The Milky Way Bulge: Observed properties and a comparison to external galaxies

The Milky Way bulge offers a unique opportunity to investigate in detail the role that different processes such as dynamical instabilities, hierarchical merging, and dissipational collapse may have played in the history of the Galaxy formation and evolution based on its resolved stellar population properties. Large observation programmes and surveys of the bulge are providing for the first time a look into the global view of the Milky Way bulge that can be compared with the bulges of other galaxies, and be used as a template for detailed comparison with models. The Milky Way has been shown to have a box/peanut (B/P) bulge and recent evidence seems to suggest the presence of an additional spheroidal component. In this review we summarise the global chemical abundances, kinematics and structural properties that allow us to disentangle these multiple components and provide constraints to understand their origin. The investigation of both detailed and global properties of the bulge now provide us with the opportunity to characterise the bulge as observed in models, and to place the mixed component bulge scenario in the general context of external galaxies. When writing this review, we considered the perspectives of researchers working with the Milky Way and researchers working with external galaxies. It is an attempt to approach both communities for a fruitful exchange of ideas.Comment: Review article to appear in "Galactic Bulges", Editors: Laurikainen E., Peletier R., Gadotti D., Springer Publishing. 36 pages, 10 figure

Oxygen abundance in local disk and bulge: chemical evolution with a strictly universal IMF

The empirical differential oxygen abundance distribution (EDOD) is deduced from subsamples related to two different samples involving solar neighbourhood (SN) thick disk, thin disk, halo, and bulge stars. The EDOD of the SN thick + thin disk is determined by weighting the mass, for assumed SN thick to thin disk mass ratio within the range, 0.1-0.9. Inhomogeneous models of chemical evolution for the SN thick disk, the SN thin disk, the SN thick + thin disk, the SN halo, and the bulge, are computed assuming the instantaneous recycling approximation. The EDOD data are fitted, to an acceptable extent, by their TDOD counterparts provided (i) still undetected, low-oxygen abundance thin disk stars exist, and (ii) a single oxygen overabundant star is removed from a thin disk subsample. In any case, the (assumed power-law) stellar initial mass function (IMF) is universal but gas can be inhibited from, or enhanced in, forming stars at different rates with respect to a selected reference case. Models involving a strictly universal IMF (i.e. gas neither inhibited from, nor enhanced in, forming stars with respect to a selected reference case) can also reproduce the data. The existence of a strictly universal IMF makes similar chemical enrichment within active (i.e. undergoing star formation) regions placed in different environments, but increasing probability of a region being active passing from SN halo to SN thick + thin disk, SN thin disk, SN thick disk, and bulge. On the basis of the results, it is realized that the chemical evolution of the SN thick + thin disk as a whole cannot be excluded.Comment: 26 pages, 10 tables, and 5 figures; tables out of page are splitted in two parts in Appendix B; sects.4 and 5 rewritten for better understanding of the results; further references added. Accepted for publication in Astrophysics & Space Scienc

A MODEST review

We present an account of the state of the art in the fields explored by the research community invested in 'Modeling and Observing DEnse STellar systems'. For this purpose, we take as a basis the activities of the MODEST-17 conference, which was held at Charles University, Prague, in September 2017. Reviewed topics include recent advances in fundamental stellar dynamics, numerical methods for the solution of the gravitational N-body problem, formation and evolution of young and old star clusters and galactic nuclei, their elusive stellar populations, planetary systems, and exotic compact objects, with timely attention to black holes of different classes of mass and their role as sources of gravitational waves. Such a breadth of topics reflects the growing role played by collisional stellar dynamics in numerous areas of modern astrophysics. Indeed, in the next decade, many revolutionary instruments will enable the derivation of positions and velocities of individual stars in the Milky Way and its satellites and will detect signals from a range of astrophysical sources in different portions of the electromagnetic and gravitational spectrum, with an unprecedented sensitivity. On the one hand, this wealth of data will allow us to address a number of long-standing open questions in star cluster studies; on the other hand, many unexpected properties of these systems will come to light, stimulating further progress of our understanding of their formation and evolution.Comment: 42 pages; accepted for publication in 'Computational Astrophysics and Cosmology'. We are much grateful to the organisers of the MODEST-17 conference (Charles University, Prague, September 2017). We acknowledge the input provided by all MODEST-17 participants, and, more generally, by the members of the MODEST communit