Perseus, Pisces & Piscis Austrinus

A Selection of Double Stars in Persius

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A Selection of Double Stars in Pisces

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Beta Piscium is not a double star but I couldn’t think of another category to place this star – so here it is! Beta Psc is a Hot “Blue-White” Star with a color index of -0.12. Though the star has a “Beta” designation it is actually the 12th brightest star in the constellation.
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A Selection of Double Stars in Piscis Austrinus

The brightest star in the constellation of Piscis Austrinus is Fomalhaut (Alpha PsA) and which is an ultra-wide double star. Fomalhaut has three components, the closest with a separation of 4.5 arc-seconds but at mag 24.5 is unviewable.  The other two physical companions have incredibly large separations of 2 degrees and 6 degrees!

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Fomalhaut B (TW PsA) is an easy capture at mag 6.5 and I used my C80ED scope which has a 1.6 x 1.3 degree FOV.  I stitched together two frames which encompassed both stars and produced the photo above.  The equatorial grid was created by the astronomical software package “Pixinsight” which will annotate plate-solved images. Click HERE for a paper discussing the binarity of Fomalhaut and TWPsA.

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Fomalhaut’s C component is a low-mass magnitude 12.75 Red Dwarf star six degrees to the Northwest of Fomalhaut. Fomalhaut C is actually located in the neighboring constellation of Aquarius! Click HERE for a paper discussing the binarity of Fomalhaut and LP876-10

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