Searching for Variable Stars in the Open Cluster NGC 2355 and Its Surrounding Region

TL;DR

This study conducted a comprehensive search for variable stars in and around NGC 2355, discovering 88 variables, classifying their types, and analyzing their cluster membership using Gaia data, thereby enhancing understanding of this open cluster.

Contribution

The paper reports the discovery of 72 new variable stars in NGC 2355 and provides detailed classification and membership analysis, expanding previous knowledge of the cluster's variable star population.

Findings

88 variable stars detected, including 72 new discoveries.

Identified 26 eclipsing binaries, 52 pulsating stars, 4 rotating variables.

Four new variable star candidates are confirmed as cluster members.

Abstract

We have investigated the variable stars in the field surrounding NGC 2355 based on the time-series photometric observation data. More than 3000 CCD frames were obtained in the V band spread over 13 nights with the Nanshan One-meter Wide-field Telescope. We have detected 88 variable stars, containing 72 new variable stars and 16 known variable stars. By analyzing these light curves, we classified the variable stars as follows: 26 eclipsing binaries, 52 pulsating stars, 4 rotating variables, and 6 unclear type variable stars for which their periods are much longer than the time baseline chosen. Employing Gaia DR2 parallax, kinematics, and photometry, the cluster membership of these variable stars were also analyzed for NGC 2355. In addition to the 11 variable members reported by Cantat-Gaudin et al. (2018), we identify 4 more variable member candidates located at the outer region of NGC 2355 and showed homogeneity in space positions and kinematic properties with the cluster members. The main physical parameters of NGC 2355 estimated from the two-color and color-magnitude diagrams are log(age/yr) = 8.9, E(B - V) = 0.24 mag, and [Fe/H] = - 0.07 dex.