Day 15

Today, Joel gave me a project to work on while Rudy is gone. I'm not sure if it exactly relates to what my final project will be, but if I get enough done with it before Rudy comes back, maybe I will present it along with my final project. Basically, I am now working with very young stars, instead of PN (dying stars). I am trying to find widely separated companion stars to certain binary systems. Using Topcat, I first find all of the 2mass sources within 15 arcmin of the binary star. Then I limit the results by only selecting the sources with a K magnitude of less than 12, and a J-K magnitude between .8 and 1.2. Next, I load a table of all of the PPMXL(position and proper motion catalog) sources within 15 arcmin of the binary onto Topcat. Finally, I match the the limited 2mass table with the PPMXL table and choose the stars closest to the target (binary) star that could be a widely separated companion star. I love my job!