BRITE-Constellation is a group of five nano-satellites - launched in 2013 and 2014 - that obtain long, uninterrupted time-series of high-precision photometry of the brightest (V < 5 mag) stars in the sky, in two passbands. This is one of the first scientific space missions accomplished with nano-satellites, cubes of 20 cm on each side. The scientific goals of the mission focus on intrinsically luminous stars, especially those that are located on the upper main sequence, i.e., hot, massive O- and B-type stars. These objects show diverse forms of variability, caused by pulsations, mass loss, rotation, stellar winds and interactions in binary and multiple systems.

The main goal of our Special Session is to present the potential and the achievements of BRITE to a broad community in order to raise its interest in the mission. To this effect, we will discuss the newest observational results obtained with BRITE-Constellation in the general context of exploiting nano-satellites for science. The aims and scope of the session can be summarized as follows:

- Explore the interaction of pulsations in massive stars with their mass loss (especially in O-type and Be stars), the presence of magnetic fields and proximity effects in binaries, with the goal of improving our knowledge of their structure and evolution.

- Promote synergies between space-based observations and ground-based observations and complementary approaches to scientific problem solving using data from different satellite missions, including BRITE.

Programme
Morning session (9:00 - 10:30), chair: G.A. Wade

• 09:00 - 09:30 Werner WEISS: BRITE-Constellation four successful years and more to come (invited)
• 09:30 - 10:00 Rainer KUSCHNIG: BRITE-Constellation: operating five nano-satellites to serve one mission (invited)
• 10:00 - 10:15 Edward GUINAN: Unravelling the complex brightness variations of the red supergiant Betelgeuse with the BRITE Constellation nanosatellites and ground-based photometry
• 10:15 - 10:30 Dietrich BAADE: BRITEning up the Be phenomenon

10:30 - 14:00 Lunch break

1st afternoon session (14:00 - 15:30), chair: R. Kuschnig

• 14:00 - 14:15 Przemyslaw WALCZAK: Pulsation analysis of early B-type stars from the BRITE Sagittarius field
• 14:15 - 14:30 Ewa NIEMCZURA: Photometric and spectroscopic variability of 53 Per
• 14:30 - 14:45 Radoslaw SMOLEC: Oscillations of classical Cepheids - new discoveries and new challenges
• 14:45 - 15:00 Werner WEISS: Testing the long-term stability of BRITE-Constellation
• 15:00 - 15:15 Andrzej PIGULSKI: δ Pictoris: massive eclipsing binary with β Cephei-type pulsating component
• 15:15 - 15:30 Milena RATAJCZAK: BRITE view on chosen eclipsing binaries

15:30 - 16:00 Coffee break

2nd afternoon session (16:00 - 17:30), chair: W.W. Weiss

• 16:00 -16:15 Jiri KRTICKA: Light variations due to wind blanketing in O stars
• 16:15 - 16:30 Gregg A. WADE: BRITE reveals tidal interaction in the double-magnetic B-type spectroscopic binary ε Lupi
• 16:30 - 16:45 Gabriela MICHALSKA: Double-lined spectroscopic binary 57 Cyg
• 16:45 - 17:00 Kresimir PAVLOVSKI: Reconstructing an accretion disk image in β Lyrae from BRITE-Constellation space photometry
• 17:00 - 17:30 Dietrich BAADE: BRITE-Constellation: science potential (invited)

Invited speakers

• Werner W. Weiss (Institute for Astronomy, University of Vienna, Austria)
• Rainer Kuschnig (Graz University of Technology, Austria)
• Dietrich Baade (European Organisation for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere (ESO), Germany)

Scientific organisers

• Andrzej Pigulski (University of Wroclaw, Poland)
• Gregg A. Wade (Department of Physics, Royal Military College of Canada, Canada)
• Konstanze Zwintz (Institute for Astro- and Particle Physics, University of Innsbruck, Austria)

Contact
pigulski @ astro.uni.wroc.pl

Updated on Sat Jun 17 09:44:46 CEST 2017

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