scholarly journals Positional Astronomy and Stellar Masses

1985 ◽  
Vol 111 ◽  
pp. 71-80
Author(s):  
W. D. Heintz

In this paper are surveyed the combinations of data needed for mass determinations, the impact of radial-velocity and speckle observations, the 1983 catalog of visual-binary orbits, the current material for main-sequence and red-dwarf masses and the controversial methods and results on low mass objects.

2020 ◽  
Vol 501 (2) ◽  
pp. 1568-1590
Author(s):  
Lukas J Furtak ◽  
Hakim Atek ◽  
Matthew D Lehnert ◽  
Jacopo Chevallard ◽  
Stéphane Charlot

ABSTRACT We present new measurements of the very low mass end of the galaxy stellar mass function (GSMF) at z ∼ 6−7 computed from a rest-frame ultraviolet selected sample of dropout galaxies. These galaxies lie behind the six Hubble Frontier Field clusters and are all gravitationally magnified. Using deep Spitzer/IRAC and Hubble Space Telescope imaging, we derive stellar masses by fitting galaxy spectral energy distributions and explore the impact of different model assumptions and parameter degeneracies on the resulting GSMF. Our sample probes stellar masses down to $M_{\star }\gt 10^{6}\, \text{M}_{\odot}$ and we find the z ∼ 6−7 GSMF to be best parametrized by a modified Schechter function that allows for a turnover at very low masses. Using a Monte Carlo Markov chain analysis of the GSMF, including accurate treatment of lensing uncertainties, we obtain a relatively steep low-mass end slope $\alpha \simeq -1.96_{-0.08}^{+0.09}$ and a turnover at $\log (M_T/\text{M}_{\odot})\simeq 7.10_{-0.56}^{+0.17}$ with a curvature of $\beta \simeq 1.00_{-0.73}^{+0.87}$ for our minimum assumption model with constant star formation history (SFH) and low dust attenuation, AV ≤ 0.2. We find that the z ∼ 6−7 GSMF, in particular its very low mass end, is significantly affected by the assumed functional form of the star formation history and the degeneracy between stellar mass and dust attenuation. For example, the low-mass end slope ranges from $\alpha \simeq -1.82_{-0.07}^{+0.08}$ for an exponentially rising SFH to $\alpha \simeq -2.34_{-0.10}^{+0.11}$ when allowing AV of up to 3.25. Future observations at longer wavelengths and higher angular resolution with the James Webb Space Telescope are required to break these degeneracies and to robustly constrain the stellar mass of galaxies on the extreme low-mass end of the GSMF.


Author(s):  
J. R. Barnes ◽  
C. A. Haswell

AbstractAriel’s ambitious goal to survey a quarter of known exoplanets will transform our knowledge of planetary atmospheres. Masses measured directly with the radial velocity technique are essential for well determined planetary bulk properties. Radial velocity masses will provide important checks of masses derived from atmospheric fits or alternatively can be treated as a fixed input parameter to reduce possible degeneracies in atmospheric retrievals. We quantify the impact of stellar activity on planet mass recovery for the Ariel mission sample using Sun-like spot models scaled for active stars combined with other noise sources. Planets with necessarily well-determined ephemerides will be selected for characterisation with Ariel. With this prior requirement, we simulate the derived planet mass precision as a function of the number of observations for a prospective sample of Ariel targets. We find that quadrature sampling can significantly reduce the time commitment required for follow-up RVs, and is most effective when the planetary RV signature is larger than the RV noise. For a typical radial velocity instrument operating on a 4 m class telescope and achieving 1 m s−1 precision, between ~17% and ~ 37% of the time commitment is spent on the 7% of planets with mass Mp < 10 M⊕. In many low activity cases, the time required is limited by asteroseismic and photon noise. For low mass or faint systems, we can recover masses with the same precision up to ~3 times more quickly with an instrumental precision of ~10 cm s−1.


2020 ◽  
Vol 496 (2) ◽  
pp. 1355-1368
Author(s):  
J-L Halbwachs ◽  
F Kiefer ◽  
Y Lebreton ◽  
H M J Boffin ◽  
F Arenou ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT Double-lined spectroscopic binaries (SB2s) are one of the main sources of stellar masses, as additional observations are only needed to give the inclinations of the orbital planes in order to obtain the individual masses of the components. For this reason, we are observing a selection of SB2s using the SOPHIE spectrograph at the Haute-Provence observatory in order to precisely determine their orbital elements. Our objective is to finally obtain masses with an accuracy of the order of one per cent by combining our radial velocity (RV) measurements and the astrometric measurements that will come from the Gaia satellite. We present here the RVs and the re-determined orbits of 10 SB2s. In order to verify the masses, we will derive from Gaia, we obtained interferometric measurements of the ESO VLTI for one of these SB2s. Adding the interferometric or speckle measurements already published by us or by others for four other stars, we finally obtain the masses of the components of five binary stars, with masses ranging from 0.51 to 2.2 solar masses, including main-sequence dwarfs and some more evolved stars whose location in the HR diagram has been estimated.


2001 ◽  
Vol 200 ◽  
pp. 165-168 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eike W. Guenther ◽  
Viki Joergens ◽  
Ralph Neuhäuser ◽  
Guillermo Torres ◽  
Natalie Stout Batalha ◽  
...  

We give here an overview of the current state of our survey for pre-main sequence spectroscopic binaries. Up to now we have taken 739 spectra of 250 pre-main sequence stars. We find that 8% of the stars show significant radial velocity variations, and are thus most likely spectroscopic binaries. In addition to the targets showing radial velocity variations, 6% of the targets are double-lined spectroscopic binaries i.e., the total fraction of spectroscopic binaries is expected to be about 14%. All short-period SB2s are monitored photometrically in order to search for eclipses. An eclipsing SB2 would allow the direct measurement of the masses of both stellar components. Measurements of the stellar masses together with determinations of the stellar radii are a crucial test of evolutionary tracks of pre-main sequence stars.


2019 ◽  
Vol 490 (4) ◽  
pp. 5722-5738 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yunchong Wang ◽  
Mark Vogelsberger ◽  
Dandan Xu ◽  
Xuejian Shen ◽  
Shude Mao ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT We study the evolutionary trend of the total density profile of early-type galaxies (ETGs) in IllustrisTNG. To this end, we trace ETGs from z = 0 to 4 and measure the power-law slope γ′ of the total density profile for their main progenitors. We find that their slopes γ′ steepen on average during z ∼ 4–2, then becoming shallower until z = 1, after which they remain almost constant, aside from a residual trend of becoming shallower towards z = 0. We also compare to a statistical sample of ETGs at different redshifts, selected based on their luminosity profiles and stellar masses. Due to different selection effects, the average slopes of the statistical samples follow a modified evolutionary trend. They monotonically decrease since z = 3, and after z ≈ 1, they remain nearly invariant with a mild increase towards z = 0. These evolutionary trends are mass dependent for both samples, with low-mass galaxies having in general steeper slopes than their more massive counterparts. Galaxies that transitioned to ETGs more recently have steeper mean slopes as they tend to be smaller and more compact at any given redshift. By analysing the impact of mergers and AGN feedback on the progenitors’ evolution, we conjecture a multiphase path leading to isothermality in ETGs: dissipation associated with rapid wet mergers tends to steepen γ′ from z = 4 to 2, whereas subsequent AGN feedback (especially in the kinetic mode) makes γ′ shallower again from z = 2 to 1. Afterwards, passive evolution from z = 1 to 0, mainly through gas-poor mergers, mildly decreases γ′ and maintains the overall mass distribution close to isothermal.


2008 ◽  
Vol 4 (S252) ◽  
pp. 163-174 ◽  
Author(s):  
Corinne Charbonnel ◽  
Suzanne Talon

AbstractLow-mass stars exhibit, at all stages of their evolution, the signatures of complex physical processes that require challenging modeling beyond standard stellar theory. In this review, we recall the most striking observational evidences that probe the interaction and interdependence of various transport processes of chemicals and angular momentum in these objects. We then focus on the impact of atomic diffusion, large scale mixing due to rotation, and internal gravity waves on stellar properties on the main sequence and slightly beyond.


2006 ◽  
Vol 2 (S239) ◽  
pp. 311-313
Author(s):  
Natália R. Landin ◽  
Paolo Ventura ◽  
Francesca D'Antona ◽  
Luiz T. S. Mendes ◽  
Luiz P. R. Vaz

AbstractThe observational data of the Orion Nebula Cluster (ONC) is reanalyzed by means of new sets of pre-main sequence (PMS) evolutionary tracks including rotation, non-gray boundary conditions (BC's) and either low (LCE) or high convection efficiency (HCE), aiming better understanding of the appropriate physical constraints for the rotational evolution of the stars within the ONC. The role played by convection is a key aspect of our analysis, since there are conflicting results from theory and observations. We derived stellar masses and ages for the ONC by using both LCE and HCE and considered was the role of non-gray atmospheres. Our results show that the resulting mass distribution for the bulk of the ONC population is in the range 0.2-0.4M⊙ for our non-gray models, and in the range 0.1-0.3M⊙ for gray models. In agreement with previous works, we found that a large percentage (∼70%) of low-mass stars (M≤Mtr, where Mtr is a transition mass) in the ONC appears to be fast rotators (P<4days). Mtr depends on the model choosen, being Mtr=0.5 for LCE, Mtr=0.35 for HCE and, as found in previous works, Mtr=0.25 for gray models. Finally, our analysis indicates that a second parameter is needed for a proper description of convection in the PMS phase.


2019 ◽  
Vol 491 (4) ◽  
pp. 5188-5215 ◽  
Author(s):  
Yunchong Wang ◽  
Mark Vogelsberger ◽  
Dandan Xu ◽  
Shude Mao ◽  
Volker Springel ◽  
...  

ABSTRACT We explore the isothermal total density profiles of early-type galaxies (ETGs) in the IllustrisTNG simulation. For the selected 559 ETGs at z = 0 with stellar masses $10^{10.7}\, \mathrm{M}_{\odot } \leqslant M_{\ast } \leqslant 10^{11.9}\, \mathrm{M}_{\odot }$, the total power-law slope has a mean of 〈γ′〉 = 2.011 ± 0.007 and a scatter of $\sigma _{\gamma ^{\prime }} = 0.171$ over the radial range 0.4–4 times the stellar half-mass radius. Several correlations between γ′ and galactic properties including stellar mass, effective radius, stellar surface density, central velocity dispersion, central dark matter fraction, and in situ-formed stellar mass ratio are compared to observations and other simulations, revealing that IllustrisTNG reproduces many correlation trends, and in particular, γ′ is almost constant with redshift below z = 2. Through analysing IllustrisTNG model variations, we show that black hole kinetic winds are crucial to lowering γ′ and matching observed galaxy correlations. The effects of stellar winds on γ′ are subdominant compared to active galactic nucleus (AGN) feedback, and differ due to the presence of AGN feedback from previous works. The density profiles of the ETG dark matter haloes are well described by steeper than NFW profiles, and they are steeper in the full physics (FP) run than their counterparts in the dark matter-only (DMO) run. Their inner density slopes anticorrelate (remain constant) with the halo mass in the FP (DMO) run, and anticorrelate with the halo concentration parameter c200 in both the types of runs. The dark matter haloes of low-mass ETGs are contracted whereas high-mass ETGs are expanded, suggesting that variations in the total density profile occur through the different halo responses to baryons.


1979 ◽  
Vol 83 ◽  
pp. 375-377
Author(s):  
T. J. Mazurek

The rapid mass loss observed in O stars can affect their evolution dramatically if it takes place during core hydrogen burning on the main sequence. Conti has suggested that this is the case for the brightest Of stars, and that these stars evolve into Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars. Support for this scenario comes from the similarity in the spectra of the Of and WR stars, and from the observed helium enrichment of Wolf-Rayet WN stars along with the correlation of the latter with the most luminous O stars. If the most massive Of stars evolve to WN stars of relatively low mass, one needs to determine the range of zero-age stellar masses where such an evolution occurs. This communication abstracts some observational evidence that bears on the question of the minimum zero-age mass for rapid mass loss on the main sequence. It then summarizes the author's investigation of a model for mass loss where photospheric acoustic waves control the flow rate.


2019 ◽  
Vol 15 (S354) ◽  
pp. 286-294
Author(s):  
Nadège Meunier ◽  
Anne-Marie Lagrange

AbstractSolar simulations and observations showed that the detection of Earth twins around Sun-like stars is difficult in radial velocities with current methods techniques. The Sun has proved to be very useful to test processes, models, and analysis methods. The convective blueshift effect, dominating for the Sun, decreases towards lower mass stars, providing more suitable conditions to detect low mass planets. We describe the basic processes at work and how we extended a realistic solar model of radial velocity, photometry, astrometry and LogR′HK variability, using a coherent grid of stellar parameters covering a large range in mass and average activity levels. We present selected results concerning the impact of magnetic activity on Earth-mass planet detectability as a function of stellar type. We show how such realistic simulations can help characterizing the effect of stellar activity on RV and astrometric exoplanet detection.


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