English

Resolving the Young 2 Cygni Run-away Star into a Binary using iLocater

Instrumentation and Methods for Astrophysics 2024-12-11 v1 Earth and Planetary Astrophysics Solar and Stellar Astrophysics

Abstract

Precision radial velocity (RV) spectrographs that use adaptive optics (AO) show promise to advance telescope observing capabilities beyond those of seeing-limited designs. We are building a spectrograph for the Large Binocular Telescope (LBT) named iLocater that uses AO to inject starlight directly into single mode fibers (SMF). iLocater's first acquisition camera system (the `SX' camera), which receives light from one of the 8.4m diameter primary mirrors of the LBT, was initially installed in summer 2019 and has since been used for several commissioning runs. We present results from first-light observations that include on-sky measurements as part of commissioning activities. Imaging measurements of the bright B3IV star 2 Cygni (V=4.98V=4.98) resulted in the direct detection of a candidate companion star at an angular separation of only θ=70\theta = 70 mas. Follow-up AO measurements using Keck/NIRC2 recover the candidate companion in multiple filters. An R1500R\approx1500 miniature spectrograph recently installed at the LBT named ``Lili'' provides spatially resolved spectra of each binary component, indicating similar spectral types and strengthening the case for companionship. Studying the multiplicity of young runaway star systems like 2 Cygni (36.6±0.536.6 \pm 0.5 Myr) can help to understand formation mechanisms for stars that exhibit anomalous velocities through the galaxy. This on-sky demonstration illustrates the spatial resolution of the iLocater SX acquisition camera working in tandem with the LBT AO system; it further derisks a number of technical hurdles involved in combining AO with Doppler spectroscopy.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2412.06982,
  title  = {Resolving the Young 2 Cygni Run-away Star into a Binary using iLocater},
  author = {Justin R. Crepp and Jonathan Crass and Andrew J. Bechter and Brian L. Sands and Ryan Ketterer and David King and Derek Kopon and Randall Hamper and Matthew Engstrom and James E. Smous and Eric B. Bechter and Robert Harris and Marshall C. Johnson and Nicholas Baggett and Shannon Dulz and Michael Vansickle and Al Conrad and Steve Ertel and B. Scott Gaudi and Philip Hinz and Marc Kuchner and Manny Montoya and Eleanya Onuma and Melanie Ott and Richard Pogge and Gustavo Rahmer and Robert Reynolds and Christian Schwab and Karl Stapelfeldt and Joseph Thomes and Amali Vaz and Ji Wang and Charles E. Woodward},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2412.06982},
  year   = {2024}
}

Comments

Accepted to AJ

R2 v1 2026-06-28T20:28:40.358Z