Determining the True Binarity of Herbig Ae/Be Objects
Abstract
Herbig Ae/Be stars are intermediate mass (2-8 solar masses), pre-main sequence stars. They are just in the mass range between low and high mass, so understanding these objects will give us clues about star formation as a function of mass. They are usually found in binary or multiple systems, and by studying the properties of the secondary star in the presence of a higher mass companion, we can learn about what is the environment's effect on star formation.
In this work, we are checking the binarity of 67 objects with possible companions seen in AO images; for 21 of these we have spectra of the secondary stars. For this purpose we are using the proper motion of the stars and a statistical aproach, and we are combining this with physical information like spectral types, magnitudes, and separation between the primary and its companion to determine if the companion is physically bound or not. We find that both methods are useful in different ways but also both of them have trouble when the primary is in a cluster. From the statistical analysis we find that it's better to limit the sample to a certain secondary magnitude, because the most fainter companions always have a high probability of being unrelated to the primary. This work was supported by the National Science Foundation under grant no. 0353843.- Publication:
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American Astronomical Society Meeting Abstracts
- Pub Date:
- December 2007
- Bibcode:
- 2007AAS...211.6225A