Related papers: DT Serpentis: neither a symbiotic star nor a plane…

A revival over the past two decades in planetary nebula (PN) morphological studies springs from a combination of factors, including the advent of wide-area, high dynamic range detectors; the growing archives of high resolution images from…

We introduce the first results from an ongoing, systematic survey for new symbiotic stars selected from the AAO/UKST SuperCOSMOS H$\alpha$ Survey (SHS). The survey aims to identify and characterise the fainter population of symbiotic stars…

Planetary nebulae (PNe) are circumstellar gas ejected during an intense mass-losing phase in the the lives of asymptotic giant branch stars. PNe have a stunning variety of shapes, most of which are not spherically symmetric. The debate over…

Context: The presence of heavier chemical elements in stellar atmospheres influences the spectral energy distribution (SED) of stars. An uneven surface distribution of these elements, together with flux redistribution and stellar rotation,…

The results from a Hubble Space Telescope (HST) snapshot survey of post-AGB objects are shown. The aim of the survey is to complement existing HST images of PPN and to connect various types of nebulosities with physical and chemical…

In this work, we present the first results of an ongoing survey to search for planetary nebulae (PNe) around hot subdwarf stars (sdOs). Deep images and intermediate-resolution long-slit spectra of RWT 152, the only confirmed PN+sdO system…

Although the Sloan Digital Sky Survey has permitted the discovery of an increasing number of new ZZ Ceti stars, recent published analyses have shown that there are still many relatively bright (V < 17) ZZ Ceti stars waiting to be found. We…

Infrared studies of asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars are critical to our understanding of the formation of cosmic dust. In this investigation, we explore the mid-to-far-infrared emission of oxygen rich AGB star RT Virginis. This…

The sensitivity of radial velocity (RV) surveys for exoplanet detection are extending to increasingly long orbital periods, where companions with periods of several years are now being regularly discovered. Companions with orbital periods…

In this chapter the focus is on the properties of post-Asymptotic Giant Branch (post-AGB) stars in binary systems. Their Spectral Energy Distributions (SEDs) are very characteristic: they show a near-infrared excess, indicative of the…

We present a detailed study of the stellar and orbital parameters of the post-common envelope binary central star of the planetary nebula Ou~5. Low-resolution spectra obtained during the primary eclipse -- to our knowledge the first…

The increase in discovered close binary central stars of planetary nebulae is leading to a sufficiently large sample to begin to make broader conclusions about the effect of close binary stars on common envelope evolution and planetary…

We search for stellar and substellar companions of young nearby stars to investigate stellar multiplicity and formation of stellar and substellar companions. We detect common proper-motion companions of stars via multi-epoch imaging. Their…

Planetary Nebulae (PNe) are the result of heavy mass loss of the asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars. They are understood in terms of Kwok's (1978) interacting-winds model as the product of the mass-loss history on the AGB and the central…

We report a multi-wavelength study of four new planetary nebula (PN) candidates selected from the INT/WFC Photometric Ha Survey of the Northern Galactic Plane (IPHAS) and Deep Sky Hunter (DSH) catalogues. We present mid-resolution optical…

A goal of the IPHAS survey is to determine the frequency and nature of emission-line sources in the Galactic plane. According to our selection criteria, K 3-22 is a candidate symbiotic star, but it was previously classified as a planetary…

In this review, I concentrate on describing observations of spatially resolved emission in symbiotic stars at sub-arcsecond scales. In some of the closer objects, the highest resolutions discussed here correspond to linear dimensions…

Symbiotic stars are interacting binary systems, making them valuable for studying various astronomical phenomena, such as stellar evolution, mass transfer, and accretion processes. Despite recent progress in the discovery of symbiotic…

Recently available near-infrared interferometric data on late-type stars show a strong increase of diameter for asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars between the K (2.0 - 2.4 \mu m) and L (3.4 - 4.1 \mu m) bands. Aiming at an explanation of…

We present the continuation of a systematic search for new southern Galactic symbiotic stars, selecting candidates from the SuperCOSMOS H$\alpha$ Survey and 2MASS. Follow-up spectroscopy with the Southern African Large Telescope (SALT) was…