Related papers: Dense Stellar Populations: Initial Conditions
We investigate the long-term dynamical evolution of two distinct stellar populations of low-mass stars in globular clusters in order to study whether the energy equipartition process can explain the high number of stars harbouring abundance…
Several observational and theoretical indications suggest that the initial mass function (IMF) becomes increasingly top-heavy (i.e., overabundant in high-mass stars with mass $m > 1M_{\odot}$) with decreasing metallicity and increasing gas…
We use the results of realistic N-body simulations to investigate the appearance of the white dwarf population in dense star clusters. We show that the presence of a substantial binary population in a star cluster, and the interaction of…
The initial mass function (IMF) succinctly characterizes a stellar population, provides a statistical measure of the end result of the star-formation process, and informs our under- standing of the structure and dynamical evolution of…
Galactic nuclei and globular clusters act as laboratories in which nature experiments with normal stars, neutron stars and black holes, through collisions and through the formation of bound states, in the form of binaries. The main…
Statistical sampling from the stellar initial mass function (IMF) for all star-forming regions in the Galaxy would lead to the prediction of ~1000 Msun stars unless there is a rapid turn-down in the IMF beyond several hundred solar masses.…
The number of millisecond pulsars (MSPs) observed in Milky Way globular clusters has increased explosively in recent years, but the underlying population is still uncertain due to observational biases. We use state-of-the-art $N$-body…
We present a new method to analyze the IMF at its high mass end in young stellar clusters, which rely on two integrated observables: the cluster bolometric and Halpha luminosity. Using several cluster samples selected in M33 we show that a…
We present the first study of the dynamical evolution of an isolated star cluster that combines a significant population of primordial binaries with the presence of a central black hole. We use equal-mass direct N-body simulations, with N…
The past few years have seen dramatic improvements in the scope and realism of star cluster simulations. Accurate treatments of stellar evolution, coupled with robust descriptions of all phases of binary evolution, have been incorporated…
The results of N-body simulations of the expulsion of residual gas from young globular clusters are presented. Globular clusters with a variety of initial masses, Galactocentric radii, concentration and initial mass function slope with star…
In this contribution initial results are presented from a program to study in detail the stellar populations of dwarf Spheroidal (dSph) galaxies in three nearby groups. The long-term aim of the program is to assess the influence of…
Accurate specification of a likelihood function is becoming increasingly difficult in many inference problems in astronomy. As sample sizes resulting from astronomical surveys continue to grow, deficiencies in the likelihood function lead…
We review what has been learned recently using N-body simulations about the evolution of globular clusters. While simulations of star clusters have become more realistic, and now include the evolution of single and binary stars, the…
(abridged) The case can be made for a rather universal stellar IMF form that can be approximated by a two-part power-law function in the stellar regime. However, there exists a possible hint for a systematic variation with metallicity. A…
Nearly all globular clusters (GCs) studied to date show evidence for multiple stellar populations, in stark contrast to the conventional view that GCs are a mono-metallic, coeval population of stars. Building on earlier work, we propose a…
Star clusters - open and globulars - experience dynamical evolution on time scales shorter than their age. Consequently, open and globular clusters provide us with unique dynamical laboratories for learning about two-body relaxation, mass…
The initial density of individual star-forming regions (and by extension the birth environment of planetary systems) is difficult to constrain due to the "density degeneracy problem": an initially dense region expands faster than a more…
Stellar clusters are regularly used to study the evolution of their host galaxy. Except for a few nearby galaxies, these studies rely on the interpretation of integrated cluster properties, especially integrated photometry observed using…
Gas-poor galaxies can be modelled as composite collisionless stellar systems, with a dark matter halo and one or more stellar components, representing different stellar populations. The dynamical evolution of such composite systems is often…