Related papers: A Substellar Mass Function for Alpha Per

Studies of the mass function (MF) of open clusters of different ages allow us to probe the efficiency with which brown dwarfs (BDs) are evaporated from clusters to populate the field. Surveys in old clusters (age > 100 Myr) do not suffer so…

Analysis of initial observations from near-infrared sky surveys has shown that the resulting photometric catalogues, combined with far-red optical data, provide an extremely effective method of finding isolated, very low-temperature objects…

(ABRIDGED) We have analysed the near-infrared photometric data from the Fourth Data Release (DR4) of the UKIRT Infrared Deep Sky Suvey (UKIDSS) Galactic Clusters Survey (GCS) to derive the cluster luminosity and mass functions, evaluate the…

I review efforts to determine the form and any lower limit to the initial mass function in the Galactic disk, using observations of low-mass stars and brown dwarfs in the field, young clusters and star forming regions. I focus on the…

We measure luminosity functions in the cores of four spiral-rich, poor clusters of galaxies at median redshift $z = 0.016$. In the red magnitude range -14 < M_R < -10, our data imply that the luminosity functions phi(L) \propto L^{alpha}…

We report the results of a deep near infrared (JHK) survey of the outer parts of the Trapezium Cluster with Gemini South/Flamingos. 396 sources were detected in a 26 arcmin^2 area, including 138 brown dwarf candidates, defined as M<0.075…

Presented are the results of a large and deep optical-near-infrared multi-epoch survey of the Praesepe open star cluster using data from the UKIDSS Galactic Clusters Survey. Multiple colour magnitude diagrams were used to select potential…

In this paper we present surveys of two open clusters using photometry and accurate astrometry from the SuperCOSMOS microdensitometer. These use plates taken by the Palomar Oschin Schmidt Telescope giving a wide field ($5^{\circ}$ from the…

We present the results of a deep wide-field near-infrared survey of 12 square degrees of the Pleiades conducted as part of the UKIDSS Deep Infrared Sky Survey (UKIDSS) Galactic Cluster Survey (GCS). We have extracted over 340 high…

We present results from an adaptive optics survey for substellar and stellar companions to Sun-like stars. The survey targeted 266 F5-K5 stars in the 3Myr to 3Gyr age range with distances of 10-190pc. Results from the survey include the…

We have obtained near-IR observations of some of the faintest objects so far known towards the Pleiades cluster, with the aim of investigating the sequence that connects cluster very low-mass (VLM) stars with substellar objects. We find…

Low-mass stars and sub-stellar objects are essential in tracing the initial mass function (IMF). We study the nearby young $\sigma$ Orionis cluster (d$\sim$408 pc; age$\sim$1.8 Myr) using deep NIR photometric data in J, W and H-bands from…

To investigate the universality hypothesis of the initial mass function in the substellar regime, the population of the rho Ophiuchi molecular cloud is analysed by including a new sample of low-mass spectroscopically confirmed members. To…

We present the result of a photometric and Keck-LRIS spectroscopic study of dwarf galaxies in the core of the Perseus Cluster, down to a magnitude of M_B = -12.5. Spectra were obtained for twenty-three dwarf-galaxy candidates, from which we…

In this paper we present the mass functions in the substellar regime of three young open clusters, IC 348, $\sigma$ Orionis and Pleiades, as derived using the data from the 2 Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS) catalogue which has a limiting…

Knowledge of the mass function in open clusters constitutes one way to constrain the formation of low-mass stars and brown dwarfs as does the knowledge of the frequency of multiple systems and the properties of disks. The aim of the project…

We present the results of a Hubble Space Telescope (HST) Advanced Camera for Surveys (ACS) study of dwarf galaxies in the core of the rich nearby Perseus Cluster, down to M_V=-12. We identify 29 dwarfs as cluster members, 17 of which are…

We present a catalogue of RIZ photometry over an area of 0.855 square degrees, centred on NGC 2547. The survey is substantially complete to limits of R_c=21.5, I_c=19.5, Z=19.5. We use the catalogue to define NGC 2547 candidates with masses…

An area large enough (180 sq arcmin) to put constraints on a possible low mass brown dwarf population in the Pleiades has been surveyed to very faint magnitudes in I, J and K. The completeness limit, I=21.6, corresponds to a mass of 0.01…

We present a combined analysis of the low-mass Initial Mass Function (IMF) for seven star forming regions. We first demonstrate that the ratios of stars to brown dwarfs are consistent with a single underlying IMF. Assuming the underlying…