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New determination of the angular diameter of Sirius

Nature volume 323, pages 234–235 (1986)Cite this article

Abstract

We report a new determination of the angular size of α CMa (Sirius), which has yielded an equivalent uniform disk diameter of 5.63 ±0.08 arc ms. This result represents the first measurement of a main-sequence star by amplitude interferometry and clearly demonstrates that accurate determinations of angular diameters are possible with a small–aperture (100 mm diameter) amplitude interferometer through the turbulent atmosphere. This observation is also the first independent check of any of the angular diameters measured with the Narrabri stellar intensity interferometer1. Such confirmation is significant because the temperature scale for stars hotter than the Sun is based on the Narrabri data2. The new result is in excellent agreement with the earlier value and was obtained in only ∼2% of the observing time required for the intensity interferometer.

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References

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Chatterton Astronomy Department, School of Physics, University of Sydney, NSW, 2006, Australia

    John Davis & William J. Tango

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  1. John Davis
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  2. William J. Tango
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Davis, J., Tango, W. New determination of the angular diameter of Sirius. Nature 323, 234–235 (1986). https://doi.org/10.1038/323234a0

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