Standard and Truncated Luminosity Functions for Stars in the Gaia Era

Abstract

The luminosity function (LF) for stars is here fitted by a Schechter function and by a Gamma probability density function. The dependence of the number of stars on the distance, both in the low and high luminosity regions, requires the inclusion of a lower and upper boundary in the Schechter and Gamma LFs. Three astrophysical applications for stars are provided: deduction of the parameters at low distances, behavior of the average absolute magnitude with distance, and the location of the photometric maximum as a function of the selected flux. The use of the truncated LFs allows to model the Malmquist bias.