Related papers: Stellar Crowding and the Science Case for Extremel…

The expected imaging capabilities of future Extremely Large Telescopes (ELTs) will offer the unique possibility to investigate the stellar population of distant galaxies from the photometry of the stars in very crowded fields. Using…

One of the key science goals for a diffraction limited imager on an Extremely Large Telescope (ELT) is the resolution of individual stars down to faint limits in distant galaxies. The aim of this study is to test the proposed capabilities…

We have obtained HST-NICMOS observations of five of M31's most metal rich globular clusters. These data allow photometry of individual stars in the clusters and their surrounding fields. However, to achieve our goals -- obtain accurate…

The images provided by the Advanced Camera for Surveys at the Hubble Space Telescope (ACS/HST) have the amazing spacial resolution of 0".05/pixel. Therefore, it is possible to resolve individual stars in nearby galaxies and, in particular,…

The Extremely Large Telescopes currently under construction have a collecting area that is an order of magnitude larger than the present largest optical telescopes. For seeing-limited observations the performance will scale as the…

We explore the use of strong lensing by galaxy clusters to constrain the dark energy equation of state and its possible time variation. The cores of massive clusters often contain several multiply imaged systems of background galaxies at…

We overview the current status of photometric analyses of images collected with Multi Conjugate Adaptive Optics (MCAO) at 8-10m class telescopes that operated, or are operating, on sky. Particular attention will be payed to resolved stellar…

We discuss the impact that the next generation of Extremely Large Telescopes will have on the open astrophysical problems of resolved stellar populations. In particular, we address the interplay between multiband photometry and…

We present a thorough investigation of stellar photometry based on HST imaging of crowded fields at 85 and 10 arcsec from the centre of the high-surface brightness elliptical M32. The Principal Investigators of the present archive data have…

A study of aperture size effects on star cluster photometry in crowded fields is presented. Tests were performed on a sample of 285 star cluster candidates in the South-West field of the M31 galaxy disk, measured in the Local Group Galaxy…

Mass-to-light versus colour relations (MLCRs), derived from stellar population synthesis models, are widely used to estimate galaxy stellar masses (M$_*$) yet a detailed investigation of their inherent biases and limitations is still…

We discuss, from a statistical point of view, some leading issues that deal with the study of stellar populations in fully or partially unresolved aggregates, like globular clusters and distant galaxies. A confident assessment of the…

We present simulated J- and K-band observations of stars in the Virgo and Coma clusters of galaxies using the proposed Next Generation Space Telescope with a Near-Infrared Camera, and discuss some of the science results that might be…

The Galactic centre and its surrounding space are important in studying galaxy-scale evolution, and stellar populations therein are expected to have imprints of the long-term evolution. Interstellar extinction, however, severely limits…

We give an overview of the science case for spectroscopy of resolved stellar populations beyond the Local Group with the European Extremely Large Telescope (E-ELT). In particular, we present science simulations undertaken as part of the…

With the aim of paving the road for future accurate astrometry with MICADO at the European-ELT, we performed an astrometric study using two different but complementary approaches to investigate two critical components that contribute to the…

We report results from numerical simulations assessing astrometry measurements with the Multiconjugate Adaptive Optics Relay for ELT Observations (MORFEO) instrument on the Extremely Large Telescope (ELT). Using the Advanced Exposure Time…

Valuable insights into galaxy evolution can be gleaned from studies of resolved stellar populations in the local Universe. Deep photometric surveys have provided tracers of the star-formation histories in galaxies from 0.8-16 Mpc, but…

Deep observations of the Universe, usually as a part of sky surveys, are one of the symbols of the modern astronomy because they can allow big collaborations, exploiting multiple facilities and shared knowledge. The new generation of…

We conduct a series of comparisons between spectroscopic and photometric observations of globular clusters and stellar models to examine their predictive power. Data from medium-to-high resolution spectroscopic surveys of lithium allow us…