Lunar Occultation Observations of Young Stars in Southern Taurus
M. Simon, Tracy L. Beck, T. P. Greene, R. R. Howell, S. Lumsden, and L. Prato
Astronomical Journal (submitted)
Lunar occultation observations of NTT 042916+1751, V 826 Tau, L1551-55, HN Tau, DQ Tau, and DR Tau by high speed single-channel photometry in the IR K band detect no companions in the angular separation range 0:020 - 10" to a magnitude limit typically 2 mag fainter than the target. We also obtained occultation observations of GG Tau and HL Tau by IR camera observations at K. These reveal no new stars in the GG Tau A binary within ~2 mag of the primary in the range � 0:08 -- 10" and no companion of HL Tau within 1.5 mag and ~0.09 -- 10". The binary fraction of the 56 systems in the Taurus SFR that have been surveyed by lunar occultation and imaging is 61%. Of these, 53 systems have been surveyed for companions in the angular separation range 0.020 - 10". Their binary frequency is at least 1.4 +/- 0.3 that measured by Duquennoy and Mayor (1991) for the nearby F and G stars. These values for the binary frequency are lower bounds because they contain no corrections for incompleteness.