The Be Star Newsletter, Volume 38 - February 2006

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Mu Centauri in a extremely bright visual state Sebastian Otero CEA & Grupo Wezen 1 88, Buenos Aires, Argentina email:  varsao@fullzero.com.ar Received: Feb 12, 2006;  Accepted: Feb 12, 2006 Dear Colleagues, I am sending this interesting news on mu Centauri that could be of interest for The Be Star Newsletter readers. The Southern Be star mu Centauri is extremely bright right now, shining at V=3.1 on February 12. AAVSO data (Henden, 2006) from 1984 to the present suggest that the star never got as bright as its current state. The first visual observations obtained this season show a bright state since at least late January but the brightening has turned into an impressive event. Two lightcurves are provided. Figure 1 shows observations from January 1998 to the present. The previous brightest state can be seen around JD 2452081 (June 21, 2001) when the star reached V=3.3 (Baade et al., 2001). Figure 2 shows the current event. The most recent visual observations by S. Otero are: 2005, Aug. 29.981, V= 3.50 2005, Sept. 12.958, V= 3.51 2005, Sept 27.964, V= 3.54 2006, Jan. 28.180, V= 3.30 2006, Jan. 29.308, V= 3.33 2006, Feb. 5.310, V= 3.37 2006, Feb. 12.314, V= 3.13 Follow-up observations are encouraged. Best wishes, Sebastian. References Baade, D., Rivinius, T., Stefl, S., Otero, S., Liu, X., 2001, IAU Circ., 7658, 2. Edited by Green, D. W. E. (2001IAUC.7658....2B) Henden, A.A., 2006, Observations from the AAVSO International Database, private communication. Figure 1 Figure 2