Related papers: Quantifying the contamination by old main-sequence…
We have completed a high-resolution (R=60,000) optical spectroscopic survey of 185 nearby M dwarfs identified using ROSAT data to select active, young objects with fractional X-ray luminosities comparable to or greater than Pleiades…
The low-density region of the interstellar medium (ISM) where the Sun is located is known as the Local Bubble, a cavity filled with high-temperature and low-density plasma that may be created by a series of supernova (SN) explosions over…
Results of photometric surveys have brought to light the existence of a population of giant planets orbiting their host stars even closer than the hot Jupiters (HJ), with orbital periods below 3 days. The reason why radial velocity surveys…
We present three new methods for determining the age of groups of pre-main-sequence stars. The first, creating empirical isochrones allows us to create a robust age ordering, but not to derive actual ages. The second, using the width of the…
We present moderate resolution (R $\sim$ 3575) optical spectra of 19 known or suspected members of the AB Doradus and $\beta$ Pictoris Moving Groups, obtained with the DeVeny Spectrograph on the 72-inch Perkins telescope at Lowell…
We have selected pre-main-sequence stars in 12 groups of notional ages ranging from 1 Myr to 35 Myrs, using heterogeneous membership criteria. Using these members we have constructed empirical isochrones in V, V-I colour magnitude diagrams…
We present continued results from a wide-field, ~150 deg^2, optical photometric and spectroscopic survey of the northern part of the ~5 Myr-old Upper Scorpius OB Association. Photometry and spectral types were used to derive effective…
We consider the effect of mass segregation on the observable integrated properties of star clusters. The measurable properties depend on a combination of the dynamical age of the cluster and the physical age of the stars in the cluster. To…
Context: Dynamically undisrupted, young populations of stars are crucial to study the role of multiplicity in relation to star formation. Loose nearby associations provide us with a great sample of close ($<$150 pc) Pre-Main Sequence (PMS)…
Nearby associations are excellent objects for the study of the initial spin up phase during the PMS evolution. An empirical approach is adopted here to infer their rotations properties and relations to X-ray emission. Three nearby…
Stars with convective envelopes display magnetic activity, which decreases over time due to the magnetic braking of the star. This age-dependence of magnetic activity is well-studied for younger stars, but the nature of this dependence for…
Reconstructing the mass assembly history of the Milky Way relies on obtaining detailed measurements of the properties of many stars in the Galaxy, especially in the stellar halo. One of the most constraining quantities is stellar age, as it…
Several recent studies of Solar twins in the Solar neighbourhood have shown a tight correlation between various elemental abundances and age, in particular [Y/Mg]. If this relation is real and valid for other types of stars as well as…
We use the Geneva Syclist isochrone models that include the effects of stellar rotation to investigate the role that rotation has on the resulting colour-magnitude diagram (CMD) of young and intermediate age clusters. We find that if a…
As part of our search for new low-mass members of nearby young moving groups (YMG), we discovered three low-mass, spectroscopic binaries, two of which are not kinematically associated with any known YMG. Using high-resolution optical…
The position of pre-main-sequence or protostars in the Hertzsprung--Russell diagram is often used to determine their mass and age by comparison with pre-main-sequence evolution tracks. On the assumption that the stellar models are accurate,…
X-ray surveys allow to identify young, main-sequence stars in the solar neighborhood. Young, stellar samples, selected according to their activity, can be used to determine the stellar birthrate in the last billion years. The ROSAT North…
Using recently acquired HST NIR observations (J, Pa$\beta$ and H bands) of the nearby galaxy NGC1313, we investigate the timescales required by a young star cluster to emerge from its natal cloud. We search for extincted star clusters,…
There is growing evidence that star clusters can no longer be considered simple stellar populations (SSPs). Intermediate and old age clusters are often found to have extended main sequence turn-offs (eMSTOs) which are difficult to explain…
The scientific goal of the SACY (Search for Associations Containing Young-stars) was to identify possible associations of stars younger than the Pleiades Association among optical counterparts of the ROSAT X-ray bright sources.…