Hubble Space Telescope spectroscopy of the Balmer lines in Sirius B

@article{Barstow2005HubbleST,
  title={Hubble Space Telescope spectroscopy of the Balmer lines in Sirius B},
  author={Martin A Barstow and Howard E. Bond and Jay B. Holberg and Matthew R. Burleigh and Ivan Huben{\'y} and Detlev Koester},
  journal={Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society},
  year={2005},
  volume={362},
  pages={1134-1142}
}
Sirius B is the nearest and brightest of all white dwarfs, but it is very difficult to observe at visible wavelengths due to the overwhelming scattered light contribution from Sirius A. However, from space we can take advantage of the superb spatial resolution of the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) to resolve the A and B components. Since the closest approach in 1993, the separation between the two stars has become increasingly favourable and we have recently been able to obtain a spectrum of the… Expand
View PDF on arXiv
84 Citations
Highly Influential Citations
12
Background Citations
24
Methods Citations
20
Results Citations
3

Figures and Tables from this paper

84 Citations

Citation Type

Citation Type

The Sirius System and Its Astrophysical Puzzles: Hubble Space Telescope and Ground-based Astrometry
Sirius, the seventh-nearest stellar system, is a visual binary containing the metallic-line A1 V star Sirius A, brightest star in the sky, orbited in a 50.13-year period by Sirius B, the brightest… Expand
ADONIS high contrast infrared imaging of Sirius-B
Context. Sirius is the brightest star in the sky and a strong source of diffuse light for modern telescopes so that the immediate surroundings of the star are still poorly known. Aims. We study the… Expand
SIRIUS B IMAGED IN THE MID-INFRARED: NO EVIDENCE FOR A REMNANT PLANETARY SYSTEM*
Evidence is building that remnants of solar systems might orbit a large percentage of white dwarfs, as the polluted atmospheres of DAZ and DBZ white dwarfs indicate the very recent accretion of… Expand
O VI in the Local Interstellar Medium
TLDR
It appears that there is much less O VI-bearing gas than previously stated within the inner rarefied regions of the local interstellar cavity, and there is no strong evidence to support a spatial correlation between O VI and SXRB emission. Expand
Project 1640 observations of the white dwarf HD 114174 B
We present the first near infrared spectrum of the faint white dwarf companion HD 114174 B, obtained with Project 1640. Our spectrum, covering the Y, J and H bands, combined with previous TaRgetting… Expand
Establishing HZ43 A, Sirius B, and RX J185635-3754 as soft X-ray standards: a cross-calibration between the Chandra LETG+HRC-S, the EUVE spectrometer, and the ROSAT PSPC
Context. The absolute calibration of space-borne instruments in the soft X-ray regime rests strongly on model spectra of hot white dwarfs. Aims. We analyze the Chandra LETG+HRC observations of the… Expand
Detection of the gravitational redshift in the orbit of the star S2 near the Galactic centre massive black hole
The highly elliptical, 16-year-period orbit of the star S2 around the massive black hole candidate Sgr A✻ is a sensitive probe of the gravitational field in the Galactic centre. Near pericentre at… Expand
The gravitational redshift of Sirius B
Special thanks to Blair Porterfield, Joleen Carlberg and the team at STScI for all their help and advice during the phase 2 proposal. We thank the referee for helpful comments. SRGJ acknowledges… Expand
PRESSURE SHIFT AND GRAVITATIONAL REDSHIFT OF BALMER LINES IN WHITE DWARFS: REDISCUSSION*
The Stark-induced shift and asymmetry, the so-called pressure shift (PS) of Hα and Hβ Balmer lines in spectra of DA white dwarfs (WDs), have been examined in detail as masking effects in measurements… Expand
SOPHIE velocimetry of Kepler transit candidates. I. Detection of the low-mass white dwarf KOI-74b
The Kepler mission has detected transits and occultations of a hot compact object around an early-type star, the Kepler Object of Interest KOI 74. The mass of this transiting object was… Expand
...
1
2
3
4
5
...

References

SHOWING 1-10 OF 30 REFERENCES
Hubble Space Telescope Absolute Spectrophotometry of Vega from the Far-Ultraviolet to the Infrared
The Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph (STIS) has measured the absolute flux for Vega from 0.17–1.01 μm on the Hubble Space Telescope white dwarf (WD) flux scale. These data are saturated by up to… Expand
RECENT SPECTROGRAPHIC OBSERVATIONS OF THE COMPANION OF SIRIUS
According to the general theory of relativity, light waves originating in a strong gravitational field should have a lower frequency than the normal ones for these radiations, so that the lines in… Expand
Sirius B: A new, more accurate view
TLDR
The mass and radius for Sirius B are found to be consistent with the theoretical mass-radius relation for a carbon-core white dwarf. Expand
A comparison of DA white dwarf temperatures and gravities from FUSE Lyman line and ground-based Balmer line observations
The observation of the strengths and profiles of the hydrogen Balmer absorption series is an established technique for determining the effective temperature and surface gravity of hot H-rich white… Expand
A New Temperature Determination for Sirius B from IUE: Implications for the Observed Soft X-Ray Fluxes
We have used IUE archive observations to obtain a new and independent estimate of the effective temperature of Sirius B. In this effort we have modeled the observed Lyman alpha profile of Sirius B as… Expand
The far-ultraviolet energy distribution of Sirius B from Voyager 2
Observations of Sirius obtained with the Voyager 2 ultraviolet spectrometer clearly reveal the presence of flux from the white dwarf Sirius B at wavelengths between 950 and 1100 A. These observations… Expand
The Formation Rate and Mass and Luminosity Functions of DA White Dwarfs from the Palomar Green Survey
Spectrophotometric observations at high signal-to-noise ratio were obtained of a complete sample of 348 DA white dwarfs from the Palomar Green (PG) Survey. Fits of observed Balmer lines to synthetic… Expand
Comparison of White Dwarf Models with STIS Spectrophotometry
Computed flux distributions for four white dwarf (WD) stars with nearly pure hydrogen atmospheres are tied to the Vega flux scale with V-band Landolt photometry. With broadband photometric precision… Expand
The Temperature Scale and Mass Distribution of Hot DA White Dwarfs
Results are presented from a comprehensive spectroscopic survey of DA white dwarfs hotter than ~25,000 K. The observations consisted of CCD spectra with signal-to-noise ratios of ~100 in the blue,… Expand
The high-resolution photospheric soft X-ray spectrum of Sirius B
High-resolution soft X-ray spectra of Sirius B have been obtained with the 500 lines/mm transmission grating spectrometer on Exosat. A large grid of model atmospheres has been used to constrain the… Expand
...
1
2
3
...