Related papers: Population III Wolf-Rayet Stars in the CAK Regime
The massive, luminous Population I Wolf-Rayet stars can be considered as stars with the highest known sustained mass loss rates. Around 10% of WR stars may form carbon-rich dust in their dense and inhomogeneous winds. Though we are yet to…
Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars are massive ($\geq$10 M$_{\odot}$) evolved stars undergoing advanced nuclear burning in their cores, rapidly approaching the end of their lives as supernovae. Their powerful winds enrich the interstellar medium with…
Are WO-type Wolf Rayet (WR) stars in the final stage of massive star evolution before core-collapse? Although WC- and WO-type WRs have very similar spectra, WOs show a much stronger O VI $\lambda \lambda$3811,34 emission-line feature. This…
Towards the end of their evolution hot massive stars develop strong stellar winds and appear as emission line stars, such as WR stars or LBVs. The quantitative description of the mass loss in these important pre-SN phases is hampered by…
Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars are the evolved descendants of the most massive stars and show emission-line dominated spectra formed in their powerful stellar winds. Marking the final evolution stage before core collapse, the standard picture of WR…
The effect of photon frequency redistribution by line branching on mass-loss rates for hot luminous stars is investigated. Monte Carlo simulations are carried out for a range of OB-star models which show that previous mass-loss calculations…
Aims: Following our comprehensive studies of the WR stars in the Milky Way, we now present spectroscopic analyses of almost all known WN stars in the LMC. Methods: For the quantitative analysis of the wind-dominated emission-line spectra,…
The Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) is the nearest low-metallicity dwarf galaxy. Its proximity and low reddening has enabled us to detect its Wolf-Rayet (WR) star population with 12 known objects. Quantitative spectroscopy of the stars…
Hydrogen-deficient Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars are potential candidates of Type Ib/Ic supernova (SN Ib/Ic) progenitors and their evolution is governed by mass loss. Stellar evolution models with the most popular prescription for WR mass-loss…
We present spectroscopic observations of the central star clusters in NGC 5253 the aim of which is to search for WC stars. Our observations show the presence of Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars not only of WN but also of WC subtype in two star forming…
The environments surrounding nine Wolf-Rayet stars were studied in molecular emission. Expanding shells were detected surrounding these WR stars (see left panels of Figure 1). The average masses and radii of the molecular cores surrounding…
We provide line luminosities and spectroscopic templates of prominent optical emission lines of 133 Galactic Wolf-Rayet stars by exploiting Gaia DR3 parallaxes and optical spectrophotometry, and provide comparisons with 112 counterparts in…
As hosts of living high-mass stars, Wolf-Rayet (WR) regions or WR galaxies are ideal objects for constraining the high-mass end of the stellar initial mass function (IMF). We construct a large sample of 910 WR galaxies/regions that cover a…
A growing number of Galactic Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars, in particular WC and transitional WN/C (WNC) objects, have been reported at comparatively low luminosities. If confirmed, these low-luminosity WR stars provide stringent tests of…
The mass-loss rates of massive helium stars are one of the major uncertainties in modern astrophysics. Regardless of whether they were stripped by a binary companion or managed to peel off their outer layers by themselves, the influence and…
The Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) hosts 12 known Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars, seven of which are apparently single. Their formation is a challenge for current stellar evolution models because line-driven winds are generally assumed to be quenched…
We investigate the influence of Wolf-Rayet (W-R) stars on their surrounding star-forming molecular clouds. We study five regions containing W-R stars in the inner Galactic plane ($l\sim$[14$^\circ$-52$^\circ$]), using multi-wavelength data…
We use integral field spectroscopy to study in detail the Wolf-Rayet (WR) population in NGC 3310, spatially resolving 18 star-forming knots with typical sizes of 200-300 pc in the disc of the galaxy hosting a substantial population of WRs.…
Some studies have claimed the existence of a stellar upper-mass limit of 150 Msun. A factor that is often overlooked concerns the issue that there might be a significant difference between the present-day and the initial mass of the most…
CONTEXT: The mass loss of He-burning stars, which are partially or completely stripped of their outer hydrogen envelope, is a catalyst of the cosmic matter cycle and decisive ingredient of massive star evolution. Yet, its theoretical…