We present distance modulus and reddening determinations for 72 Galactic globular clusters from the homogeneous photometric database of Piotto et al. (2002, cat. ), calibrated to the HST flight F439W and F555W bands. The distances have been determined by comparison with theoretical absolute magnitudes of the ZAHB. For low and intermediate

We analyse the complex short-term SiIII line-profile variability of the spectroscopic binary β Cep star κ Scorpii after orbit subtraction, before and after spectral disentangling. We refine the known oscillation frequency of the star: f1=4.99922 c d-1 and detect 2f1. Variability is also found at frequencies near f2≃ 4.85 c d-1 and f3≃ 5.69 c d-1 or

We present updated results of a high-resolution, magnitude-limited (Ks 0.8, ΔKs 20 AU), very low mass (VLM; Mtot ~3 AU and mass ratios q>~0.6. Within these instrumental sensitivities, these results support the overall trend that both the semimajor axis distribution and binary fraction are a function of the mass of the primary star and decrease with

Since the discovery in 1995 of the first extrasolar planet candidate around a solar type star using the radial velocity method, to date (beginning of 2005), 135 candidate planets around main sequence stars have been discovered by the transit and the radial velocity (RV) methods. Their minimum masses are in the range 0.045 to 13 MJup. The proximity

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Solar observations of the center-to-limb variation of several spectral lines were carried out in October 22-23, 1997, with the Gregory Coude Telescope (GCT) and its Czerny-Turner echelle spectrograph at the Observatorio del Teide (Tenerife, Spain). We secured spectra for 8 spectral setups in 6 different positions across the solar disk, as