2003/02/11 by B. J. Teegarden, S. H. Pravdo, M. Hicks +14 · 75 citations
Engineering · Mathematics · Physics and Astronomy · #Astrometry #Astronomical Observations and Instrumentation #Astronomy #Astronomy and Astrophysical Research #Astrophysics #Classical mechanics #Geometry #Limit (mathematics) #Mathematical analysis #Mathematics #Motion (physics) #Parallax #Physics #Proper motion #Star (game theory) #Stars #Stellar classification #Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies #Trigonometry #astro-ph
paper · pdf · doi:10.1086/375803
published in The Astrophysical Journal 589(1), L51-L53 (IOP Publishing) · 5 pages, 3 figures. Submitted to ApJ Letters
arxiv created 2003/02/11 · openalex publication_date 2003/04/21 · arxiv updated 2009/12/01 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/08/05
We report the discovery of a nearby star with a very large proper motion of 5 05 ± 0 03 yr -1 . The star is called SO 025300.5+165258 and referred to herein as a high proper motion star (HPMS). The discovery came as a result of a search of the SkyMorph database, a sensitive and persistent survey that is well suited for finding stars with high proper motions. There are currently only seven known stars with proper motions greater than 5'' yr -1 . The spectrum and measured tangential velocity indicate that the HPMS is a main-sequence star with spectral type M6.5. Trigonometric and photometric parallaxes have been determined, yielding distance estimates of 2.4 pc (lower limit) and 3.6 ± 0.4 pc, respectively. If the former is correct, the HPMS ranks third in the list of nearest stellar systems. If the latter is correct, it is 17th. A more precise trigonometric parallax measurement is expected to be completed near the end of the year.