from last April. Monitoring observations need to be filtered and with as good precision as possible. So this is an object for those of you with good aperture and long exposures. Monitor it once a week or so and once a month do a time series run of a few hours. If you notice activity, take data for as long as possible. Do this for the next couple of months. A DARE!: If any of you think you can get 0.01 mag filtered precision with a time resolution better than 5 minutes then please consider an all-night observing run. For that type of project you can go unfiltered. If you do this, please e-mail me after submitting your data. Recent activity: BZ UMA NOV 29.3167 2453338.8167 16.61 MDW CCDV Err: 0.10 BZ UMA NOV 26.2826 2453335.7826 16.54 MDW CCDV Err: 0.06 BZ UMA NOV 23.3201 2453332.8201 16.68 MDW CCDV Err: 0.04 BZ UMA NOV 16.3618 2453325.8618 16.31 MDW CCDV Err: 0.10 BZ UMA NOV 15.3729 2453324.8729 16.60 MDW CCDV Err: 0.04 BZ UMA NOV 14.3806 2453323.8806 16.39 MDW CCDV Err: 0.04 BZ UMA NOV 09.3826 2453318.8826 16.65 MDW CCDV Err: 0.03 BZ UMA NOV 04.3764 2453313.8764 16.42 MDW CCDV Err: 0.03 Observer: MDW WALTER MACDONALD WINCHESTER, ONTARIO, CANADA --------------------------------------------------------------------------- To receive CCD Views via e-mail send a message to majordomo@aavso.org with "subscribe ccdviews" in the body of the e-mail. To unsubscribe, place "unsubscribe ccdviews" in the e-mail. The AAVSO has many free online publications including "Eyepiece Views", a similar newsletter intended for visual observers. To learn more and subscribe visit: http://www.aavso.org/mailinglists.stm Good observing! Aaron Price, AAVSO Technical Assistant (PAH) Copyright 2004, American Association of Variable Star Observers |
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