Search Publications
The VMC survey - XLI. Stellar proper motions within the Small Magellanic Cloud
Sun, Ning-Chen; de Grijs, Richard; Ripepi, Vincenzo +13 more
We used data from the near-infrared Visible and Infrared Telescope for Astronomy (VISTA) survey of the Magellanic Cloud system (VMC) to measure proper motions (PMs) of stars within the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC). The data analysed in this study comprise 26 VMC tiles, covering a total contiguous area on the sky of ∼40 deg2. Using multi…
Gaia view of a stellar sub-structure in front of the Small Magellanic Cloud
de Grijs, Richard; Cioni, Maria-Rosa L.; Bekki, Kenji +6 more
Recent observational studies identified a foreground stellar sub-structure traced by red clump (RC) stars (∼12 kpc in front of the main body) in the eastern regions of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) and suggested that it formed during the formation of the Magellanic Bridge (MB), due to the tidal interaction of the Magellanic Clouds. Previous stu…
LAMOST J0140355 + 392651: an evolved cataclysmic variable donor transitioning to become an extremely low-mass white dwarf
Xiang, Maosheng; Rix, Hans-Walter; El-Badry, Kareem +6 more
We present LAMOST J0140355 + 392651 (hereafter J0140), a close (Porb = 3.81 h) binary containing a bloated, low-mass ($M \approx 0.15 \, \mathrm{M}_{\odot }$) proto-white dwarf (WD) and a massive ($M \approx 0.95\, \mathrm{M}_{\odot }$) WD companion. The system's optical light curve is dominated by large-amplitude ellipsoidal variabilit…
The age of the carina young association and potential membership of HD 95086
Booth, Mark; del Burgo, Carlos; Hambaryan, Valeri V.
Carina is a nearby young stellar association. So far, only a small number of stars have been clearly identified as members of this association. In this paper, we reanalyse the membership of the association in light of Gaia DR2 data, in particular finding that HD 95086 is a potential member (probability of 71 per cent). This star is noteworthy as o…
Photometric, polarimetric, and spectroscopic studies of the luminous, slow-decaying Type Ib SN 2012au
Pandey, S. B.; Ochner, P.; Benetti, S. +15 more
Optical, near-infrared (NIR) photometric and spectroscopic studies, along with the optical imaging polarimetric results for SN 2012au, are presented in this article to constrain the nature of the progenitor and other properties. Well-calibrated multiband optical photometric data (from -0.2 to +413 d since B-band maximum) were used to compute the b…
Detailed elemental abundances of binary stars: searching for signatures of planet formation and atomic diffusion
Bitsch, Bertram; Ting, Yuan-Sen; Murphy, Michael T. +5 more
Binary star systems are assumed to be co-natal and coeval, and thus to have identical chemical composition. In this work, we aim to test the hypothesis that there is a connection between observed element abundance patterns and the formation of planets using binary stars. Moreover, we also want to test how atomic diffusion might influence the obser…
Internal rotation of Milky Way dwarf spheroidal satellites with Gaia Early Data Release 3
van der Marel, Roeland P.; Watkins, Laura L.; del Pino, Andrés +2 more
We present an analysis of the kinematics of 14 satellites of the Milky Way (MW). We use proper motions (PMs) from the Gaia Early Data Release 3 (EDR3) and line-of-sight velocities (vlos) available in the literature to derive the systemic 3D motion of these systems. For six of them, namely the Carina, Draco, Fornax, Sculptor, Sextans, an…
Revealing the formation histories of the first stars with the cosmic near-infrared background
Furlanetto, Steven R.; Sun, Guochao; Mirocha, Jordan +1 more
The cosmic near-infrared background (NIRB) offers a powerful integral probe of radiative processes at different cosmic epochs, including the pre-reionization era when metal-free, Population III (Pop III) stars first formed. While the radiation from metal-enriched, Population II (Pop II) stars likely dominates the contribution to the observed NIRB …
Fundamental X-ray corona parameters of Swift/BAT AGN
Mushotzky, Richard; Hinkle, Jason T.
While X-ray emission from active galactic nuclei (AGN) is common, the detailed physics behind this emission is not well understood. This is in part because high quality broad-band spectra are required to precisely derive fundamental parameters of X-ray emission, such as the photon index, folding energy, and reflection coefficient. Here, we present…
Photometric cross-calibration of the SDSS Stripe 82 Standard Stars catalogue with Gaia EDR3, and comparison with Pan-STARRS1, DES, CFIS, and GALEX catalogues
Gwyn, Stephen; Ivezić, Željko; Tucker, Douglas L. +3 more
We extend the SDSS Stripe 82 Standard Stars catalogue with post-2007 SDSS imaging data. This improved version lists averaged SDSS ugriz photometry for nearly a million stars brighter than r ~ 22 mag. With 2-3 times more measurements per star, random errors are 1.4-1.7 times smaller than in the original catalogue, and about three times smaller than…