The Tycho-2 Catalogue is an astrometric reference catalogue containing positions and proper motions as well as two-colour photometric data for the 2.5 million brightest stars in the sky. The Tycho-2 positions and magnitudes are based on precisely the same observations as the original Tycho Catalogue (hereafter Tycho-1) collected by the star mapper of the ESA Hipparcos satellite, but Tycho-2 is much bigger and slightly more precise, owing to a more advanced reduction technique. Components of double stars with separations down to 0.8 arcsec are included. Proper motions precise to about 2.5 mas/yr are given as derived from a comparison with the Astrographic Catalogue and 143 other ground-based astrometric catalogues, all reduced to the Hipparcos celestial coordinate system. Tycho-2 supersedes in most applications Tycho-1, as well as the ACT and TRC catalogues based on Tycho-1. Supplement-1 lists stars from the Hipparcos and Tycho-1 Catalogues which are not in Tycho-2. Supplement-2 lists 1146 Tycho-1 stars which are probably either false or heavily disturbed.

For more information, please consult the Tycho-2 home page: http://www.astro.ku.dk/~erik/Tycho-2

Catalogue Characteristics:

The principal characteristics of the Tycho-2 Catalogue are summarized below. By means of proper motions the positions are transferred to the year 2000.0, the epoch of the catalogue. The median values of internal standard errors are given.

Mean satellite observation epoch ~J1991.5 Epoch of the Tycho-2 Catalogue J2000.0 Reference system ICRS coincidence with ICRS (1) +/-0.6 mas deviation from inertial (1) +/-0.25 mas/yr Number of entries 2,539,913 Astrometric standard errors (2) V_T_ < 9 mag 7 mas all stars, positions 60 mas all stars, proper motions 2.5 mas/yr Photometric std. errors (3) on V_T_ V_T_ 9 mag is below 1.5