Related papers: Hyades star cluster and the New comets
In the first of a new series of papers on open cluster distances, we use updated stellar evolution models to construct an isochrone appropriate for the Hyades, and compare it with the Hyades eclipsing binary system vB 22. We find that the…
Planets in young clusters are powerful probes of the evolution of planetary systems. Here we report the discovery of three planets transiting K2-136 (EPIC 247589423), a late K dwarf in the Hyades (~800 Myr) cluster, and robust detection…
The sample of known star clusters, the fundamental building blocks of galaxies, in the Milky Way is still extremely incomplete for objects beyond a distance of 1-2kpc. Many of the more distant and young clusters are compact and hidden…
Since very recently, we acquired knowledge on the existence of comets in extrasolar planetary systems. The formation of comets together with planets around host stars now seems evident. As stars are often born in clusters of interstellar…
Large or even medium sized asteroids impacting the Earth can cause damage on a global scale. Existing and planned concepts for finding near-Earth objects (NEOs) with diameter of 140 m or larger would take ~15-20 years of observation to find…
An overview of our current understanding of the formation and evolution of star clusters is given, with main emphasis on high-mass clusters. Clusters form deeply embedded within dense clouds of molecular gas. Left-over gas is cleared within…
Context. As the Solar System orbits the Milky Way, it encounters various Galactic environments, including dense regions of the interstellar medium (ISM). These encounters can compress the heliosphere, exposing parts of the Solar System to…
Orbital elements of C2011 L4 (PanStarrs) Oort cloud comet, computed by MPC (Minor Planet Center, Minor Planet Electronic Circular 2012-T08), show that the closest approach to the Sun occurred on 2013 March 10th, at about 0.3 A.U., then…
Both simulations and observations indicate that stars form in filamentary, hierarchically clustered associations, most of which disperse into their galactic field once feedback destroys their parent clouds. However, during their early…
Efforts to unveil the structure of the local interstellar medium and its recent star formation history have spanned the past seventy years. Recent studies utilizing precise data from space astrometry missions have revealed nearby, newly…
The hypothesis that a massive Planet Nine exists in the outer solar system on a distant eccentric orbit was inspired by observations showing that the objects with the most distant eccentric orbits in the Kuiper belt have orbits which are…
The HST data archive contains images of several nearby spirals, suitable for detailed studies of the properties of individual star clusters and their surroundings. By combining structural information derived from HST images with…
The solar system started to form about 4.56 Gyr ago and despite the long intervening time span, there still exist several clues about its formation. The three major sources for this information are meteorites, the present solar system…
We re-examine the formation of the inner Oort comet cloud while the Sun was in its birth cluster with the aid of numerical simulations. This work is a continuation of an earlier study (Brasser et al., 2006) with several substantial…
We studied the orbital evolution of Jupiter-family comets (JFCs), Halley-type comets (HTCs), and long-period comets, and probabilities of their collisions with planets. In our runs the probability of a collision of one object with the Earth…
We study the evolution and observability of young, compact star clusters near the Galactic center, such as the Arches and Quintuplet systems. The clusters are modeled by integrating the equations of motion of all stars while accounting for…
The Oort Cloud's dynamical evolution is significantly influenced by both the galactic tide and stellar flybys. This study investigates the particular case of HD7977's close encounter 2.47 Myr ago, which likely repopulated the Inner Oort…
The stars that populate the solar neighbourhood were formed in stellar clusters. Through N-body simulations of these clusters, we measure the rate of close encounters between stars. By monitoring the interaction histories of each star, we…
The Oort Cloud remains one of the most poorly explored regions of the Solar System. We propose that its properties can be constrained by studying a population of dust grains produced in collisions of comets in the outer Solar System. We…
We report on $BVI$ CCD photometry of a field centered in the region of the Galactic star cluster Whiting~1 down to $V=23.0$. This cluster has never been studied insofar, and we provide for the first time estimates of its fundamental…