Hostname: page-component-5c6d5d7d68-txr5j Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-08-15T10:24:28.115Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Automated Proper Motion Survey: Data Reduction and Initial System Performance

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  12 April 2016

A. E. La Bonte
A. E. La Bonte*
Affiliation:
Control Data Corporation

Extract

Core share and HTML view are not available for this content. However, as you have access to this content, a full PDF is available via the ‘Save PDF’ action button.

The Automated Proper Motion Survey (APMS) has three broad goals-accuracy, completeness, and efficiency in the discovery and measurement of stellar proper motions on pairs of red-sensitive photographic star plates taken with the forty-eight inch Schmidt telescope. The specific range of motions sought is from 0.1 to 2.5 seconds-of-arc per year. The lower limit of 0.1 arc sec/year is consistent with the inherent uncertainties in the photographic emulsion and the typical epoch difference between plate exposures. At the opposite end of the scale, extension of the search radius beyond that corresponding to 2.5 arc sec/year would result in a prohibitively large number of spurious matches and a significant increase in processing time while yielding extremely few (though individually interesting) additional stellar motions. The specific range of stellar magnitudes sought is from 12 to 19 red. Significant motions for stars brighter than the limit mred = 12 are already fairly well documented and the corresponding bright Schmidt images begin to show extensive contamination from diffraction spikes, “blazes” radially away from the plate center, and photographic “bloom”. At the other limit, although images of stars fainter than mred = 19 are visually discernible on the plates (the plate limit is typically mred= 20), inspection of the faintest images reveals that they are amorphous and often quite asymmetric clusters of photographic grain. Thus, both the motion limits and the magnitude limits for the survey have been selected to cover the range of reliable and largely unexplored data on the plate material. The implementation of APMS, then, is tailored to these goals and ranges.

Type
Research Article
Information
International Astronomical Union Colloquium , Volume 7: Proper Motions , August 1965 , pp. 26 - 47
Copyright
Copyright © University of Minnesota 1970

References

1.“The National Geographic Society – Palomar Observatory Sky Survey Minkowski, R.L. and Abell, G.O., Appendix II, BASIC ASTRONOMICAL DATA, edited by Strand, K. A., pages 481–487, University of Chicago Press, 1963.Google Scholar
2.“Proper Motion Survey with the Forty-Eight Inch Schmidt Telescope, I. Organization and Purpose” Luyten, Willem J., The Observatory, University of Minnesota, 1963.Google Scholar
3.“The Luyten-Control Data Stellar Proper Motion Measuring Machine” Newcomb, J. S., Proceedings of IAU Colloquium No. 7 – Conference on Proper Motions, Minneapolis, Minnesota, 21-23 April 1970 (This is the preceeding paper in the present volume.)Google Scholar
4. Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory Star Catalog, Smithsonian Institution, Washington D. C., 1966 (This publication includes a computer-compatible magnetic tape version of the catalog.)Google Scholar
5.“Photoelectric Magnitudes and Colors of Stars in Selected Areas 57, 61, and 68” Stebbins, J., Whitford, A. E. , Johnson, H. L., Astrophys. J. 112 469–476(1950). (Mt. Wilson magnitudes)10.1086/145361CrossRefGoogle Scholar
6. Mt. Palomar magnitudes, W. A. Baum, unpublished (This data extends the SA 57 Magnitude Sequence down to the limits of the 200 inch Telescope.)Google Scholar
7.“Proper Mothion Survey with the Forty-Eight Inch Schmidt Telescope, III. Six Northern Regions”, Luyten, Willem J., The Observatory, University of Minnesota, 1964.Google Scholar