COMMISSION 27 OF THE I. A. U.
            INFORMATION BULLETIN ON VARIABLE STARS
                         Number 3328

                                          Konkoly Observatory
                                          Budapest
                                          15 May 1989

                                          HU ISSN 0374 - 0676


               ON THE SPECTRUM OF BD +24d676


Recently Weaver and Hobson (1989) reported on the presence of the H_alpha
emission line in the spectrum of BD +24d676 on Feb. 16, 1988. This line had
been previously detected also on a plate of the late seventies/early eighties
by Stephenson (1986) in the course of one of his large surveys, and Weaver and
Hobson concluded that the star might be a bright T Tauri object, particularly
because the energy distribution in their spectra met a G to K star.

The object is present on several plates taken by W. Gotz with the 7deg and 3deg
objective prisms attached to the 50/70/172 cm Schmidt camera of Sonneberg
Observatory. On two well-exposed blue sensitive 7deg plates the Balmer lines
H_gamma to H_eta are visible in absorption (Oct. 11, 1967, and Nov. 26, 1968);
traces of H_delta and H_epsilon seem also indicated on two further plates.
This finding is not in crude contrast to the spectral type of F5, given in the
HD extension (HDE283817), and of G0 of the AGK3 catalogue (AG +24d421), but
certainly a more efficient spectral investigation is needed.

A good 7deg IN plate exposed behind a Schott RG1 filter shows neither a trace of
H_alpha in emission nor in absorption (Feb. 5, 1967). As to H_beta, no 
statement can
be made because it lies outside or at the edge of the sensitivity range or
inside the green gap of our plates. We conclude that on our plate the H_alpha
emission just fills in the absorption line and we thus confirm the supposition
of Weaver and Hobson (1989) who pointed to the fact that an H_alpha emission
has not been discovered at this star by the H_alpha surveys for T Tauri stars
in that sky region and that therefore the line strength must probably be
considered as variable.

Although the star is situated in the merging area of several dark lanes
extending from northwest to southeast, the question whether BD +24d676 is
truly related to the T Tauri class is still open, especially since its
polarization behaviour is not different from the field stars of that region
(Moneti et al., 1984).

A part of this paper is based on the SIMBAD data retrieval system of the
astronomical Data Center, Strasbourg, France.


W. WENZEL
Sternwarte Sonneberg
Zentralinstitut für Astrophysik
Akademie der Wissenschaften
der DDR


References:

Moneti, A., Pipher, J.L., and Helfer, H.L. 1984, Astrophys. J., 282, 508. [BIBCODE 1984ApJ...282..508M ]
Stephenson, C.B. 1986, Astrophys. J., 300, 779. [BIBCODE 1986ApJ...300..779S ]
Weaver, B., and Hobson, S.W. 1989, Publ. Astron. Soc. Pacific, 100, 1443. [BIBCODE 1988PASP..100.1443W ]