Authors: Colas F. and Buil C.
Year: 1992
Title: First Earth-based observations of Neptune's satellite Proteus
Journal: Astronomy and Astrophysics
Volume: 262
Number: 1
Pages: L13, L14
Keywords: Neptune, faint, observation, data, CCD, position
Abstract: Proteus (Neptune III) was discovered from Voyager Spacecraft images in 1989 (Smith, 1989). It was never observed from ground-based observatories because of its magnitude (m = 20.3) and closeness to Neptune (maximum elongation = 6 arcsec). In October 1991, we used the 2.2 m telescope at the European Southern Observatory (La Silla, Chile) to look for it. The observation success is mainly due to the use of an anti blooming CCD and to good seeing conditions (less than 1 arcsec). We give the differential positions of Proteus referred to Neptune and we compare with theoretical positions issued from Voyager's data (Owen et al., 1991). We found that the rms orbital residual was about 0.1 arcsec.
%F: AA(Bureau des Longitudes, Paris, France) AB(CNES, Toulouse, France)
Bibliogaphic Code: 1992A%26A...262L..13C
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