Wind estimates from cloud motions: Preliminary results from phases 1, 2, and 3 of an in situ aircraft verification experiment

Low level aircraft equipped with Inertial Navigation Systems (INS) were used to define the vertical extent and horizontal motion of a cloud and to measure the ambient wind field. A high level aircraft, also equipped with an INS, took photographs to describe the horizontal extent of the cloud field and to measure cloud motion. The aerial photographs were also used to make a positive identification in a satellite picture of the cloud observed by the low level aircraft. The experiment was conducted over the tropical oceans in the vicinity of Florida, Puerto Rico, Panama and in the Western Gulf of Mexico. Results for tropical cumulus clouds indicate excellent agreement between the cloud motion and the wind at the cloud base. The magnitude of the vector difference between the cloud motion and the cloud base wind is less than 1.3 m/sec for 67% of the cases with track lengths of 1 hour or longer. The cirrus cloud motions agreed best with the mean wind in the cloud layer with a vector difference of about 1.6 m/sec

SDSS J210014.12+004446.0 - dwarf nova with negative and positive superhumps

We report the results of 67h of CCD photometry of the recently discovered dwarf nova SDSS J210014.12+004446.0. The data were obtained on 24 nights spanning a month. During this time we observed four ordinary outbursts lasting about 2-3 days and reaching an amplitude of ~1.7 mag. On all nights our light curve revealed persistent modulation with the stable period of 0.081088(3) days. These humps were already observed on one night by Tramposch et al. (2005), who additionally observed superhumps during a superoutburst. Remarkably, from scant evidence at their disposal they were able to discern them as negative and positive (common) superhumps, respectively. Our period in quiescence clearly different from their superhump period confirmed this. Our discovery of an additional modulation, attributed by us to the orbital wave, completes the overall picture. Lack of superhumps in our data indicates that all eruptions we observed were ordinary outbursts. The earlier observation of the superhumps combined with the presence of the ordinary outbursts in our data enables classification of SDSS J2100 as an active SU UMa dwarf nova. Additionally, we have promoted SDSS J2100 to the group of cataclysmic variables exhibiting three periodic modulations of light from their accretion discs. We updated available information on positive and negative superhumps and thus provided enhanced evidence that their properties are strongly correlated mutually as well as with the orbital period. By recourse to these relations we were able to remove an alias ambiguity and to identify the orbital period of SDSS J2100 of 0.083304(6) days. SDSS J21000 is only third SU UMa dwarf nova showing both positive and negative superhumps. Their respective period excess and deficit equal to 4.99(3)% and -2.660(8)%, yielding the mass ratio q=0.24.Comment: 10 pages, 9 figures, accepted for publication in MNRA