Speckle interferometry at SOAR in 2014

TL;DR

This paper reports speckle interferometric observations at SOAR in 2014, resolving new binary stars, improving existing orbits, and providing precise measurements for a large sample of stellar systems.

Contribution

First-time resolution of 56 binary pairs and new orbital solutions, enhancing the understanding of binary star systems with high-precision data.

Findings

Resolved 56 new binary pairs, including nearby binaries.

Improved 148 existing binary star orbits.

First-time orbits for 46 binary systems.

Abstract

The results of speckle interferometric observations at the SOAR telescope in 2014 are given. A total of 1641 observations were taken, yielding 1636 measurements of 1218 resolved binary and multiple stars and 577 non-resolutions of 441 targets. We resolved for the first time 56 pairs, including some nearby astrometric or spectroscopic binaries and ten new subsystems in previously known visual binaries. The calibration of the data is checked by linear fits to the positions of 41 wide binaries observed at SOAR over several seasons. The typical calibration accuracy is 0.1deg in angle and 0.3% in pixel scale, while the measurement errors are on the order of 3mas. The new data are used here to compute 194 binary-star orbits, 148 of which are improvements on previous orbital solutions and 46 are first-time orbits.