Related papers: The Long-term Evolution of the Galactic Disk Trace…
Disk galaxies evolve over time through processes that may rearrange both the radial mass profile and the metallicity distribution within the disk. This review of such slow changes is largely, though not entirely, restricted to…
Stars in disks of spiral galaxies are usually assumed to remain roughly at their birth radii. This assumption is built into decades of modelling of the evolution of stellar populations in our own Galaxy and in external systems. We present…
Recent theoretical work suggests that it may be common for stars in the disks of spiral galaxies to migrate radially across significant distances in the disk. Such migrations are a result of resonant scattering with spiral arms and move the…
In the solar-neighbourhood, older stars have larger random velocities than younger ones. It is argued that the increase in velocity dispersion with time is predominantly a gradual process rather than one induced by discrete events such as…
The redistribution of stars in galactic disks is an important aspect of disk galaxy evolution. Stars that efficiently migrate in such a way that does not also appreciably heat their orbits can drastically affect the stellar populations…
Recent knowledge of Galactic dynamics suggests that stars radially move on the disk when they encounter transient spiral arms that are naturally generated during the process of disk formation. We argue that a large movement of the solar…
Over the past 10 years abundant evidence has emerged that many (if not all) stars are born with circumstellar disks. Understanding the evolution of post-accretion disks can provide strong constraints on theories of planet formation and…
Stellar migration is an important dynamical process in Galactic disk. Here we model the radial stellar migration in the Galactic disk with an analytical method, then add it to detailed Galactic chemical evolution model to study the…
Spiral galaxies offer a unique opportunity to study the role of star formation in galaxy evolution and to test various theoretical star formation schemes. I review some recent relevant work on the evolution of spiral galaxies. Detailed…
We investigate the evolution of galactic disks in N-body Tree-SPH simulations. We find that disks, initially truncated at three scale-lengths, can triple their radial extent, solely driven by secular evolution. Both Type I (single…
For several decades now, open clusters have been used to study the structure and chemical evolution of the disk of our Galaxy. Due to the fact that their ages and metallicities can be determined with relatively good precision, and since…
A clear understanding of the chemical processing of matter, as it is transferred from a molecular cloud to a planetary system, depends heavily on knowledge of the physical conditions endured by gas and dust as these accrete onto a disk and…
Galaxy disks are characterised by star formation histories that vary systematically along the Hubble sequence. We study global star formation, incorporating supernova feedback, gas accretion and enriched outflows in disks modelled by a…
In this review, I discuss just three aspects of the stability and evolution of galactic discs. (1) I first review our understanding of the bar instability and how it can be controlled. Disc galaxies in which the orbital speed does not…
Their ubiquity and extreme densities make star clusters probes of prime importance of galaxy evolution. Old globular clusters keep imprints of the physical conditions of their assembly in the early Universe, and younger stellar objects,…
Disks are ubiquitous in stellar astronomy, and play a crucial role in the formation and evolution of stars. In this contribution we present an overview of the most recent results, with emphasis on high spatial and spectral resolution. We…
We seek to understand the origin of radial migration in spiral galaxies by analyzing in detail the structure and evolution of an idealized, isolated galactic disk. To understand the redistribution of stars, we characterize the…
Galaxy disks evolve through angular momentum transfers between sub-components, like gas, stars, or dark matter halos, through non axi-symmetric instabilities. The speed of this evolution is boosted in presence of a large fraction of cold…
The bulk of old stars in the Galactic disk have migrated radially by up to several kpc in their lifetimes, yet the disk has remained relatively cool, i.e., the ratio of radial heating to migration has been small. Here, we demonstrate that…
Circumstellar disks are an integral part of the star formation process and the sites where planets are formed. Understanding the physical processes that drive their evolution, as disks evolve from optically thick to optically thin, is…