2021-03-30

we were wrong about the lower main sequence

I wrote ten days ago about a bimodality in the lower main sequence that Hans-Walter Rix (MPIA) found a few weeks ago. I sent it to some luminaries and my very old friend John Gizis (Delaware) wrote back saying that it might be issues with the ESA Gaia photometry. I argued back at him, saying: Why would you not trust the Gaia photometry, it is the world's premier data on stars? He agreed, and we explored issues of stellar variability, spectroscopy, and kinematics. But then, a few days later, Gizis pointed me at figure 29 in this paper. It looks like we just rediscovered a known data issue. Brutal! But kudos to Gizis for his great intuition.

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