Related papers: A theoretical analysis of the systematic errors in…
The mean absolute magnitude of the local red clump (RC) is a very well determined quantity due to the availability of accurate HIPPARCOS parallaxes for several hundred RC stars, potentially allowing it to be used as an accurate…
We present a detailed analysis of the behaviour of the Red Clump K-band absolute magnitude (M(K,RC)) in simple and composite stellar populations, in light of its use as standard candle for distance determinations. The advantage of using…
The Hipparcos I-band calibration of horizontal-branch red clump giants as standard candles has lead to controversial results for the distance to the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). In an attempt to properly ascertain the corrections for…
We present a new distance determination to the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds using the newly developed red clump stars method (Paczynski and Stanek 1998). This new, single-step, Hipparcos calibrated method seems to be one of the most…
We have obtained deep imaging in the near-infrared J and K bands for 2 nearby fields in the bar of the LMC with the ESO NTT telescope, under exquisite seeing conditions. The K, J-K color-magnitude diagrams constructed from these data are of…
The I-band brightness of clump stars has been used recently to determine the distance to the bulge, the LMC and SMC, and to M31. It was assumed to be a standard candle based on the observational fact that it is independent of (V-I)-colour…
We use the Main Sequence stars in the LMC cluster NGC 1866 and of Red Clump stars in the local field to obtain two independent estimates of the LMC distance. We apply an empirical Main Sequence-fitting technique based on a large sample of…
We present results from a study of the distances and distribution of a sample of intermediate-age clusters in the Large Magellanic Cloud. Using deep near-infrared photometry obtained with ISPI on the CTIO 4m, we have measured the apparent…
Over the past decade the use of the red clump (RC) as distance indicator has increased in importance as this evolutionary phase is well populated and a good local calibration exists. The absolute calibration of the RC in the $I$ and $K$…
Following an approach developed by Paczy\'nski & Stanek, we derive a distance to the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) by comparing red clump stars from the Hipparcos catalog with the red clump stars observed in two fields in the LMC that were…
The zero point of the reddening toward the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) has been the subject of some dispute. Its uncertainty propagates as a systematic error for methods which measure the extragalactic distance scale through knowledge of…
(Abridged) We have investigated the reliability of the widely used I-band Tip of the RGB relative distances for a sample of Local Group galaxies with complex Star Formation Histories (SFR) and Age Metallicity Relationships (AMR) namely the…
We present a sample of about 120,000 red clump candidates selected from the LAMOST DR2 catalog based on the empirical distribution model in the effective temperature vs. surface gravity plane. Although, in general, red clump stars are…
On the basis of the near infrared observations of bulge red clump stars near the Galactic center, we have determined the galactocentric distance to be R_0 = 7.52 +- 0.10 (stat) +- 0.35 (sys) kpc. We observed the red clump stars at |l| < 1.0…
We show that the luminosity dependence of the red clump stars on age and metallicity can cause a difference of up to < ~0.6 mag in the mean absolute I magnitude of the red clump between different stellar populations. We show that this…
We identify a vertical extension of the red clump stars in the color magnitude diagram (CMD) of a section of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). After subtracting the principal red clump component, we find a peak in the residual stellar…
We analyze the mean luminosity of three samples of field RRab Lyr stars observed in the course of the OGLE microlensing experiment: 73 stars from the Galactic bulge and 110 and 128 stars from selected fields in the LMC and SMC,…
Variations of ~0.4 mag are expected in the I-band absolute magnitude of red clump giants, M_I^RC, as a function of both stellar age and metallicity. This regardless of some potential theoretical uncertainties. Due to the quite large…
Red clump stars (RCs) are useful tracers of distances, extinction, chemical abundances, and Galactic structures and kinematics. Accurate estimation of the RC parameters -- absolute magnitude and intrinsic color -- is the basis for obtaining…
We present a study of simultaneous determination of mean distance and reddening to the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) using the two photometric band RR Lyrae data. Currently available largest number of highly accurate and precise light curve…