Pluto-Charon Stellar Occultation Candidates: 1996-1999 (original) (raw)

NASA/ADS

Abstract

With the hope of finding stellar occultation events that can be used to answer fundamental questions about Pluto and Charon, we have extended our previous search for stellar-occultation candidates for these bodies to include the years 1996 to 1999. The data for this work are CCD strip scans to about 17.5 R magnitude for stars close to Pluto's and Charon's ephemerides (DE403). We list 60 stars within 1.0 arcsec of Pluto's ephemeris and 64 within 1.0 arcsec of Charon's ephemeris over these four years. In addition, we list our predictions for stars that have been previously published as Pluto and/or Charon occultation candidates [Mink et al AJ, 101, 2255 (1991); Dunham et al AJ, 102, 1464 (1991)]. Four events involve stars brighter than 15th magnitude and minimum separations less than 0.31 arcsec. An appulse with a minimum geocentric separation less than 0.35 arcsec will result in a stellar occultation observable from Earth, but further astrometry and photometry will be necessary to refine individual predictions for identification of actual occultations. Finder charts are included to aid in further studies and prediction refinement.

Publication:

The Astronomical Journal

Pub Date:

August 1996

DOI:

10.1086/118054

Bibcode:

1996AJ....112..788M

Keywords: