Using Galactic Cepheids to verify Gaia parallaxes
Context. The Gaia satellite will measure highly accurate absolute parallaxes of hundreds of millions of stars by comparing the parallactic displacements in the two fields of view of the optical instrument. The requirements on the stability of the "basic angle" between the two fields are correspondingly strict, and possible variations (on the microarcsec level) are therefore monitored by an on-boar
