Pictor is a constellation in the Southern Celestial Hemisphere, located between the star Canopus and the Large Magellanic Cloud. Its name is Latin for painter, and is an abbreviation of the older name Equuleus Pictoris. Normally represented as an easel, Pictor was named by Abbé Nicolas-Louis de Lacaille in the 18th century. The constellation's brightest star is Alpha Pictoris, a white main-sequence star around 97 light-years away from Earth. Pictor also hosts RR Pictoris, a cataclysmic variable star system that flared up as a nova, reaching apparent (visual) magnitude 1.2 in 1925 before fading into obscurity.
V604 Aquilae or Nova Aquilae 1905 is a nova which was first observed in the constellation Aquila in 1905 with a maximum brightness of magnitude 7.6. It was never bright enough to be seen with the naked eye. It was discovered by Williamina Fleming on a Harvard College Observatory photographic plate taken on August 31, 1905. Examination of plates taken earlier indicates that peak brightness occurred in mid-August 1905. The star's quiescent visual band brightness is 19.6.
NQ Vulpeculae also known as Nova Vulpeculae 1976, was a nova that appeared in the constellation Vulpecula in 1976. It was discovered visually at 18:20 UT on October 21, 1976 by English amateur astronomer George Alcock. Its apparent magnitude at the time of discovery was 6.5 It reached its maximum brightness of magnitude 6.0 thirteen days after its discovery, at which point it may have been faintly visible to the naked eye. A few days after maximum brightness, it had faded to magnitude 8.3.
V838 Herculis, also known as Nova Herculis 1991, was a nova which occurred in the constellation Hercules in 1991. It was discovered by George Alcock of Yaxley, Cambridgeshire, England at 4:35 UT on the morning of 25 March 1991. He found it with 10×50 binoculars, and on that morning its apparent visual magnitude was 5. Palomar Sky Survey plates showed that before the outburst, the star was at photographic magnitude 20.6 and 18.25.
V842 Centauri, also known as Nova Centauri 1986, was a nova which occurred in 1986 in the constellation Centaurus. It was discovered by Robert H. McNaught of Siding Spring Observatory in Australia, on 22 November 1986. At the time of its discovery, it had an apparent magnitude of 5.6. It reached a peak magnitude of 4.6 one and a half days later, making it easily visible to the naked eye.
V1059 Sagittarii was a nova, which lit up in 1898 in the constellation Sagittarius. The star reached apparent magnitude 4.5, making it easily visible to the naked eye. It was discovered on 8 March 1898, by Williamina Fleming on a photographic plate taken at the Harvard College Observatory. The discovery plate was an objective prism plate, part of the Henry Draper Memorial Photographs, and Ms Fleming identified it as a nova based on its spectral characteristics.
V606 Aquilae was a nova, which lit up in the constellation Aquila in 1899. The brightest reported magnitude for this nova was apparent magnitude 5.5, making it a naked eye object. It was discovered by Williamina Fleming on a photographic plate taken on 21 April 1899 at the Harvard College Observatory. On the discovery plate, its photographic magnitude was later determined to be 6.75. It was not seen on the plate taken on 1 November 1898, and there were no reported observations of the region around the star during the 171 day interval before Fleming's discovery, so it is possible that the actual maximum of the event was missed. By 27 October 1899 it had faded to 10th magnitude, and on 9 July 1900 Oliver Wendell reported its brightness to be between magnitude 11.5 and 12.0.
A dwarf nova, or U Geminorum variable, is one of several types of cataclysmic variable star, consisting of a close binary star system in which one of the components is a white dwarf that accretes matter from its companion. Dwarf novae are dimmer and repeat more frequently than "classical" novae.
RW Ursae Minoris is a cataclysmic variable star system that flared up as a nova in the constellation Ursa Minor in 1956.
HR Delphini, also known as Nova Delphini 1967, was a nova which appeared in the constellation Delphinus in 1967. It was discovered by George Alcock at 22:35 UT on 8 July 1967, after searching the sky for over 800 hours with binoculars. At the time of discovery it had an apparent magnitude of 5.0. It reached a peak brightness of magnitude 3.5 on 13 December 1967, making it easily visible to the naked eye around that time. Pre-outburst photographs taken with the Samuel Oschin telescope showed it as a ~12th magnitude star which might have been variable.
V1017 Sagittarii is a cataclysmic variable star system in the constellation Sagittarius. It first erupted in 1919, reaching magnitude 7. Its other eruptions in 1901, 1973 and 1991 only reached magnitude 10, leading it to be reclassified from a recurrent nova to a dwarf nova.
SW Sextantis variable stars are a kind of cataclysmic variable star; they are double-star systems in which there is mass transfer from a red dwarf to a white dwarf forming a stable accretion disc around the latter. Unlike other non-magnetic cataclysmic variables, the emission lines from hydrogen and helium are not doubled, except briefly near phase 0.5.
Q Cygni, is a star located in the constellation Cygnus. It is also known as Nova Cygni 1876, and has the designation NGC 7114, and HR 8296. Nova Cygni is located in the northwestern portion of Cygnus along the border with Lacerta.
In astronomy, a superhump is a periodic brightness variation in a cataclysmic variable star system, with a period within a few percent of the orbital period of the system.
SU Ursae Majoris, or SU UMa, is a close binary star in the northern circumpolar constellation of Ursa Major. It is a periodic cataclysmic variable that varies in magnitude from a peak of 10.8 down to a base of 14.96. The distance to this system, as determined from its annual parallax shift of 4.53 mas, is 719 light-years. It is moving further from the Earth with a heliocentric radial velocity of +27 km/s.
V630 Sagittarii was a nova visible to the naked eye in 1936. It was discovered on 3 October 1936 by Shigeki Okabayashi of Kobe, Japan when it had an apparent magnitude of 4.5.
V728 Scorpii, also known as Nova Scorpii 1862, was a nova that occurred in the constellation of Scorpius. It was discovered on 4 October 1862 by John Tebbutt, an astronomer living in New South Wales, Australia, while he was observing a comet. He reported that the star was in the constellation Ara. At the time of its discovery, the nova had an apparent magnitude of 5, making it visible to the unaided eye. Nine days later it had faded to below 11th magnitude, indicating that it was a very fast nova.
WY Sagittae, also known as Nova Sagittae 1783, is a star in the constellation Sagitta which had a nova eruption visible in 1783. It was discovered on 26 July 1783 by the French astronomer Joseph Lepaute D'Agelet. It is usually difficult to precisely identify novae that were discovered hundreds of years ago, because the positions were often vaguely reported and historically there was not a clear distinction drawn between different sorts of transient astronomical events such as novae and comet apparitions. However D'Agelet observed this nova with a mural quadrant, which produced coordinates accurate enough to allow modern astronomers to identify the star. D'Agelet reported the apparent magnitude of the star as 6, but Benjamin Apthorp Gould, who analysed D'Agelet's records, determined that what D'Agelet called magnitude 6 corresponds to magnitude 5.4 ± 0.4 on the modern magnitude scale, so the nova was visible to the naked eye.
BZ Ursae Majoris is a dwarf nova star system in the northern circumpolar constellation of Ursa Major. It consists of a white dwarf primary in a close orbit with a red dwarf. The latter star is donating mass, which is accumulating in an accretion disk orbiting the white dwarf. The system is located at a distance of approximately 505 light years from the Sun based on parallax measurements.
ER Ursae Majoris is a variable star in the northern circumpolar constellation of Ursa Major, abbreviated ER UMa. It is a prototype system for a subclass of SU Ursae Majoris dwarf novae. The system ranges in brightness from a peak apparent visual magnitude of 12.4 down to 15.2, which is too faint to be visible to the naked eye. The distance to this system, based on parallax measurements, is approximately 1,163 light years.
