Formation and fate of low metallicity stars in IllustrisTNG50

Low metallicity stars give rise to unique spectacular transients and are of immense interest for understanding stellar evolution. Their importance has only grown further with the recent detections of mergers of stellar mass black holes that likely originate mainly from low metallicity progenitor systems. Moreover, the formation of low metallicity stars is intricately linked to galaxy evolution, in particular to early enrichment and to later accretion and mixing of lower metallicity gas. Because low metallicity stars are difficult to observe directly, cosmological simulations are crucial for understanding their formation. Here we quantify the rates and locations of low metallicity star formation using the high-resolution TNG50 magnetohydrodynamical cosmological simulation, and we examine where low metallicity stars end up at $z=0$. We find that $20\%$ of stars with $Z_*<0.1\,\mathrm{Z_\odot}$ form after $z=2$, and that such stars are still forming in galaxies of all masses at $z=0$ today. Moreover, most low-metallicity stars at $z=0$ reside in massive galaxies. We analyse the radial distribution of low metallicity star formation, and discuss the curious case of seven galaxies in TNG50 that form stars from primordial gas even at $z=0$.Comment: 15 pages, 11 figures, accepted by MNRAS, comments welcom

Astrophysics with the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna

The Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) will be a transformative experiment for gravitational wave astronomy, and, as such, it will offer unique opportunities to address many key astrophysical questions in a completely novel way. The synergy with ground-based and space-born instruments in the electromagnetic domain, by enabling multi-messenger observations, will add further to the discovery potential of LISA. The next decade is crucial to prepare the astrophysical community for LISA’s first observations. This review outlines the extensive landscape of astrophysical theory, numerical simulations, and astronomical observations that are instrumental for modeling and interpreting the upcoming LISA datastream. To this aim, the current knowledge in three main source classes for LISA is reviewed; ultra-compact stellar-mass binaries, massive black hole binaries, and extreme or interme-diate mass ratio inspirals. The relevant astrophysical processes and the established modeling techniques are summarized. Likewise, open issues and gaps in our understanding of these sources are highlighted, along with an indication of how LISA could help making progress in the different areas. New research avenues that LISA itself, or its joint exploitation with upcoming studies in the electromagnetic domain, will enable, are also illustrated. Improvements in modeling and analysis approaches, such as the combination of numerical simulations and modern data science techniques, are discussed. This review is intended to be a starting point for using LISA as a new discovery tool for understanding our Universe

Astrophysics with the Laser Interferometer Space Antenna

Laser Interferometer Space Antenna (LISA) will be a transformative experiment for gravitational wave astronomy as it will offer unique opportunities to address many key astrophysical questions in a completely novel way. The synergy with ground-based and other space-based instruments in the electromagnetic domain, by enabling multi-messenger observations, will add further to the discovery potential of LISA. The next decade is crucial to prepare the astrophysical community for LISA's first observations. This review outlines the extensive landscape of astrophysical theory, numerical simulations, and astronomical observations that are instrumental for modeling and interpreting the upcoming LISA datastream. To this aim, the current knowledge in three main source classes for LISA is reviewed: ultra-compact stellar-mass binaries, massive black hole binaries, and extreme or intermediate mass ratio inspirals. The relevant astrophysical processes and the established modeling techniques are summarized. Likewise, open issues and gaps in our understanding of these sources are highlighted, along with an indication of how LISA could help make progress in the different areas. New research avenues that LISA itself, or its joint exploitation with studies in the electromagnetic domain, will enable, are also illustrated. Improvements in modeling and analysis approaches, such as the combination of numerical simulations and modern data science techniques, are discussed. This review is intended to be a starting point for using LISA as a new discovery tool for understanding our Universe

Chemical evolution of the Universe and its consequences for gravitational-wave astrophysics

Gravitational waves (GW) emitted by merging black holes (BH) and neutron stars are now routinely detected. Those are the afterlives of massive stars that formed all across the Universe—at different cosmic times and with different metallicities. Birth metallicity plays an important role in the evolution of massive stars. Consequently, the population properties of mergers are sensitive to the metallicity dependent cosmic star formation history (fSFR(Z,z)). In particular, within the isolated formation scenarios (the focus of this paper), a strong low metallicity preference of the formation of BH mergers is found. The origin of this dependence and its consequences are discussed. Most importantly, uncertainty in the fSFR(Z,z) (substantial even at low redshifts) cannot be ignored in the models. This poses a challenge for the interpretation of the observed GW source population properties. Possible improvements and the role of future GW detectors are considered. Recent efforts to determine fSFR(Z,z) and the factors that dominate its uncertainty are summarized. Many of those factors stem from the uncertain properties of faint and distant galaxies. The fact that they leave imprint on the redshift-dependent properties of mergers makes GW a promising (and complementary to electromagnetic observations) tool to study galaxy chemical evolution

Impact of massive binary star and cosmic evolution on gravitational wave observations - II. Double compact object rates and properties

Making the most of the rapidly increasing population of gravitational-wave detections of black hole (BH) and neutron star (NS) mergers requires comparing observations with population synthesis predictions. In this work, we investigate the combined impact from the key uncertainties in population synthesis modelling of the isolated binary evolution channel: the physical processes in massive binary-star evolution and the star formation history as a function of metallicity, Z, and redshift z, S(Z,z)⁠. Considering these uncertainties, we create 560 different publicly available model realizations and calculate the rate and distribution characteristics of detectable BHBH, BHNS, and NSNS mergers. We find that our stellar evolution and S(Z,z) variations can combined impact the predicted intrinsic and detectable merger rates by factors in the range 102–104. We find that BHBH rates are dominantly impacted by S(Z,z) variations, NSNS rates by stellar evolution variations and BHNS rates by both. We then consider the combined impact from all uncertainties considered in this work on the detectable mass distribution shapes (chirp mass, individual masses, and mass ratio). We find that the BHNS mass distributions are predominantly impacted by massive binary-star evolution changes. For BHBH and NSNS, we find that both uncertainties are important. We also find that the shape of the delay time and birth metallicity distributions are typically dominated by the choice of S(Z,z) for BHBH, BHNS, and NSNS. We identify several examples of robust features in the mass distributions predicted by all 560 models, such that we expect more than 95 per cent of BHBH detections to contain a BH ≳8M⊙ and have mass ratios ≲ 4. Our work demonstrates that it is essential to consider a wide range of allowed models to study double compact object merger rates and properties. Conversely, larger observed samples could allow us to decipher currently unconstrained stages of stellar and binary evolution

Full orbital solution for the binary system in the northern Galactic disc microlensing event Gaia16aye

Gaia16aye was a binary microlensing event discovered in the direction towards the northern Galactic disc and was one of the first microlensing events detected and alerted to by the Gaia space mission. Its light curve exhibited five distinct brightening episodes, reaching up to I? =? 12 mag, and it was covered in great detail with almost 25 000 data points gathered by a network of telescopes. We present the photometric and spectroscopic follow-up covering 500 days of the event evolution. We employed a full Keplerian binary orbit microlensing model combined with the motion of Earth and Gaia around the Sun to reproduce the complex light curve. The photometric data allowed us to solve the microlensing event entirely and to derive the complete and unique set of orbital parameters of the binary lensing system. We also report on the detection of the first-ever microlensing space-parallax between the Earth and Gaia located at L2. The properties of the binary system were derived from microlensing parameters, and we found that the system is composed of two main-sequence stars with masses 0.57 ± 0.05 M? and 0.36 ± 0.03 M? at 780 pc, with an orbital period of 2.88 years and an eccentricity of 0.30. We also predict the astrometric microlensing signal for this binary lens as it will be seen by Gaia as well as the radial velocity curve for the binary system. Events such as Gaia16aye indicate the potential for the microlensing method of probing the mass function of dark objects, including black holes, in directions other than that of the Galactic bulge. This case also emphasises the importance of long-term time-domain coordinated observations that can be made with a network of heterogeneous telescopes. © ESO 2020

The small size telescope projects for the Cherenkov Telescope Array

The small size telescopes (SSTs), spread over an area of several square km, dominate the CTA sensitivity in the photon energy range from a few TeV to over 100 TeV, enabling for the detailed exploration of the very high energy gamma-ray sky. The proposed telescopes are innovative designs providing a wide field of view. Two of them, the ASTRI (Astrophysics con Specchi a Tecnologia Replicante Italiana) and the GCT (Gamma-ray Cherenkov Telescope) telescopes, are based on dual mirror Schwarzschild-Couder optics, with primary mirror diameters of 4 m. The third, SST-1M, is a Davies-Cotton design with a 4 m diameter mirror. Progress with the construction and testing of prototypes of these telescopes is presented. The SST cameras use silicon photomultipliers, with preamplifier and readout/trigger electronics designed to optimize the performance of these sensors for (atmospheric) Cherenkov light. The status of the camera developments is discussed. The SST sub-array will consist of about 70 telescopes at the CTA southern site. Current plans for the implementation of the array are presented

Ellsworth American : January 19, 1893

The single mirror small-size telescope (SST-1M) is one of the telescope projects being proposed for the Cherenkov Telescope Array observatory by a sub-consortium of Polish and Swiss institutions. The SST-1M prototype structure is currently being constructed at the Institute of Nuclear Physics in Cracow, Poland, while the camera will be assembled at the University of Geneva, Switzerland. This prototype enables measurements of parameters having a decisive influence on the telescope performance. We present results of numerical simulations of the SST-1M performance based on such measurements. The telescope effective area, the expected trigger rates and the optical point spread function are calculated

Full orbital solution for the binary system in the northern Galactic disc microlensing event Gaia16aye

© ESO 2020. Gaia16aye was a binary microlensing event discovered in the direction towards the northern Galactic disc and was one of the first microlensing events detected and alerted to by the Gaia space mission. Its light curve exhibited five distinct brightening episodes, reaching up to I? =? 12 mag, and it was covered in great detail with almost 25 000 data points gathered by a network of telescopes. We present the photometric and spectroscopic follow-up covering 500 days of the event evolution. We employed a full Keplerian binary orbit microlensing model combined with the motion of Earth and Gaia around the Sun to reproduce the complex light curve. The photometric data allowed us to solve the microlensing event entirely and to derive the complete and unique set of orbital parameters of the binary lensing system. We also report on the detection of the first-ever microlensing space-parallax between the Earth and Gaia located at L2. The properties of the binary system were derived from microlensing parameters, and we found that the system is composed of two main-sequence stars with masses 0.57 ± 0.05 M? and 0.36 ± 0.03 M? at 780 pc, with an orbital period of 2.88 years and an eccentricity of 0.30. We also predict the astrometric microlensing signal for this binary lens as it will be seen by Gaia as well as the radial velocity curve for the binary system. Events such as Gaia16aye indicate the potential for the microlensing method of probing the mass function of dark objects, including black holes, in directions other than that of the Galactic bulge. This case also emphasises the importance of long-term time-domain coordinated observations that can be made with a network of heterogeneous telescopes