Solar System Objects and the AAVSO Photometric All-Sky Survey (APASS) (Abstract)

Volume 47 number 1 (2019)

Stephen Levine

Lowell Observatory, 1400 West Mars Hill Road, Flagstaff, Arizona 86001; sel@lowell.edu

Arne Henden

106 Hawkins Pond Road, Center Harbor, NH 03226; ahenden@gmail.com

Dirk Terrell

4932 Peakview Street, Erie, CO 80516; terrell@boulder.swri.edu

Doug Welch

100 Melville Street, Dundas, ON L9h 2A3, Canada; welch@physics.mcmaster.ca

Brian Kloppenborg

3450 Miller Drive, Unit 1116, Atlanta, GA 30341; brian@kloppenborg.net

Abstract

(Abstract only) The AAVSO Photometric All-Sky Survey, data release 10 (APASS DR10) can be used for photometric calibration of observations of moving objects. Because APASS provides calibrated photometry over the whole sky, it makes it much simpler to tie together observations of objects, like asteroids and comets, that move appreciable distances over the time they are observed. Because the photometric standards are in each image, it will also be possible to recover photometry at the few percent level from non-photometric nights. In addition to providing calibration for new observations, the original APASS data comprise over 500,000 images, each 7.8 square degrees in size, taken over the course of more than nine years. We have searched those images for known Solar System bodies, and present the initial results of this search. For many of the objects found, we have simultaneous five color (B,V, g', r', and i') photometry. APASS provides photometric standards in at least five colors over the magnitude range 7 to 17, which makes it a good match for calibration for telescopes ranging from a few inches in size up to several meters.