(cba:news) FS Aurigae

[Joe Patterson]

          FS AUR

Gary Poyner's announcement of a brightnening in this star, a dwarf nova
candidate, brings up some history.  We in the CBA have been tracking the
star episodically for the past two years, and it shows a pretty
well-defined photometric period of 0.143 d (with no information yet about
how, if at all, this depends on luminosity state).  Yet John Thorstensen 
(the "horse's mouth" on such matters) firmly avows that the radial-
velocity period is close to 0.0595 d.  We've been trading "are you sure?"
queries for two years.

Well, at this point we *are* sure, but haven't the foggiest idea why the
star should have two very well-defined, stable, and incommensurate
periods.  Wouldn't you like to help us find out?  Photometry in the higher
brightness state (perhaps not quite right to call it an "eruption" but
anyway brighter) is likely to help us a lot.  Will the signal be
enhanced? reduced? destroyed?  Who knows... there are precedents for
all, and its actual behavior is likely to guide us along to find the right
answer.  So we're doing a CBA campaign on the star right now, and would
greatly welcome your contributions!


Joe Patterson CBA-New York  jop at astro.columbia.edu
              www.cbastro.org