The All Sky Automated Survey. The Catalog of Bright Variable Stars in the I-band, South of Declination +28

TL;DR

This paper catalogs over 27,000 bright variable stars in the southern sky using I-band data from the ASAS survey, providing light curves, classifications, and cross-identifications, significantly expanding the known bright variable star database.

Contribution

It presents the first extensive catalog of bright variable stars in the I-band for the southern sky, including new detections and automated classification methods.

Findings

Over 27,000 variable stars identified and cataloged.

7842 stars detected as variable for the first time.

Data and classifications publicly available online.

Abstract

This paper presents the results of our extensive search for the bright variable stars in approximately 30000 square degrees of the south sky in the I-band data collected by 9 deg x 9 deg camera of the All Sky Automated Survey between 2002 and 2009. Lists of over 27000 variable stars brighter than 9 mag at maximum light, with amplitudes ranging from 0.02 mag to 7 mag and variability time-scales from hours to years, as well as corresponding light curves are provided. Automated classification algorithm based on stellar properties (period, Fourier coefficients, 2MASS J, H, K, colors, ASAS V-band data) was used to roughly classify objects. Despite low spatial resolution of the ASAS data (~15 arcs) we cross-identified all objects with other available data sources. Coordinates of the most probable 2MASS counterparts are provided. 27705 stars brighter than I=9 mag were found to be variable, of which 7842 objects were detected to be variable for the first time. Brief statistics and discussion of the presented data is provided. All the photometric data is available over the Internet at http://www.astrouw.edu.pl/~gp/asas/AsasBrightI.html