Recent IR surveys of the Galactic plane have revealed a large number of candidate Luminous Blue Variables. In order to verify these classifications we have been undertaking a long term spectroscopic and photometric monitoring campaign supplemented with tailored non-LTE model atmosphere analysis. Here we present a brief overview of selected aspects of this program, highlighting the prospects for identification, classification and quantitative analysis of LBVs in the near-IR spectral window.
@article{arxiv.1012.2997,
title = {Investigating the properties of Galactic Luminous Blue Variables via IR observations},
author = {J. S. Clark and A. Arkharov and V. Larionov and B. Ritchie and P. Crowther and F. Najarro},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1012.2997},
year = {2010}
}
Comments
5 pages, 3 figures, to appear in the proceedings of the 39th Liege International Astrophysical Colloquium on "The multi-wavelength view of hot, massive stars", Liege, 12-16 July 2010