Abstract
THE determination of stellar parallaxes by photography has shown a striking improvement in recent years, and the results obtained with the Yerkes refractor are of the highest order of excellence. Two of the precautions observed in this and similar series of measures are the taking of all th6 plates at small hour-angles, so as to minimise the effect of unequal atmospheric dispersion in the stars, arid the reduction of the magnitude of the parallax star to equality with file comparison stars. This latter precaution is necessary, since any inequality in the driving will have a different effect on the images of objects that differ much in brightness. The usual way of effecting this is by rotating a screen in the form of a sector of a circle in front of the brighter image. By altering the angle of the sector, any desired diminution of light may be obtained.
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CROMMELIN, A. Photographic Determinations of Stellar Parallax 1 . Nature 101, 88 (1918). https://doi.org/10.1038/101088a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/101088a0