TASS field and PMS delta Scuti stars

[Doug Welch <welch@physics.mcmaster.ca>]

Folks,

You may be amused to know that COROT ("COnvection ROtation and planetary 
Transits") mission has an interest in some of the stars in a Dataset 23 
field. In fact, 35795 = V588 Mon (thanks, Mike K.!) is a suspected pre-main 
sequence (PMS) delta Scuti variable (the WS=1.0 from the DS23 photometry).

In "Communications in Asteroseismology", volume 141, pages 13-19, Feb 2002,
M. Marconi, F. Palla, and V. Ripepi have picked an anticenter field
with several PMS delta Scuti stars which overlaps the TASS field
significantly.

Note that they are also keen on finding extrasolar planet transits.
These would look like shallow (0.0-0.1 mag), frequently flat-bottomed 
eclipses which occupy of order 0.1-1% of the orbital period. Said 
differently, they would *not* have a whopping huge WS statistic!
Your chances of locating one increases linearly with the number of
points you take and the number of stars you observe. Not too surprisingly,
planetary transits are more easily detected when the system contains
a main sequence star rather than a giant. The Monoceros field is
actually an excellent choice in this regard. Note that the microlensing
surveys which have gone after transits in their data have started
by confining themselves to main sequence stars - dramatically
lowering the total number of stars to be examined from their galactic 
bulge samples!

COROT doesn't launch until 2005 ...

Cheers,
Doug