Photometric error analysis. VI. Confirmation of Reiger's theory of scintillation

The scintillation theory of Reiger (Astron. J. 68, 395, 1963) is confirmed by additional observations and some of its implications for astronomical photoelectric photometry are discussed. The amplitude of scintil- lation noise is nearly independent of wavelength, and is proportional to the 33 power of the air mass and (at low frequencies) to the - 23 power of the telescope aperture. Since the scintillation power spectrum is a smeared version of the telescope's diffraction pattern, a central stop increases high-frequency scintillation noise. An apodized aperture is recommended for photometric observations of stars occulted by the moon.