THE DISTANCE TO THE T-TAURI STARS IN TAURUS DETERMINED FROM THEIR ROTATIONAL PROPERTIES

We have determined the average distance to the young stars in the Taur us star formation region through their rotational properties. While mo st other distance estimates to star forming regions give the distance to the associated molecular clouds, the method used here gives the dis tance to the stars. Our statistical method assumes that the photometri c variations are due to surface starspots that co-rotate with the equa torial surface speed and the rotation axes of the stars are randomly d istributed. Furthermore, we pay much attention to possible unresolved binaries. A ''best fit'' distance of 152 +/- 10 parsecs is derived fro m our sample of 25 weak line T Tauri stars in Taurus. This is within t he range of distances found for the molecular cloud (140 pc - 160 pc) and confirms that the T Tauri stars are embedded within. Alternatively , the agreement of the distances to the stars and dark cloud, along wi th their intimate sky location, lends support to the interpretation an d assumptions. This means that we find a random orientation of the rot ation axes, which excludes a preferential orientation that might be ca used by large scale magnetic fields in the molecular cloud. Another as pect is that our results seem to exclude strong differential rotation for the T Tauri stars.