Summer With the Variable Stars (Abstract)

Volume 29 number 2 (2001)

Lee Anne Willson

Department of Astronomy and Physics Iowa State University Ames, IA 50011

Abstract

(Abstract only) This summer three undergraduate students worked with me on three projects using AAVSO light curves together with infrared light curves from the South Africa Astronomical Observatory. Sean Patterson, Bradley University junior, worked on O-C diagrams at different wavelengths, and in the process of doing this he rediscovered the Harrington effect. Carleton Miller, ISU junior, looked at the correlation of light curve shapes with mass loss rates from the infrared color index K-L to check whether the correlation discovered by Bowers and Kerr (P. F. Bowers, and F. J. Kerr, 1977, Astron. and Astrophys., 57, 115) (from OH maser data) holds for the IR color as well. Kevin Marasinghe, Cal Tech sophomore and Ames native, focused on methods for automating the predictions for the AAVSO, and devised a novel but physically well-grounded approach to this problem as well as some new and unexpected patterns in the light curves. In this presentation I will describe this "Mira Gang" and discuss their results.