32 DENIS nearby red dwarfs

Out of 11 targets with low proper motion (mu<0.1arcsec/yr) but a Reduced Proper Motion above an inclusive threshold, 9 are red dwarfs. The 4 contaminants are all reddened F-K main sequence stars, and could have been eliminated by checking for small well-known high latitude molecular clouds.

These stars might be of interest as probes of interstellar absorption. For the red dwarfs we derive spectral types and spectroscopic distances, using a new calibration of the PC3 spectral index to absolute magnitudes in the I, J, H and K photometric bands. We confirm 2 new members of the 12 pc volume (2 new M8.5), and one M7.5 NLTT object closer than 10pc; and show that one quarter of the stars with photometric distances under 30pc have too small a proper motion for inclusion in the NLTT catalog.