Embedded Clusters and the IMF

Abstract

Despite valiant efforts over nearly five decades, attempts to determine the IMF over a complete mass range for galactic field stars and in open clusters have proved difficult. Infrared imaging observations of extremely young embedded clusters coupled with Monte Carlo modeling of their luminosity functions are improving this situation and providing important new contributions to our fundamental knowledge of the IMF and its universality in both space and time.Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures to appear in "The IMF@50", Kluwer Academic Press, eds. C. Corbelli, F. Palla, & Hans Zinnecke