1,248 research outputs found
High-resolution Spectroscopy of [Ne II] Emission from TW Hya
We present high-resolution echelle spectra of [Ne II] 12.81 micron emission
from the classical T Tauri star (CTTS) TW Hya obtained with MICHELLE on Gemini
North. The line is centered at the stellar radial velocity and has an intrinsic
FWHM of 21\pm 4 km/s. The line width is broader than other narrow emission
lines typically associated with the disk around TW Hya. If formed in a disk,
the line broadening could result from turbulence in a warm disk atmosphere,
Keplerian rotation at an average distance of 0.1 AU from the star, or a
photoevaporative flow from the optically-thin region of the disk. We place
upper limits on the [Ne II] emission flux from the CTTSs DP Tau and BP Tau.Comment: Accepted by ApJ. 18 pages, including 2 figures and 2 table
No evidence for mass segregation in massive young clusters
Aims. We investigate the validity of the mass segregation indicators commonly
used in analysing young stellar clusters. Methods. We simulate observations by
constructing synthetic seeing-limited images of a 1000 massive clusters (10^4
Msun) with a standard IMF and a King-density distribution function. Results. We
find that commonly used indicators are highly sensitive to sample
incompleteness in observational data and that radial completeness
determinations do not provide satisfactory corrections, rendering the studies
of radial properties highly uncertain. On the other hand, we find that, under
certain conditions, the global completeness can be estimated accurately,
allowing for the correction of the global luminosity and mass functions of the
cluster. Conclusions. We argue that there is currently no observational
evidence of mass segregation in young compact clusters since there is no robust
way to differentiate between true mass segregation and sample incompleteness
effects. Caution should then be exercised when interpreting results from
observations as evidence of mass segregation.Comment: 10 pages, 12 figures, typos corrected. Download a high-resolution
version at http://www.astro.up.pt/~jascenso/mseg_v2.pdf (1 MB
Rotation of Low-mass Stars in Taurus with K2
We present an analysis of K2 light curves (LCs) from Campaigns 4 and 13 for members of the young (~3 Myr) Taurus association, in addition to an older (~30 Myr) population of stars that is largely in the foreground of the Taurus molecular clouds. Out of 156 of the highest-confidence Taurus members, we find that 81% are periodic. Our sample of young foreground stars is biased and incomplete, but nearly all stars (37/38) are periodic. The overall distribution of rotation rates as a function of color (a proxy for mass) is similar to that found in other clusters: the slowest rotators are among the early M spectral types, with faster rotation toward both earlier FGK and later M types. The relationship between period and color/mass exhibited by older clusters such as the Pleiades is already in place by Taurus age. The foreground population has very few stars but is consistent with the USco and Pleiades period distributions. As found in other young clusters, stars with disks rotate on average slower, and few with disks are found rotating faster than ~2 days. The overall amplitude of the LCs decreases with age, and higher-mass stars have generally lower amplitudes than lower-mass stars. Stars with disks have on average larger amplitudes than stars without disks, though the physical mechanisms driving the variability and the resulting LC morphologies are also different between these two classes
The Initial Mass Function of the Orion Nebula Cluster across the H-burning limit
We present a new census of the Orion Nebula Cluster (ONC) over a large field
of view (>30'x30'), significantly increasing the known population of stellar
and substellar cluster members with precisely determined properties. We develop
and exploit a technique to determine stellar effective temperatures from
optical colors, nearly doubling the previously available number of objects with
effective temperature determinations in this benchmark cluster. Our technique
utilizes colors from deep photometry in the I-band and in two medium-band
filters at lambda~753 and 770nm, which accurately measure the depth of a
molecular feature present in the spectra of cool stars. From these colors we
can derive effective temperatures with a precision corresponding to better than
one-half spectral subtype, and importantly this precision is independent of the
extinction to the individual stars. Also, because this technique utilizes only
photometry redward of 750nm, the results are only mildly sensitive to optical
veiling produced by accretion. Completing our census with previously available
data, we place some 1750 sources in the Hertzsprung-Russel diagram and assign
masses and ages down to 0.02 solar masses. At faint luminosities, we detect a
large population of background sources which is easily separated in our
photometry from the bona fide cluster members. The resulting initial mass
function of the cluster has good completeness well into the substellar mass
range, and we find that it declines steeply with decreasing mass. This suggests
a deficiency of newly formed brown dwarfs in the cluster compared to the
Galactic disk population.Comment: 16 pages, 18 figures. Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical
Journa
Towards the field binary population: Influence of orbital decay on close binaries
Surveys of the binary populations in the solar neighbourhood have shown that
the periods of G- and M-type stars are log-normally distributed. However,
observations of young binary populations suggest a log-uniform distribution.
Clearly some process(es) change the period distribution over time. Most stars
form in star clusters, in which two important dynamical processes occur: i)
gas-induced orbital decay of embedded binary systems and ii) destruction of
soft binaries in three-body interactions. The emphasis here is on orbital decay
which has been largely neglected so far. Using a combination of Monte-Carlo and
dynamical nbody modelling it is demonstrated here that the cluster dynamics
destroys the number of wide binaries, but leaves short-period binaries
basically undisturbed even for a initially log-uniform distribution. By
contrast orbital decay significantly reduces the number and changes the
properties of short-period binaries, but leaves wide binaries largely
uneffected. Until now it was unclear whether the short period distribution of
the field is unaltered since its formation. It is shown here, that orbital
decay is a prime candidate for such a task. In combination the dynamics of
these two processes, convert an initial log-uniform distribution to a
log-normal period distribution. The probability is 94% that the evolved and
observed period distribution were sampled from the same parent distribution.
This means binaries can be formed with periods that are sampled from the
log-uniform distribution. As the cluster evolves, short-period binaries are
merged to single stars by the gas-induced orbital decay while the dynamical
evolution in the cluster destroys wide binaries. The combination of these two
equally important processes reshapes a initial log-uniform period distribution
to the log-normal period distribution, that is observed in the field
(abridged).Comment: 9 pages, 9 figure
- …