The third installment of the Yale/San Juan Southern Proper Motion Catalog,
SPM3, is now available.
Absolute proper motions, positions, and photographic B,V photometry
are given for 10.7 million objects, down to a magnitude of V=17.5.
The Catalog covers an irregular area of 3700 square degrees, between
the declinations of -20 and -45 degrees, and excluding the Galactic plane.
All observations were made with the 51-cm double astrograph of Cesco
Observatory in El Leoncito, Argentina.
The Catalog is based on full-plate scans using the USNO Precision
Measuring Machine (PMM) and its image detection and centering software.
Almost all SPM fields for which second-epoch plates are available have
been included, excepting the Galactic plane.
The proper-motion precision, for well-measured stars, is estimated to
be 4.0 mas/yr.
Unlike previous releases of the SPM Catalog, the proper motions are on the
International Celestial Reference System by way of Hipparcos Catalog stars,
and have an estimated systematic uncertainty of 0.4 mas/yr.
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This page last modified by T. Girard - April 22, 2004.