** Useful Links for Nearby Star Research **
AAVSO - (American Association of Variable Star Observers). This is a quality site for Variable Star information and Light Charts.
ARICNS - (ARI database for Nearby Stars) This is a professional astronomy site for Nearby Star information from the Astronomisches Rechen-Institute of Heidelberg Germany. This is the home site for the Gleise Jahreiss Catalog of Nearby Stars (CNS3).
COSETI - (Colombus Optical Search for Extraterrestrial Intellegence). A visual approach to SETI investigations. This interesting site has a lot of astronomical info., data and links.
CDS - (Centre de Données astronomiques de Strasbourg - France). The ultimate site for astronomical catalogs. With support from NASA, CDS has all available major catalogs and most are web accessable for copying, downloading and querries. Use the VizieR form to access these catalogs that are of specific interest to Nearby Star Investigators:
CNS3 ( V70A ) Gliese/Jahreiss - Catalog of Nearby Stars
GCTP ( I/238 ) Yale - General Catalog of Trigonometric Parallaxes
HIP ( I/239 ) Hipparcos - Main Catalog
Digitized Sky Survey - (DSS) A site where a digitized image of any portion of the celestial sphere can be retrieved in either a Gif or Fits format. Use the Simple Retrieval Form with the SIMBAD resolver for Nearby Stars with a common name or other identifiers. Exact cooridinates can also be specified.
Hipparcos & Tycho Catalogs - A direct access form for these two important catalogs. The Hipparcos catalog contains the most accurate Trigonometric Parallax data to date and contains most of the Nearby Stars. The Tycho catalog contains more of the fainter magnitude stars.
Hubble Space Telescope - The Space Telescope Science Institute site that distributes the Hubble information. This site conatins great data resources and links.
The Internet Stellar Database - A very informative Nearby Stars information site maintained by Roger Wilcox. Submit the star you are inquiring about using either its common name (e.g. Sirius) or its GL/GJ (Gliese/Jahriess) designation (e.g. GL 244). It will provide you with a large amount of scientific and general information about the star.
NSTARS - A NASA / NSF sponsored initiative which has become the central and authoritative web based site for all Nearby Star data. All known (and scientifically verified) data about the stars within a 25 parsec radius (approx. 2600 stars) is presented in an easy to understand and retrieve format.
RECONS - (Research Consortium On Nearby Stars) - The most authoritive Nearby Stars website. A Professional Astronomers Group that is comprised of leading Nearby Star researchers. On going projects include southern hemisphere new parallax measurements and brown dwarf searches. Their scientific papers published under the RECONS banner are available at this site.
3D Universe - An excellent website by David Nash that provides 3D and animated visual presentations of the Nearby Stars based on stellar position measurements taken by the Hipparcos satellite. It also generates sky charts which you can download to your computer.
WDS - (Washington Double Star catalog) - Maintained by the USNO is the world's principal database of astrometric double and multiple star data. The WDS Catalog contains positions (J2000), discoverer designations, epochs, position angles, separations, magnitudes, spectral types, proper motions, and, when available, DM numbers and Notes for the components of more than 81,000 systems based on more than 480,000 measurements.
Jerry Blackwell
NBSO.ORG