These data are formally published for the years 1900 to 2008.  For a description of this data set, please click here.

The Harvard Designation of Variable Stars

Margaret W. Mayall
This appeared in Vol. 5, No. 1 of the Journal of the AAVSO

Elizabeth O. Waagen, Janet A. Mattei, and Matthew R. Templeton

Click here for data access

Introduction

Long-term observations of long period variable stars are essential to the determination of period, change in period, change in behavior resulting from mass loss and/or evolution, mode of pulsation (fundamental or overtone), internal structure, and phase at specific times for these stars.

A number of papers have been written discussing visual magnitude estimates in comparison to photometry.  Multiple studies have shown that visual magnitude estimates compare very favorably with instrumental photometry in terms of sensitivity and consistency.  As with all data, care must be taken to understand what visual magnitude estimates represent, what their bandpass is, and when their use is appropriate.

1. JD: The Julian Date of the observation.
2. Magnitude: The magnitude estimate of the observation. A < sign means it was a null observation "fainter than" the magnitude given.
3. Uncertainty: Uncertainty (error) of the observation as submitted by the observer
4. HQuncertainty: Uncertainty (error) of the observation as calculated by AAVSO Headquarters
5. Band: Bandpass of the observation.

Overview: Long-term visual light curves

This page gives background on our long-term visual data archives, with an emphasis on our data holdings for different classes of variable stars.  It is meant to give an overview of the AAVSO International Database (AID) to researchers interested in studying a number of different light curves of a given class, or who are interested in a summary of what the AAVSO's visual data archives have to offer.