10 research outputs found
Sizes and Shapes of Young Star Cluster Light Profiles in M83
We measure the radii and two-dimensional light profiles of a large sample of
young, massive star clusters in M83 using archival HST/WFC3 imaging of seven
adjacent fields. We use GALFIT to fit the two-dimensional light profiles of the
clusters, from which we find effective (half-light) radii, core radii, and
slopes of the power-law (EFF) profile (). We find lognormal distributions
of effective radius and core radius, with medians of 2.5 pc and
1.3 pc, respectively. Our results provide strong evidence for a
characteristic size of young, massive clusters. The average effective radius
and core radius increase somewhat with cluster age. Little to no change in
effective radius is observed with increasing galactocentric distance, except
perhaps for clusters younger than 100 Myr. We find a shallow correlation
between effective radius and mass for the full cluster sample, but a stronger
correlation is present for clusters 200-300 Myr in age. Finally, the majority
of the clusters are best fit by an EFF model with index . There is
no strong evidence for change in with cluster age, mass, or
galactocentric distance. Our results suggest that clusters emerge from early
evolution with similar radii and are not strongly affected by the tidal field
of M83. Mass loss due to stellar evolution and/or GMC interactions appear to
dominate cluster expansion in the age range we study.Comment: 34 pages, 11 figures, 3 tables, accepted by MNRAS. Machine-readable
table attached (full version of Table 3). To obtain, download the source file
from the "Other formats" link abov
Measuring Young Stars in Space and Time -- I. The Photometric Catalog and Extinction Properties of N44
In order to better understand the role of high-mass stellar feedback in
regulating star formation in giant molecular clouds, we carried out a Hubble
Space Telescope (HST) Treasury Program "Measuring Young Stars in Space and
Time" (MYSST) targeting the star-forming complex N44 in the Large Magellanic
Cloud (LMC). Using the F555W and F814W broadband filters of both the ACS and
WFC3/UVIS, we built a photometric catalog of 461,684 stars down to
mag and mag,
corresponding to the magnitude of an unreddened 1 Myr pre-main-sequence star of
at the LMC distance. In this first paper we describe
the observing strategy of MYSST, the data reduction procedure, and present the
photometric catalog. We identify multiple young stellar populations tracing the
gaseous rim of N44's super bubble, together with various contaminants belonging
to the LMC field population. We also determine the reddening properties from
the slope of the elongated red clump feature by applying the machine learning
algorithm RANSAC, and we select a set of Upper Main Sequence (UMS) stars as
primary probes to build an extinction map, deriving a relatively modest median
extinction mag. The same procedure applied to
the red clump provides mag.Comment: 29 pages, 15 figures, accepted for publication in A
Measuring Young Stars in Space and Time -- II. The Pre-Main-Sequence Stellar Content of N44
The Hubble Space Telescope (HST) survey Measuring Young Stars in Space and
Time (MYSST) entails some of the deepest photometric observations of
extragalactic star formation, capturing even the lowest mass stars of the
active star-forming complex N44 in the Large Magellanic Cloud. We employ the
new MYSST stellar catalog to identify and characterize the content of young
pre-main-sequence (PMS) stars across N44 and analyze the PMS clustering
structure. To distinguish PMS stars from more evolved line of sight
contaminants, a non-trivial task due to several effects that alter photometry,
we utilize a machine learning classification approach. This consists of
training a support vector machine (SVM) and a random forest (RF) on a carefully
selected subset of the MYSST data and categorize all observed stars as PMS or
non-PMS. Combining SVM and RF predictions to retrieve the most robust set of
PMS sources, we find candidates with a PMS probability above 95%
across N44. Employing a clustering approach based on a nearest neighbor surface
density estimate, we identify 18 prominent PMS structures at
significance above the mean density with sub-clusters persisting up to and
beyond significance. The most active star-forming center, located
at the western edge of N44's bubble, is a subcluster with an effective radius
of pc entailing more than 1,100 PMS candidates. Furthermore, we
confirm that almost all identified clusters coincide with known H II regions
and are close to or harbor massive young O stars or YSOs previously discovered
by MUSE and Spitzer observations.Comment: 29 pages, 21 figures, accepted for publication in A
An Open System for Social Computation
Part of the power of social computation comes from using the collective intelligence of humans to tame the aggregate uncertainty of (otherwise) low veracity data obtained from human and automated sources. We have witnessed a surge in development of social computing systems but, ironically, there have been few attempts to generalise across this activity so that creation of the underlying mechanisms themselves can be made more social. We describe a method for achieving this by standardising patterns of social computation via lightweight formal specifications (we call these social artifacts) that can be connected to existing internet architectures via a single model of computation. Upon this framework we build a mechanism for extracting provenance meta-data across social computations
A Comparison of Young Star Properties with Local Galactic Environment for LEGUS/LITTLE THINGS Dwarf Irregular Galaxies
We have explored the role environmental factors play in determining characteristics of young stellar objects in nearby dwarf irregular and blue compact dwarf galaxies. Star clusters are characterized by concentrations, masses, and formation rates; OB associations by mass and mass surface density; O stars by their numbers and near-ultraviolet absolute magnitudes; and H ii regions by Hα surface brightnesses. These characteristics are compared to surrounding galactic pressure, stellar mass density, H i surface density, and star formation rate (SFR) surface density. We find no trend of cluster characteristics with environmental properties, implying that larger-scale effects are more important in determining cluster characteristics or that rapid dynamical evolution erases any memory of the initial conditions. On the other hand, the most massive OB associations are found at higher pressure and H i surface density, and there is a trend of higher H ii region Hα surface brightness with higher pressure, suggesting that a higher concentration of massive stars and gas is found preferentially in regions of higher pressure. At low pressures we find massive stars but not bound clusters and OB associations. We do not find evidence for an increase of cluster formation efficiency as a function of SFR density. However, there is an increase in the ratio of the number of clusters to the number of O stars with increasing pressure, perhaps reflecting an increase in clustering properties with SFR
A Study of Two Dwarf Irregular Galaxies with Asymmetrical Star Formation Distributions
Two dwarf irregular galaxies, DDO 187 and NGC 3738, exhibit a striking pattern of star formation: intense star formation is taking place in a large region occupying roughly half of the inner part of the optical galaxy. We use data on the H i distribution and kinematics and stellar images and colors to examine the properties of the environment in the high star formation rate (HSF) halves of the galaxies in comparison with the low star formation rate halves. We find that the pressure and gas density are higher on the HSF sides by 30%–70%. In addition we find in both galaxies that the H i velocity fields exhibit significant deviations from ordered rotation and there are large regions of high-velocity dispersion and multiple velocity components in the gas beyond the inner regions of the galaxies. The conditions in the HSF regions are likely the result of large-scale external processes affecting the internal environment of the galaxies and enabling the current star formation there