Star catalogue

Star catalogs used in astronomy to a large number of stars by different properties, to listen in book form or To record databases. The most important parameters are

• The star positions ( accurate star positions ) in the celestial coordinate system;
• The proper motions of these stars were when highly accurate star positions exist for some decades and examined for systematic changes;
• The spectral or the color indices of the stars.

Because of their huge number of most stars are referenced by their respective catalog numbers. There are quite a few different star catalogs which have been created over the years for different purposes. This article lists only the most commonly used catalogs. Most of the jobs created in recent times catalogs from the Astronomical Data Center at NASA or elsewhere downloaded (see links).

• 3.1 Aitken double star catalog (ADS )
• 3.2 Gliese ( Gl ) and Gliese Jahreiß ( GJ)
• 3.3 Hipparcos (HIP )
• 3.4 Fundamental Catalogs
• 3.5 Further catalogs

Historic Catalogs

Although he has long been no longer used by serious astronomers, the star catalog of Ptolemy should be mentioned, which contains 1022 stars visible from Alexandria, and AD was published as part of his Almagest in the 2nd century. He was for over a thousand years the standard catalog in the Western and Arab world. The catalog was based to some extent on a previous of Hipparchus of Nicaea from the 2nd century BC An even earlier catalog was that of Timocharis of Alexandria, which was about 300 BC, and later used by Hipparchus wrote.

Two systems that have been introduced in historical catalogs, are still used today. The Bayer letters from Johann Bayer's star catalog Uranometria from 1603, where the brighter stars of each constellation were labeled with Greek letters, such as γ or κ Orionis Lyrae.

A little more than a hundred years later followed in 1712 Flamsteed designations from the Historia Britannica coelestis of John Flamsteed, in the place of scarce Greek letters numbers were used. The same example star hot here 24 Orionis and 1 Lyrae.

Bayer and Flamsteed recorded only a few thousand stars, all of which are visible to the naked eye. In theory, should the remaining star catalogs list for the entire sky. There are, however, alone in the Milky Way billions of stars, this is an unattainable goal. Therefore, most attempts in this kind of catalogs, perform each star, which is brighter than a given apparent magnitude.

Catalogs of the whole sky

Henry Draper Catalogue (HD / HDE)

The Henry Draper Catalogue of the Harvard College Observatory was published in nine volumes 1918-1924 and represents the first large-scale effort is to catalog the spectral types of stars. It covers the entire sky and contains 225 300 stars down to an apparent magnitude of 9m. 1949, the catalog was supplemented by a further 133 783 to a total of 359 083 stars. The position data both times refer to the astronomical epoch 1900.0.

The stars are in it with the abbreviation followed by the HD number of the star referenced, such as HD 185,037th Even with the stars of the extension catalog ( HDE, HD extension) is mostly used HD, since the additional stars are clearly numbered. HD numbers are now frequently used in stars which have no or Bayer Flamsteed designation.

SAO catalog

The catalog of the Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory (SAO catalog) was created around 1965 for satellite geodesy in the standard epoch 1950.0. It contains 250,000 stars down to 9m from different sources. Therefore, there is a considerable overlap with the HD catalog. On the northern sky he has accuracy better than 1 ". A set of nearly 200 star maps complements the 4- volume work.

In the latest edition is the epoch of the position data J2000.0. SAO catalog includes an additional important piece of information that does not include the HD directory, namely, the natural motion of the stars. Therefore, it is often used if it is important. In the last version also the corresponding numbers are given in the HD and BD catalog.

The names in the SAO catalog start with the letters SAO, followed by a number. The numbers are assigned eighteen 10 ° bands, the stars are ordered within a band by right ascension.

Bonner, Southern, Cordoba and Cape Photographic Screening (BD / SD / CD / CPD)

The Bonner Durchmusterung and its subsequent editions were the most comprehensive catalogs before photography was introduced for this purpose.

The Bonner Durchmusterung (BD ) itself has been edited by Friedrich Wilhelm Argelander, Adalbert Krüger and Eduard Schönfeld 1852-1859. It contained the loci of 324 198 stars in the epoch 1855.0.

Since they almost covering only the northern hemisphere, it was in 1886 by the Southern survey (SD) with 120,000 stars and 1892 by the Córdoba - screening (CD) extended again with 580,000 stars. Finally, in 1896, followed by the Cape Photographic Screening (CPD ) with 450,000 stars again.

Astronomers generally attract before the HD name of a star, because in him and spectroscopic information are included. But as much contain the surveys more stars, these older terms are sometimes used when there is no entry in the HD catalog exists.

In the survey catalogs star with the initials of the respective work (BD, SD, CD, CPD ), followed by the declination in degrees and a further number are excellent. The latter number is more or less arbitrary, as there are at any declination angle of thousands of stars. Examples of this type are known as BD or CD 1725 50 ° -45 ° 13677th

U.S. Naval Observatory ( USNO - B1.0 )

The USNO - B1.0 is a catalog of researchers from the United States Naval Observatory, which contains for 1,042,618,261 objects the places proper motions, apparent magnitudes at various wavelengths and estimates of whether it is a star or galaxy, determined from 3,643 .201.733 individual observations. The data were obtained by cataloging of 7435 Schmidt plates taken at different surveys over the past 50 years.

From the USNO - B1.0, it is believed that it covers the entire sky down to 21m, an accuracy of 0.2 "with respect to the epoch J2000.0 and an accuracy of 0.3 m in the photometric light measurement in up to five colors and has 85 % accuracy in distinguishing stars from non- stellar objects.

Other catalogs

• Bright Star Catalogue (HR)
• Positions and Proper Motions (PPM ): Catalogue of the Astronomical computing Institut Heidelberg
• Tycho and Tycho -2 ( TYC, TYC2 ): 1,058,322 stars to 11.5 m or 2,557,501 to 12m, in the context of the Hipparcos project (see below ) were recorded.
• Guide Star Catalog (GSC )
• USNO CCD Astrograph Catalog ( UCAC )

Special catalogs

Specialized catalogs are not aimed at all the stars of heaven list, but instead star or astronomical objects of a particular type, such as variable stars, double stars or very nearby stars.

Aitken double star catalog (ADS )

In his catalog New general catalog of double stars within 120 deg of the North Pole from 1932 Robert Grant Aitken leads to 17,180 double stars from -30 ° to 90 ° declination.

Gliese ( Gl ) and Gliese Jahreiß ( GJ)

The catalog of Wilhelm Gliese ( Gl ), and later with Hartmut Jahreiß ( GJ), has the goal to gather all stars within 25 parsecs around the Earth. It was extended several times:

• Catalogue of Nearby Stars ( Catalogue of nearby stars, 1969, Gliese ): the second edition with numbers from 1.0 to 965.0. Decimal points have been inserted here to distinguish them from the stars of the first edition. The catalog itself is also known as CNS2, but not in conjunction with the catalog numbers.
• Extension of the Gliese catalog ( Gliese extension of the catalog, 1970, Woolley, Epps, Penston and Pocock ): numbers 9001-9850.
• Nearby Star Data Published 1969-1978 (data of nearby stars, published from 1969 to 1978, 1979, W. Gliese and H. Jahreiß ): With the numbers from 1000 to 1294 nearby stars are denoted by 2001-2159 such, of which this is suspected.
• Preliminary Version of the Third Catalogue of Nearby Stars ( Preliminary Version of the Third Catalogue of nearby stars, in 1991, Gliese and Jahreiß ): numbers 3001-4388.

Although latter version of the catalog has been described as " preliminary ", it is still used ( in September 2001) and CNS3 is called. It contains 3803 stars, of which most had already GJ numbers, but also new in 1388. An example of an already well-known star in this " unofficial " version is FY 3021, of a planet ( exoplanet ) GJ 3021 b is encircled.

→ See also: Category: Gliese star catalog Jahreiß

→ See also: List of nearest stars

Hipparcos (HIP )

The Hipparcos Catalogue is evaluated from data of the astrometric satellite Hipparcos of the European Space Agency ESA compiled, which was in use between 1989 and 1993. The catalog was published in 1997 and contains 118 218 stars in Unprecedented precision - an average of ± 0.003 " It 's interesting because of its parallax, which are much more accurate than made ​​from observatories on the ground, and because of the measurements of radial velocities. .

In addition to these very precise measurements of the satellite charted a variety of other stars with a slightly lower accuracy. These two Tycho catalogs, Tycho and Tycho 2, containing 1 or 2 million stars with 0.03 " accuracy.

Fundamental Catalogs

In so-called fundamental catalogs the positions and proper motions of stars are listed that have been accurately measured over long periods of time. You set a special, absolute coordinate system, the fundamental system, which largely corresponds to an inertial system.

This " fundamental stars " can be used for different types of measurements, in which a high absolute accuracy is required, eg for latitude, plumb or local time. The catalog FK3 (1937 ) was followed by 1963 twice as extensive FK4 rake of the Astronomical Institute of Heidelberg in 1535 and 1988 stars of the fundamental catalog FK5. Since 2000, with Hipparcos significantly refined FK6 stars with 3300 is in use.

Other catalogs

• General Catalogue of Variable Stars ( GCVS ): 68 179 variable stars
• Washington Double Star Catalog ( WDS): 83 211 double stars
• Yale Parallax Catalogue ( 1952): 5822 stars with accuracy ( ground based ) ± 0.01 ''