New BVI C Photometry of Low-Mass Pleiades Stars: Exploring the Effects of Rotation on Broadband Colors

摘要

We present new BVIC photometry for 350 Pleiades proper motion members with 9 9 > V - 17. Importantly, our new catalog includes a large number of K- and early M-type stars, roughly doubling the number of low-mass stars with well-calibrated Johnson/Cousins photometry in this benchmark cluster. We combine our new photometry with existing photometry from the literature to define a purely empirical isochrone at Pleiades age (= 100 Myr) extending from V = 9 to 17. We use the empirical isochrones to identify 48 new probably binaries and 14 likely nonmembers. The photometrically identified single stars are compared against their expected positions in the color-magnitude diagram (CMD). At 100 Myr, the mid K and early M stars are predicted to lie above the zero-age main sequence (ZAMS) having not yet reached the ZAMS. We find in the B-V versus V CMD that mid K and early M dwarfs are instead displaced below (or blueward of) the ZAMS. Using the stars' previously reported rotation periods, we find a highly statistically significant correlation between rotation period and CMD displacement, in the sense that the more rapidly rotating stars have the largest displacements in the B-V CMD.