Uncatalogued Variable Stars found in two of the Kepler Mission Fields

ORAL

Abstract

The Kepler Mission in its search for planets orbiting a star outside of our solar system --exoplanets-, opened the doors to important findings in Astronomy. The opportunity was given to higher education institution and other groups to confirm the findings proposed by Kepler's. Beside the possibility of concentrating on a given star, now there was a whole field, $+$- 1000 stars, to harvest for knowledge and information. This was the case for the presenter: through a Research Experience for Undergraduates --REU- at Brigham Young University, under the advisory of Dr. Michael Joner, seven new variable stars and star systems were found. Working with the 0.9m optical telescope at West Mountain Observatory, enough data was collected and processed, using Differential Photometry, to obtain Light Curves graphs of the seven object.

Authors

  • Pamela Lara

    University of Texas in El Paso

  • Michael Joner

    Brigham Young University