A Search for Light Variations in Some Supergiants in the Large Magellanic Cloud

A careful photometric study has been made of five of the most luminous supergiants in the Large Magellanic Cloud. The results are (1) the maximum amplitude of variability on short time scales (minutes to hours) is less than +0.015 mag in both the blue and visual wavelength ranges for all five program stars, and (2) all five stars appear to be variable when observed over a time interval of a month or more with the variability ranging from 0.02 to 0.07 mag in the visual and from 0.04 to 0.08 mag in the blue. Implications of these results for recent theoretical calculations of the stability of massive stars are briefly discussed.