Infrared Variation of Radio Selected BL Lacertae Objects

Abstract

In this paper, the historical infrared (JHK) data compiled from the published literature are presented in electronic form for 40 radio selected BL Lacertae objects (RBLs) for the first time. Largest variations are found and compared with the largest optical variation. Relations between color index and magnitude and between color-color indices are discussed individually. For the color-magnitude relation, some objects (0048-097, 0735+178, 0851+202, 1215+303, 1219+285, 1749+096, and perhaps 0219+428, 0537-441, 1514-241) show that color index increases with magnitude indicating that the spectrum flattens when the source brightens while some other objects (0754+100, 1147+245, 1418+546, and 1727+502) perhaps show an opposite behaviour, while remaining objects do not show any clear tendency; For color-color relation, it is found common that (J-K) is closely correlated with (J-H) while (J-H) is not correlated with (H-K).