Abstract
THE BINARY STAR β DELPHINI.—In 1873 Burnham discovered that the primary star of the well-known wide doublestar 13 Deiphini wa itself a very close double, and a few years' observations sufficed to shox that it was a binary star in rapid motion. As the companion star has now described over 180° of its apparent path, a fairly accurate approximation to the elements of its orbit is possible. An attempt has accordingly been made, first by Dubiago and more recently by Gore, to determine the orbit, with tolerably accordant results. The former makes the period to be 26.07 years, with perihelion passage at 1882.19 and semi-axis major 0″.55. Gore finds the period to be 30.91 years, and fixes the periastron passage at 182.25, with semi-axis major = 0″.517. The observations are fairly well represented by these elements, considering what a close and difficult object the star is to measure. According to Gore's elements the components were at their minimum distance, 0″.192, at the epoch 1879.91; and during 1879 Burnham failed to elongate the star with the 181/2inch Dearborn refractor. We hope that those double-star observers who p ssess sufficiently powerful telescopes will not lose sight of this interesting object.
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Our Astronomical Column . Nature 33, 518 (1886). https://doi.org/10.1038/033518a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/033518a0