Related papers: Estimating distances from parallaxes
We demonstrate an algorithm for learning a flexible color-magnitude diagram from noisy parallax and photometry measurements using a normalizing flow, a deep neural network capable of learning an arbitrary multi-dimensional probability…
A star enshrouded in a Dyson sphere with high covering fraction may manifest itself as an optically subluminous object with a spectrophotometric distance estimate significantly in excess of its parallax distance. Using this criterion, the…
I used the 2.4 m Hiltner telescope at MDM Observatory in an attempt to measure trigonometric parallaxes for 14 cataclysmic variable stars. Techniques are described in detail. In the best cases the parallax uncertainties are below 1 mas, and…
Accurate distances to local molecular clouds are critical for understanding the star and planet formation process, yet distance measurements are often obtained inhomogeneously on a cloud-by-cloud basis. We have recently developed a method…
The systematic offset of Gaia parallaxes has been widely reported with Gaia's second data release, and it is expected to persist in future Gaia data. In order to use Gaia parallaxes to infer distances to high precision, we develop a…
In its all-sky survey, the ESA global astrometry mission Gaia will perform high-precision astrometry and photometry for 1 billion stars down to $V = 20$ mag. The data collected in the Gaia catalogue, to be published by the end of the next…
We reconsider calibration of statistical distance scales for planetary nebulae, examining precision and systematic error for various distance methods used as well as the scales themselves. A different calibration strategy, one based on…
Despite the advances provided by large-scale photometric surveys, stellar features - such as metallicity - generally remain limited to spectroscopic observations often of bright, nearby low-extinction stars. To rectify this, we present a…
Over the course of several years, stars trace helical trajectories as they traverse across the sky due to the combined effects of proper motion and parallax. It is well known that the gravitational pull of an unseen companion can cause…
Correctly interpreting observations of sources such as type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) require knowledge of the power spectrum of matter on AU scales - which is very hard to model accurately. Because under-dense regions account for much of the…
The systematic errors are inevitable in Gaia published astrometric data. Lindegren et al. (L21) proposed a global recipe to correct for the GEDR3 parallax zero point offset, which did not consider the Galactic plane. The applicability of…
We matched the astrometry of central stars (CSs) of spectroscopically-confirmed Galactic planetary nebulae (PNe) with DR2 Gaia parallaxes ($p$), finding 430 targets in common with $p>0$ and $|\sigma_{\rm p}/p|<1$. A catalog of PNe whose CSs…
Use of the brightest stars in galaxies as a distance indicator and claims that the method supports the `short' distance scale are examined. Data from several different observational programmes are brought together for the first time with a…
Data from the space missions {\it Gaia}, {\it Kepler}, {\it CoRoT} and {\it TESS}, make it possible to compare parallax and asteroseismic distances. From the ratio of two densities $\rho_{\rm sca}/\rho_{\pi}$, we obtain an empirical…
Astrometry provides the foundation for astrophysics. Accurate positions are required for the association of sources detected at different times or wavelengths, and distances are essential to estimate the size, luminosity, mass, and ages of…
When a planet is only observed to transit once, direct measurement of its period is impossible. It is possible, however, to constrain the periods of single transiters, and this is desirable as they are likely to represent the cold and far…
We show that for high-magnification (Amax > 100) microlensing events, accurate microlens parallaxes can be obtained from three or fewer photometric measurements from a small telescope on a satellite in solar orbit at ~1 AU from Earth. This…
Over the past decade, the BeSSeL Survey and the VERA project have measured trigonometric parallaxes to approximately 250 massive, young stars using VLBI techniques. These sources trace spiral arms over nearly half of the Milky Way. What is…
We propose the use of robust, Bayesian methods for estimating extragalactic distance errors in multi-measurement catalogs. We seek to improve upon the more commonly used frequentist propagation-of-error methods, as they fail to explain both…
We study the kinematics of a sample of classical Cepheids younger than 120 Myr. For these stars, the estimates of distances taken from Skowron et al., which are based on the period-luminosity relation, and the line-of-sight velocities and…