Jena 2013 – scientific programme

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EP: Fachverband Extraterrestrische Physik

EP 4: Poster Session

EP 4.16: Poster

Tuesday, February 26, 2013, 11:15–12:45, Poster OG

Orbital motion of the binary brown dwarf companions HD130948BC around their host star — •Christian Ginski, Ralph Neuhäuser, Markus Mugrauer, Tobias O. B. Schmidt, and Christian Adam — Astrophysikalisches Institut und Universitäts-Sternwarte Jena, Jena 07745, Germany

Evolutionary models and mass estimates for brown dwarfs remain uncertain, hence determining the masses of brown dwarfs by model-independent methods is important to test and constrain such theories. Following the orbital motion of brown dwarf companions around their primaries gives us the opportunity to dynamically calculate the masses of these systems. In addition, detecting curvature (acceleration or deceleration) in the orbit would confirm that the companion is physically associated with its primary, thus eliminating the possibility of a by-chance alignment of the primary’s and the companion’s proper motions and positions. Furthermore, the orbit parameters can be important indicators for the formation process of such wide, massive sub-stellar companions.

The binary brown dwarf companions to HD 130948 were discovered by Potter et al. 2002. We present various observations of this triple system over the course of seven years. With these data points we can infer that HD 130948 BC show orbital motion around A.