Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics
Scientific paper
Jul 2000
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2000hst..prop.8619d&link_type=abstract
HST Proposal ID #8619
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
Hst Proposal Id #8619 Hot Stars
Scientific paper
The very massive, unstable, persistently enigmatic star Eta Carinae has implications for several branches of astrophysics. While HST has produced a series of remarkable discoveries concerning this object, the nature of the central star remains elusive. Now, however, recent developments offer, for the first time, an approach that can settle certain long-standing questions which have been obstacles to understanding this unique object. A 5.5-year spectroscopic and X-ray cycle has been confirmed. STIS now provides the most promising and very likely the only way to test whether Eta Car is a 5.5-yr binary system. If it is, STIS will also allow us to constrain the parameters, needed to assess the companion star's possible role in past outbursts and ejecta. If the data conflict with binary models, then the 5.5-yr effect is probably a thermal cycle which will give novel information about the star's structure. In addition to the periodicity, a large, almost unprecedented brightening, first noticed in HST data, has occurred since 1997 and merits followup observations. We sense a breakthrough in the periodicity and the brightening, if Eta Car can be observed repeatedly with STIS through the current 5.5-year period, 1998.0---2003.5.
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