(cba:news) Outburst of VW Hyi

[Joe Patterson]

Dear CBAers,

Despite the rash of fascinating targets in this month's night skies - 
and in particular the first-in-history eruption of BW Scl - I'm inclined 
to give VW Hyi an emphatic welcome to the CBA menu.  Although it has 
been studied a lot, it has never been thoroughly studied with today's 
"all-telescopes-all-the-time" techniques... and as one of the 
nearest/brightest dwarf novae, it promises to yield a lot of information 
from such close scrutiny.  In particular:
(1) the fascinating but still little-known fine structure of superhumps 
(nw-mW, where n and m are unequal integers);
(2) the details of how power gets shuffled between orbit and superhump 
frequencies;
(3) the possible transient appearance of negative superhumps; and
(4) the precise shape of the long-term O-C.

With very nearly global coverage of the outburst, I bet VW Hyi would 
have something useful to contribute to each of these questions.  And 
that doesn't even count the harvest of unanticipated results... which is 
the usual outcome of *any* scientific experiment!

I imagine that VW Hyi will be an all-night target for you australites... 
which might threaten BW Scl somewhat.  I hope there's enough telescopes 
and overlap of coverage to permit both targets!

joe


Why?  Because it's one of the very brightest of dwarf novae

-------- Original Message --------
Subject: [vsnet-alert 13894] Outburst of VW Hyi
Date: Sat, 26 Nov 2011 11:19:53 +0100
From: Josch Hambsch <hambsch at telenet.be>
To: <vsnet-alert at ooruri.kusastro.kyoto-u.ac.jp>



Dear all,

I have been observing VW Hyi for the past two nights on request and 
observed a rise in magnitude from about 13.5 on Nov. 24/25 to 10.1 on 
Nov. 25/26.
I have taken time series during both nights (the last night is still 
busy to be analysed) and those will be submitted to VSNET and AAVSO.
Please advice whether I should continue time series or only snapshots 
during the coming nights.

Regards,

Josch

http://www.astronomie.be/hambsch