SAGUARO ASTRONOMY CLUB DATABASE VERSION 6.0 dated Thursday, May 20, 1993 This compilation of data was begun in an effort to provide a comprehensive observing list for use at the telescope. This data is released for private use of anyone who wishes to use this database. Please do not sell this database in any form. The members of the Saguaro Astronomy Club (pronounced sa-war-oh) of Phoenix, Arizona have provided much of the effort to compile this database. However, it could not have been completed without the skill of a variety of people who are not SAC members. Thank you to all. The database is in ASCII format and is delimited with a double quote ("). A description of the fields and what data they contain follows: Field Number: 1 Name: OBJECT Size: 17 Usually the NGC number is in field #1, but for objects with no NGC value the alphabetical name used is listed below. These abbreviations are also used in field #2 as an OTHER name for some objects. Abell - George Abell (planetary nebulae and galaxy clusters) ADS - Aitken Double Star catalog AM - Arp-Madore (globular clusters) Antalova - (open clusters) Ap - Apriamasvili (planetary nebulae) Arp - Halton Arp (interacting galaxies) Bark - Barkhatova (open clusters) B - Barnard (dark nebulae) Basel - (open clusters) BD - Bonner Durchmusterung (stars) Berk - Berkeley (open clusters) Be - Bernes (dark nebulae) Biur - Biurakan (open clusters) Blanco - (open clusters) Bochum - (open clusters) Ced - Cederblad (bright nebulae) Cr - Collinder (open clusters) Czernik - (open clusters) DDO - David Dunlap Observatory (dwarf galaxies) Do - Dolidze (open clusters) DoDz - Dolidze-Dzimselejsvili (open clusters) Dun - Dunlop (globular clusters) Fein - Feinstein (open clusters) Frolov - (open clusters) Gum - (bright nebulae) H - William Herschel (globular clusters) Haffner - (open clusters) Harvard - (open clusters) He - Henize (planetary nebulae) Hogg - (open clusters) HP - Haute Provence (globular clusters) Hu - Humason (planetary nebulae) IC - 1st and 2nd Index Catalogs to the NGC (All types of objects except dark nebulae) Isk - Iskudarian (open clusters) J - Jonckheere (planetary nebulae) K - Kohoutek (planetary nebulae) King - (open clusters) Kr - Krasnogorskaja (planetary nebulae) Lac - Lacaille (globular clusters) Loden - (open clusters) LDN - Lynds (dark nebulae) Lynga - (open clusters) M - Messier (all types of objects except dark nebula) MCG - Morphological Catalog of Galaxies Me - Merrill (plantary nebulae) Mrk - Markarian (open clusters and galaxies) Mel - Melotte (open clusters) M1 thru M4 - Minkowski (planetary nebulae) NGC - New General Catalog of Nebulae & Clusters of Stars. (All types of objects except dark nebulae) Pal - Palomar (globular clusters) PC - Peimbert and Costero (planetary nebulae) Pismis - (open clusters) PK - Perek & Kohoutek (planetary nebulae) RCW - Rodgers, Campbell, & Whiteoak (bright nebulae) Roslund - (open clusters) Ru - Ruprecht (open clusters) Sa - Sandqvist (dark nebulae) Sher - (open clusters) Sh - Sharpless (bright nebulae) SL - Sandqvist & Lindroos (dark nebulae) SL - Shapley & Lindsay (clusters in LMC) Steph - Stephenson (open clusters) Stock - (open clusters) Ter - Terzan (globular clusters) Tombaugh - (open clusters) Ton - Tonantzintla (globular clusters) Tr - Trumpler (open clusters) UA - Catalog of selected Non-UGC galaxies UGC - Uppsala General Catalog (galaxies) UKS - United Kingdom Schmidt (globular clusters) Upgren - (open clusters) VV - Vorontsov-Velyaminov (interacting galaxies) vdB - van den Bergh (open clusters, bright nebulae) vdBH - van den Bergh & Herbst (bright nebulae) vdB-Ha - van den Bergh-Hagen (open clusters) Vy - Vyssotsky (planetary nebulae) Waterloo - (open clusters) Westr - Westerlund (open clusters) Zw - Zwicky (galaxies) Field Number: 2 Name: OTHER Size: 18 Other catalog designations by which this object may be known. The same abbreviations as the OBJECT field are used in this field. Field Number: 3 Name: TYPE Size: 5 Type of object. The code that applies is: ASTER Asterism BRTNB Bright Nebula CL+NB Cluster with Nebulosity DRKNB Dark Nebula GALCL Galaxy cluster GALXY Galaxy GLOCL Globular Cluster GX+DN Diffuse Nebula in a Galaxy GX+GC Globular Cluster in a Galaxy G+C+N Cluster with Nebulosity in a Galaxy LMCCN Cluster with Nebulosity in the LMC LMCDN Diffuse Nebula in the LMC LMCGC Globular Cluster in the LMC LMCOC Open cluster in the LMC NONEX Nonexistent in RNGC OPNCL Open Cluster PLNNB Planetary Nebula SMCCN Cluster with Nebulosity in the SMC SMCDN Diffuse Nebula in the SMC SMCGC Globular Cluster in the SMC SMCOC Open cluster in the SMC SNREM Supernova Remnant QUASR Quasar UVSOB Unverified Southern Object #STAR # Stars (#=1, 2, 3, 4, 5, etc.) Nonexistent means Sulentic and Tifft couldn't find it on the POSS plates for inclusion in the RNGC. Field Number: 4 Name: CON Size: 3 Constellation in which the object is found in IAU format, given in the table below. Only upper case abbreviations are used for ease of programming using case-sensitive commands. ANDROMEDA AND LACERTA LAC ANTLIA ANT LEO LEO APUS APS LEO MINOR LMI AQUARIUS AQR LEPUS LEP AQUILA AQL LIBRA LIB ARA ARA LUPUS LUP ARIES ARI LYNX LYN AURIGA AUR LYRA LYR BOOTES BOO MENSA MEN CAELUM CAE MICROSCOPIUM MIC CAMELOPARDALIS CAM MONOCEROS MON CANCER CNC MUSCA MUS CANES VENATICI CVN NORMA NOR CANIS MAJOR CMA OCTANS OCT CANIS MINOR CMI OPHIUCHUS OPH CAPRICORNUS CAP ORION ORI CARINA CAR PAVO PAV CASSIOPEIA CAS PEGASUS PEG CENTAURUS CEN PERSEUS PER CEPHEUS CEP PHOENIX PHE CETUS CET PICTOR PIC CHAMAELEON CHA PISCES PSC CIRCINUS CIR PISCES AUSTRINUS PSA COLUMBA COL PUPPIS PUP COMA BERENICES COM PYXIS PYX CORONA AUSTRALIS CRA RETICULUM RET CORONA BOREALIS CRB SAGITTA SGE CORVUS CRV SAGITTARIUS SGR CRATER CRT SCORPIUS SCO CRUX CRU SCULPTOR SCL CYGNUS CYG SCUTUM SCT DELPHINUS DEL SERPENS SER DORADO DOR SEXTANS SEX DRACO DRA TAURUS TAU EQUULEUS EQU TELESCOPIUM TEL ERIDANUS ERI TRIANGULUM AUSTRALE TRA FORNAX FOR TRIANGULUM TRI GEMINI GEM TUCANA TUC GRUS GRU URSA MAJOR UMA HERCULES HER URSA MINOR UMI HOROLOGIUM HOR VELA VEL HYDRA HYA VIRGO VIR HYDRUS HYI VOLANS VOL INDUS IND VULPECULA VUL Field Number: 5 Name: RA Size: 7 characters Right Ascension of the object in equinox 2000.0 coordinates. The RA is in the form XX XX.X, such as 14 34.8. Use leading or trailing zeros. Field Number: 6 Name: DEC Size: 6 Declination of the object in equinox 2000.0 coordinates. The DEC is in the form +/-XX XX, such as +48 10 or -88 04. Use the sign and leading or trailing zeros. The declination is given in degrees and minutes. Field Number: 7 Name: MAG Size: 4 Magnitude to nearest tenth in the form XX.X, such as 12.3. There are many objects which have no published magnitude we could find, they have been assigned a magnitude of 99.9. Dark nebulae obviously have no magnitude, so we assigned them a mag of 79.9 to differentiate them from objects with no magnitude given. The reason we chose large values for objects without magnitudes is that a sort would find 0.0 or "" as a large value of brightness. Field Number: 8 Name: SUBR Size: 4 Surface brightness as given in the Reference Catalog of Galaxies 3. Dr. Harold Corwin calculated these values of surface brightness and has supplied them to us, along with much other valuable galaxy data. Field Number: 9 Name: U2000 Size: 3 The charts in the Uranometria 2000.0 that map the area of sky in which the object is located. It is not guaranteed that all objects plotted on U2000 are contained in the database. Field Number: 10 Name: TIRION Size: 2 The charts in the Tirion Sky Atlas 2000.0 that map the area of sky in which the object is located. This is included so that a less detailed view of the area will be available to star hoppers. Field Number: 11 Name: DESCR Size: 50 Visual description of the object. Most of these are from the NGC, some are from prominent amateurs. Back issues of Deep Sky Magazine, Astronomy magazine, Sky and Telescope magazine and Burnham's Celestial Handbook are used as a source of some of these descriptions. The descriptions use the abbreviations from the NGC and Burnham's. They are given below: ! remarkable object !! very remarkable object am among n north att attached N nucleus bet between neb nebula, nebulosity B bright P w paired with b brighter p pretty (before F,B,L or S) C compressed p preceding c considerably P poor Cl cluster R round D double Ri rich def defined r not well resolved, mottled deg degrees rr partially resolved diam diameter rrr well resolved dif diffuse S small E elongated s suddenly e extremely s south er easily resolved sc scattered F faint susp suspected f following st star or stellar g gradually v very iF irregular figure var variable inv involved nf north following irr irregular np north preceding L large sf south following l little sp south preceding mag magnitude 11m 11th magnitude M middle 8... 8th magnitude and fainter m much 9...13 9th to 13th magnitude If you have never dealt with the NGC abbreviations before, perhaps a few examples will help. NGC# Description Decoded descriptions 214 pF, pS, lE, gvlbM pretty faint, pretty small, little elongated gradually very little brighter in the middle 708 vF, vS, R very faint, very small, round 891 B, vL, vmE bright, very large, very much elongated 7009 !, vB, S remarkable object, very bright, small 7089 !! B, vL, mbM extremely remarkable object, bright, very rrr, stars mags large, much brighter middle, resolved, 13..... stars 13th magnitude and dimmer 2099 ! B, vRi, mC remarkable object, bright, very rich, much compressed 6643 pB,pL,E50,2 st p pretty bright, pretty large, elongated in position angle 50 degrees, two stars preceding Field Number: 12 Name: SIZE Size: 11 Size of object in minutes of arc (') or seconds of arc (''). Seconds of arc is marked with two single quotes so as to free the double quote symbol for use as a delimiter. Field Number: 13 Name: CLASS Size: 10 Several professional classification schemes are contained here. ----Trumpler type for open clusters----- Concentration I. Detached, strong concentration toward the center II. Detached, weak concentration toward the center III. Detached, no concentration toward the center IV. Not well detached from surrounding star field Range in brightness 1. Small range 2. Moderate range 3. Large range Richness p Poor (<50 stars) m Moderately rich (50-100 stars) r Rich (>100 stars) An "n" following the Trumpler type denotes nebulosity in cluster ----Shapley-Sawyer concentration rating for globular clusters--- The values range from 1 to 12, smaller numbers are more concentrated clusters. ----Vorontsov-Velyaminov type for planetary nebulae----- 1. Stellar 2. Smooth disk (a, brighter center; b, uniform brightness; c, traces of ring structure) 3. Irregular disk (a, very irregular brightness distribution; b, traces of ring structure) 4. Ring structure 5. Irregular form similar to diffuse nebula 6. Anomalous form, no regular structure Some very complex forms may combine two types. -----Hubble type for galaxies----- E elliptical, E0 is roundest to E7 is flattest subgroups; 'd'is dwarf, 'c'is supergiant, 'D' has diffuse halo S Spiral, 'a' has tightly wound arms, 'b' has moderately wound arms and 'c' has loosely wound arms SB Spiral with central bar Ir Irregular Field Number: 14 Name: NSTS Size: 4 Number of stars within a cluster from a study of POSS plates by Lynga. Field Number: 15 Name: BRSTR Size: 5 Magnitude of brightest star in cluster or central star of planetary nebula. Field Number: 16 Name: NOTES Size: 70 Much of this field came from UGC Notes provided by Jim Lucyk. Most of the abbreviations used by the NGC apply here also. An abbreviation that always comes first is PA for Position Angle of the elongation of the main object. Other PA's in the NOTES are companion objects' angle in relation to the main object. Another abbreviation that is used often is P w N ( paired with NGC ###) or P w U ( paired with UGC ###). Most of the data on companions to an object have been marked to make recognition easier, but some did not fit into the 60 spaces we alloted. So, the data is always in this order: distance in minutes from main object, PA from main object, then size and mag of companion. Example: P w N4566 @ 4.5,120,0.9X0.7 says that the main object is paired with NGC 4566 and is at 4.5', PA 120 degrees and 0.9'X0.7'. HINTS ON USING THE SAC DATABASE The layout of the data was thought out to try and let the user get the type of listing that is preferred with as few problems as possible. People who have taken the time to write or call have said that a wide variety of database managers will make it easier for the sophisticated deep sky observer to utilize the data in a variety of forms. People have used dBase III, Paradox, PC File, PC File dB, Microsoft Works, Wampum and a few have used a word processor to search and sort the SAC database. Several people have considered burning it into a ROM for use in a telescope control program. Of course, if you do not need such complex search routines, the SACREP program from A.J. Crayon and Dan Ward will suffice with no problem. It will allow the user to make a fine observing list quickly. The problem which gave us the most trouble is choosing what to put into the Name and Other columns. We tried to set up a hierarcy that would introduce some consistency in the data. Here is some general info on how to navigate around the database. 1) If there is an NGC or IC number, that is in the NAME column. 2) The Messier number is in the OTHER column. Now the fun starts. 3) If it is a non-NGC object and is a planetary nebula, then it has a PK number with any other designation in the OTHER column. 4) If it is a non-NGC object and is a Bright Nebula then it probably has a Sharpless (Sh) or Cederblad (Ced) number in the NAME column and the OTHER column for cross references. 5) If it is a non-NGC object and is a Galaxy then it probably has a UGC (Uppsala Galaxy Catalog) number. Some have a proper name and the UGC or other reference in the OTHER column. 6) All Quasars start with a 3C designation for the 3rd Cambridge Catalog. 7) All Galaxy Clusters start with an Abell designation. 8) Open clusters that are non-NGC objects have several common and lots of uncommon designations. Many are Collinder (Cr), Stock, Melotte (Mel) or Trumpler (Tr) objects. 9) Dark Nebulae have had several designation systems over the years. Barnard (B) numbers are used first and are cross referenced to Lynds (LDN) numbers. Obviously, if you do find the object you are looking to find, try both the NAME and OTHER columns before giving up. If you know the constellation, sort by constellation and just look in that area. This a problem if the constellation is Virgo, Ursa Major or Cygnus. CONTRIBUTORS A. J. Crayon and Dan Ward did error correction and wrote the install and observing list programs included with this disk set. SACREP is a simple, easy to use database manager, and is thereby limited in it's flexibility - but it seems to suit the needs of a large percentage of the earlier SAC database users. SACREP and documentation are included in the SAC60F.ZIP file. Bill Anderson provided the precessed coordinates for many objects. He used the program from Astronomy magazine, Aug. 84, pp 74-77. Jeffrey Weintraub entered much of the data from Sky Catalog Vol 2. Brian Skiff provided us with error checking data and taught us how to use a variety of sources to do this project with as few errors as possible. Jim Lucyk provided a wealth of data on objects included on the Uranometria 2000.0 charts and his cross reference index is the basis of much of the info on references to books and magazines. Alister Ling provided information on planetary nebulae and did error checking. Gene Lucas provided data for error checking. Steve Stanford wrote the program which determined the Tirion and U2000 chart numbers. Dr. Harold Corwin was nice enough to allow us to use his list of errors in the NGC. Otherwise, we would have carried forth several errors that have not been corrected for 100 years. Dr. Jack Marling and Steve Gottlieb provided much data on planetary nebulae from a wide variety of professional sources. Steve Coe wrote the file you are reading and checked and entered data for the Non NGC objects. Paul Maxson checked and entered data for NGC 1 to 1000. Alan Gore checked and entered data for NGC 1001 to 2000. Dean Corn checked and entered data for NGC 2001 to 3000. Bob Dahl checked and entered data for NGC 3001 to 4000. Paul Dickson checked and entered data for NGC 4001 to 5000. Mike Willmoth, Jean Goddin and Mike Janes checked and entered data for NGC 5001 to 6000. Jim Knott checked and entered data for NGC 6001 to 7000. John and Tom McGrath checked and entered data for NGC 7001 to 7840. FINAL NOTES We realize that such an undertaking could not possibly be completed without some errors or typos creeping into the database. We would like you to get in contact with us if you find any of three types of problems. One, just plain errors, either typos or problems we did not know about. Two, places in the database where we have no data in that field and you know what should go there. Three, ideas on how better to arrange the data or programs you have written to manipulate the data. It is hoped that over a period of time we can hunt down mistakes and make the database as error free as possible. Thank you for any help you can render in attaining that goal. Steve Coe 6652 W. Mescal St. Glendale, Az. 85302 Ph. (602) 878-1873 A. J. Crayon 13819 N. 37th Ave. Phoenix, Az. 85023 Ph. (602) 938-3277