Searching for Treasure in the South: Red Dwarfs within 25 Parsecs

Details Searching for Treasure in the South: Red Dwarfs within 25 Parsecs Searching for Treasure in the South: Red Dwarfs within 25 Parsecs

Jan 2012

adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2012aas...21934507h&link_type=abstract

American Astronomical Society, AAS Meeting #219, #345.07

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astronomy

Scientific paper

We describe the RECONS (REsearch Consortium On Nearby Stars) effort to find the missing red dwarf star systems in the solar neighborhood, defined here to be those closer than 25 parsecs. Knowing that there are currently 37 red dwarf systems known within 5 parsecs, and assuming a constant density of star systems in the solar neighborhood, we predict there to be roughly 4600 red dwarf star systems within 25 parsecs. But how many have been identified? Here we present results of our comprehensive reconnaissance of the southern sky, focused on red dwarf systems having proper motions in excess of 0.18"/yr. Using BRI plate magnitudes from the SuperCOSMOS Sky Survey and photometry from 2MASS, we have found 1711 star systems estimated to be within 25 parsecs, or 74% of the anticipated 2300 systems in the southern sky. However, 1041 of the star systems do not have the trigonometric parallaxes required to verify their proximity. Since 1999, we have been obtaining accurate VRI photometry at the CTIO 0.9m to improve distance estimates (also in concert with 2MASS photometry), and measuring trigonometric parallaxes for the closest systems. Here we provide a census of the southern red dwarf systems, which span V magnitudes of 7.3 to 20.4. At present, the 25 parsec census includes 750 systems with plate distance estimates, 270 systems with CCD distance estimates, and 660 systems with trigonometric parallaxes, for a total of 1700 systems. These nearby red dwarfs will be the fundamental sample to inform us about the stellar content of the Milky Way, and provide the benchmark luminosity and mass functions against which star formation scenarios must be reconciled.
This effort is supported by the NSF through grants AST-0908402 and AST-1109445, and via observations made possible by the SMARTS Consortium.

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