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B. Chaboyer (Dartmouth), B.W. Carney (UNC-CH), D.K. Duncan (U Colorado), T.M. Girard (Yale U), D.W. Latham (CfA), A.C. Layden (BGSU), A. McWilliam (Carnegie Observatories), A. Sarajedini (U Florida), M. Shao (JPL)
SIM Planetquest is expected to produce parallaxes with an accuracy of 5 microarcseconds. Our key project has been awarded 1330 hours of time on SIM Planetquest to determine the distance scale to Population II objects (globular clusters, RR Lyrae stars and main-sequence turn-off and subgiant stars). We describe the observing strategy we will adopt with SIM Planetquest, which will result in parallax distances to 21 globular clusters, ~60 RR Lyrae stars and ~60 very metal-poor turn-off and subgiant branch stars. We present results of simulations which demonstrate how the expected performance of SIM Planetquest will allow us to (a) determine correlations between age, chemical composition and orbital parameters for the globular clusters and field turn-off/subgiant branch stars and (b) determine the absolute magnitude of the RR Lyrae stars as a function of chemical composition, pulsation period and other parameters.
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Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, 37 #2
© 2005. The American Astronomical Soceity.