3.11

Open clusters in the Hipparcos Catalogue

 

Holger Baumgardt, Christian Dettbarn, Burkhard Fuchs, Roland Wielen, Heidelberg

 

Complete text (abstract only):

A status report on our ongoing project to determine the proper motions of star clusters is given. We have searched the Hipparcos catalog for possible members of open clusters. Probable members were identified by combining already existing ground-based data (photometry, radial velocities, ground-based proper motions, distance from the cluster centre) with the new information provided by Hipparcos (proper motions, parallaxes). In total about 700 probable members in nearly 200 clusters were identified. During our search we found that several stellar groupings, once thought to be open clusters, are only chance alignments of stars. On the other hand, the Hipparcos data add further evidence to the reality of some dubious clusters.


Bibliographical details:

Holger Baumgardt, Christian Dettbarn, Burkhard Fuchs, Roland Wielen: Open clusters in the Hipparcos Catalogue. In: Peter Brosche, Wolfgang R. Dick, Oliver Schwarz, Roland Wielen (Eds.): The Message of the Angles - Astrometry from 1798 to 1998. Proceedings of the International Spring Meeting of the Astronomische Gesellschaft, Gotha, May 11-15, 1998. (Acta Historica Astronomiae; 3). Thun ; Frankfurt am Main : Deutsch, 1998, p. 202.