Looking up W Aurigae in the Simbad database, we find that it is a double star, Cou 1725. Paul Couteau discovered the double star nature of W Aur in 1979, when he measured the star on three nights. The stars both had magnitude 9.7 and lay at a distance of 0.”16.1
How come, then, that W Aur doesn’t have a flat minimum at 9.7? Are both stars variables?
Update: Thomas Karlsson pointed out that the entry for W Aur was mixed up in Simbad with another star that is Cou 1725.
Simbad no longer identify W Aur with Cou 1725.
- P. Couteau, “New Double Stars Discovered at Nice – Part Sixteen,” Astronomy and Astrophysics Supplement Series 43 (January 1, 1981): 79. [↩]
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