The Effect of Photometric Errors on the Measured Width of the Main Sequence in Star Clusters

Abstract

This paper deals with the effect of errors in the B and V magnitudes, or measurements in any other color system, on the width of the main sequence in a color-magnitude (Hertzsprung-Russell) diagram. The width is defined as the dispersion in apparent (or absolute) magnitude at a fixed, measured photometric color. I find that the dispersion is larger than might be thought, a priori. A statistical analysis is presented which demonstrates that the error in the magnitude residual from a linear approximation to the main sequence is Gaussian, but with a standard deviation which is much larger, in general, than the errors in the individual B and V magnitudes. This result is confirmed by a Monte Carlo simulation of a main sequence population with specified errors in B and V magnitudes, and can be explained on the basis of simple algebraic arguments.