Related papers: Barb\'a 2: A new supergiant-rich Galactic stellar …
We report the discovery of a previously unknown massive Galactic star cluster at l=29.22, b=-0.20. Identified visually in mid-IR images from the Spitzer GLIMPSE survey, the cluster contains at least 8 late-type supergiants, based on…
Recent studies have revealed massive star clusters in a region of the Milky Way close to the tip of the Long Bar. These clusters are heavily obscured and are characterised by a population of red supergiants. We analyse a previously…
We report the discovery of an extraordinarily massive young cluster of stars in the Galaxy, having an inferred total initial cluster mass comparable to the most massive young clusters in the Galaxy. Using {\it IRMOS}, {\it 2MASS}, and {\it…
We provide evidence that indicate the star cluster Pfleiderer 2, which is projected in a rich field, as a newly identified Galactic globular cluster. Since it is located in a crowded field, core extraction and decontamination tools were…
Clear identifications of Galactic young stellar clusters farther than a few kpc from the Sun are rare, despite the large number of candidate clusters. We aim to improve the selection of candidate clusters rich in massive stars with a…
We used optical images acquired with the Wide Field Camera of the Advanced Camera for Surveys onboard the Hubble Space Telescope and near-infrared data from GeMS/GSAOI to construct a high-resolution extinction map in the direction of the…
Obscuration and confusion conspire to limit our knowledge of the inner Milky Way. Even at moderate distances, the identification of stellar systems becomes compounded by the extremely high density of background sources. Here we provide a…
In the past few years, several clusters containing large numbers of red supergiants have been discovered. These clusters are amongst the most massive young clusters known in the Milky Way, with stellar masses reaching a few…
Up to ages of ~100 Myr, massive clusters are still swamped in large amounts of gas and dust, with considerable and uneven levels of extinction. At the same time, large grains (ices?) produced by type II supernovae profoundly alter the…
Aims: To try and clarify whether there are stars in the neighbourhood of $\beta$ Lyrae which are physically connected to the famous prototype eclipsing binary. Methods: Scrutinize the astrometric and photometric data (from Hipparcos and…
We report the serendipitous discovery of a cluster of galaxies at z=0.369. Thirty-eight candidate members were identified based on rough broad-band photometric redshifts, and three members were confirmed spectroscopically. The brightest…
We have studied the interstellar extinction in a field of ~3' x 3' at the core of the 30 Doradus nebula, including the central R136 cluster, in the Large Magellanic Cloud. Observations at optical and near-infrared wavelengths, obtained with…
The VISTA Variables in the Via L\'actea Extended Survey (VVVX) allows probing previously unexplored regions of the inner Milky Way (MW). We are looking for new candidate globular clusters (GCs), with the aim of completing the census of the…
We report the discovery of a pair of extremely reddened classical Cepheid variable stars located in the Galactic plane behind the bulge, using near-infrared time-series photometry from the VVV Survey. This is the first time that such…
Evidence is presented indicating that the young star cluster Westerlund~2 lies $d_{\odot}\sim3.0$ kpc in the direction of Carina. The distance is tied partly to new $UBVRI_c$ photometry and revised spectral classifications for cluster…
Several clusters of red supergiants have been discovered in a small region of the Milky Way close to the base of the Scutum-Crux Arm and the tip of the Long Bar. Population synthesis models indicate that they must be very massive to harbour…
We report the discovery of a probable new globular cluster in the disk of the Milky Way. Visible in 2MASS and the GLIMPSE survey, it has an estimated foreground extinction of A_V ~ 24 mag. The absolute magnitude of the cluster and the…
We report the serendipitous discovery of three new open clusters, named UFMG 1, UFMG 2 and UFMG 3 in the field of the intermediate-age cluster NGC 5999, by using Gaia DR2 data. A colour-magnitude filter tailored for a proper selection of…
The census of massive clusters of galaxies in the local Universe is almost complete, thanks to their prominent observational signatures at X-ray, optical, and sub-mm wavelengths. Nevertheless, a number of such systems are likely to be…
Massive stars are important for the evolution of the interstellar medium. The detailed study of their properties (such as mass loss, rotation, magnetic fields) is enormously facilitated by samples of these objects in young massive galactic…