[vsnet-chat 7479] Re: [AAVSO-DIS] Antares (and delta Sco) faint

[Thom Gandet]

Hi, Sebastian,

    Thanks for your post.  It was of great interest!   I can not make
very accurate visual estimates, but I have noticed that delta Sco
is much fainter lately.  Also, Antares seemed a lot fainter to me,
but I couldn't be sure because there are no good comp stars
visible from here.  I'm glad to hear my casual observations are
confirmed!

    I'd like to add my voice to Sebastian's, and others, that the next
couple of years will be important for our knowledge of delta Sco
because periastron in the binary orbit is coming up.  The next two
years will be an excellent opportunity to contribute a lot to
understanding this peculiar Be star, and new observers may be
interested in joining the fun!

    Anatoly Miroshnichenko, at the University of North Carolina,
USA, has a lot of useful info and links about this star at
http://www.uncg.edu/~a_mirosh/Delta_Sco/.


Cheers,
Thom Gandet
Lizard Hollow Observatory
Tucson, AZ USA


----- Original Message ----- 
From: "Sebastián Otero" <varsao at hotmail.com>
To: <aavso-discussion at mira.aavso.org>
Cc: <vsnet-chat at ooruri.kusastro.kyoto-u.ac.jp>
Sent: Monday, August 10, 2009 10:14 PM
Subject: [AAVSO-DIS] Antares (and delta Sco) faint


> Hi, all,
> this might be of interest.
> I had never seen Antares so faint. It is fading to a very faint minimum in 
> its short term pulsation cycle but it is in the middle of a minimum of its 
> long-term periodicity. This combination results in this very faint state. 
> It is almost as faint as beta Crucis tonight (I made it V= 1.23).
> You can see light curves in my webpage:
> http://varsao.com.ar/Curva_alp_Sco.htm
>
> Delta Sco also happens to be in a faint state, almost reaching quiescence. 
> The 60 d.-periodicity that was dominant over the past years seems to be 
> disappearing. Is the star going to stop varying for now? V= 2.25 tonight. 
> (My reported observations to the lists are 0.03 mag. fainter than V 
> probably due to the emission lines. The stronger the H-alpha emission the 
> larger the offset)
> http://varsao.com.ar/delta_Sco.htm
>
> This means that the scorpion looks very much dimmer as a whole!
>
> Best wishes,
> Sebastian.
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> The Santa Barbara Instrument Group (www.sbig.com): Take the next step. 
> SGS,
> the self-guiding spectrograph.