Related papers: Wolf-Rayet Stars as IMF Probes
Gamma-ray observations of young star clusters have recently provided evidence for particle acceleration occurring at stellar wind termination shocks, fueled by the mechanical energy of stellar winds from massive stars. In this work, we…
Some ultra-compact dwarf galaxies have large dynamical mass to light (M/L) ratios and also appear to contain an overabundance of LMXB sources, and some Milky Way globular clusters have a low concentration and appear to have a deficit of…
(Abridged) We perform a comprehensive multiwavelength analysis of a sample of 20 starburst galaxies that show the presence of a substantial population of Wolf-Rayet (WR) stars. In this paper we present the analysis of the O and WR star…
Wolf-Rayet stars (WRs) represent the end of a massive star's life as it is about to turn into a supernova. Obtaining complete samples of such stars across a large range of metallicities poses observational challenges, but presents us with…
Wolf-Rayet stars are amongst the rarest but also most intriguing massive stars. Their extreme stellar winds induce famous multi-wavelength circumstellar gas nebulae of various morphologies, spanning from circles and rings to bipolar shapes.…
(Abridged) We have performed a comprehensive analysis of a sample of 20 starburst galaxies, most of them classified as Wolf-Rayet galaxies. In this paper, the last of the series, we analyze the global properties of our galaxy sample using…
The stellar initial mass function (IMF) seems to be variable and not universal, as argued in the literature in the last three decades. Several relations among the low-mass end of the IMF slope and other stellar population, photometric or…
The stellar initial mass function (IMF) is a fundamental property of star formation, offering key insight into the physics driving the process as well as informing our understanding of stellar populations, their by-products, and their…
The initial mass function (IMF) succinctly characterizes a stellar population, provides a statistical measure of the end result of the star-formation process, and informs our under- standing of the structure and dynamical evolution of…
Few topics in astronomy initiate such vigorous discussion as whether or not the initial mass function (IMF) of stars is universal, or instead sensitive to the initial conditions of star formation. The distinction is of critical importance:…
One of the most robust observations of the stellar initial mass function (IMF) is its near-universality in the Milky Way and neighboring galaxies. But recent observations of early-type galaxies can be interpreted to imply a bottom-heavy…
Massive stars deeply influence their surroundings by their luminosity and the injection of kinetic energy. So far, they have mostly been studied with spatially unresolved observations, although evidence of geometrical complexity of their…
We report the detection of WC stars in 5 Wolf-Rayet (WR) galaxies: He 2-10, NGC 3049, NGC 3125, NGC 5253 and Tol 89. The faint broad CIV5808 line requires sufficiently high S/N to be detected explaining the non-detection of this WC feature…
There is good evidence that the centers of massive early-type galaxies have a bottom-heavy stellar initial mass function (IMF) compared to the IMF of the Milky Way. Here we study the radial variation of the IMF within such galaxies, using a…
Massive Wolf-Rayet stars are recognized today to be in a very common, but short, evolutionary phase of massive stars. While our understanding of Wolf-Rayet stars has increased dramatically over the past decades, it remains unclear whether…
Context: Recent gamma-ray observations of young star clusters revealed that stellar wind termination shocks accelerate particles, with the energy reservoir provided by the mechanical power of massive-star winds. Aims: Our goal is to…
The measured star-formation rates (SFRs) of galaxies comprise an important constraint on galaxy evolution and also on their cosmological boundary conditions. Any available tracer of the SFR depends on the shape of the mass-distribution of…
Massive stars that become stripped of their hydrogen envelope through binary interaction or winds can be observed either as Wolf-Rayet stars, if they have optically thick winds, or as transparent-wind stripped-envelope stars. We approximate…
Here we examine 12 Galactic clusters and OB associations containing Wolf-Rayet stars (W-Rs) and/or Luminous Blue Variables (LBVs), in order to assess the progentor masses of these evolved massive stars. We find that in the Milky Way,…
Because direct measurements require resolved stellar populations including low-mass stars, determining the stellar initial mass function (IMF) has been a historically difficult problem even within our own Galaxy and impossible everywhere…