Related papers: Very Massive Stars (VMS) in the Local Universe
Recent studies suggest the existence of very massive stars (VMS) up to 300 solar masses in the local Universe. As this finding may represent a paradigm shift for the canonical stellar upper-mass limit of 150 solar masses, it is timely to…
Very massive stars (VMS) are defined as stars with an initial mass in excess of 100 Msun. Because of their short lifetime and the shape of the stellar mass function, they are rare objects. Only about twenty of them are known in the Galaxy…
The fate of massive stars up to 300 Msun is highly uncertain. Do these objects produce pair-instability explosions, or normal Type Ic supernovae? In order to address these questions, we need to know their mass-loss rates during their lives.…
We use contemporary evolutionary models for Very Massive Stars (VMS) to assess whether the Eddington limit constrains the upper stellar mass limit. We also consider the interplay between mass and age for the wind properties and spectral…
Stars with masses in excess of 100 Msun are observed in the Local Universe, but they remain rare objects. Because of the shape of the mass function, they are expected to be present only in the most massive and youngest clusters. They may…
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…
In this contribution we present the properties of the most massive stars known by the end of 2013. We start with a summary of historical claims for stars with masses in excess of several hundreds, even thousands of solar masses. We then…
The locations of massive stars (> 8 Msun) within their host galaxies is reviewed. These range from distributed OB associations to dense star clusters within giant HII regions. A comparison between massive stars and the environments of…
We examine the possibility that very massive stars greatly exceeding the commonly adopted stellar mass limit of 150 Msun may be present in young star clusters in the local universe. We identify ten candidate clusters, some of which may host…
In addition to being spectacular objects, Very Massive Stars (VMS) are suspected to have a tremendous impact on their environment and on the whole cosmic evolution. The nucleosynthesis both during their advanced stages and their final…
Recent studies of high-redshift galaxies with James Webb Space Telescope (JWST), such as GN-z11 at $z=10.6,$ show unexpectedly significant amounts of nitrogen (N) in their spectra. As this phenomenology appears to extend to gravitionally…
Theoretical considerations lead to the expectation that stars should not have masses larger than about m_{max*}=60-120Msun, while the observational evidence has been ambiguous. Only very recently has a physical stellar mass limit near…
Recent studies of high-redshift galaxies using JWST, such as GN-z11 revealed highly elevated levels of nitrogen (N). This phenomenon extends to gravitationally-lensed galaxies like the Sunburst Arc at z = 2.37, as well as to globular…
We present a comprehensive analysis of the presence of very massive stars (VMS > $100 M_{\odot}$) in the integrated spectra of 13 UV-bright star-forming galaxies at $2.2 \lesssim z \lesssim 3.6$ taken with the Gran Telescopio Canarias…
One of the key questions in Astrophysics concerns the issue of whether there exists an upper-mass limit to stars, and if so, what physical mechanism sets this limit, which might also determine if the upper-mass limit is metallicity (Z)…
Is there a stellar upper mass limit? Recent statistical work seems to indicate that there is and that it is in the vicinity of 150 solar masses. In this paper we use HST and ground-based data to investigate the brightest members of the…
Core collapse of dense massive star clusters is unavoidable and this leads to the formation of massive objects, with a mass up to 1000 $\msun$ and even larger. When these objects become stars, stellar wind mass loss determines their…
There is no accepted upper mass limit for stars. Such a basic quantity escapes both theory, because of incomplete understanding of star formation, and observation, because of incompleteness in surveying the Galaxy. The Arches cluster is…
The observed masses of the most massive stars do not surpass about 150Msun. This may either be a fundamental upper mass limit which is defined by the physics of massive stars and/or their formation, or it may simply reflect the increasing…
In this chapter, after a brief introduction and overview of stellar evolution, we discuss the evolution and nucleosynthesis of very massive stars (VMS: M>100 solar masses) in the context of recent stellar evolution model calculations. This…