Related papers: Galactic Stellar Populations
The stellar populations of the stellar halo and of the thick disk of the Milky Way reveal much about the merging history that our Galaxy, a typical large disk galaxy, has experienced. Our current understanding, described here, implies a…
I discuss how the chemical abundance distributions, kinematics and age distributions of stars in the thin and thick disks of the Galaxy can be used to decipher the merger history of the Milky Way, a typical large galaxy. The observational…
Stellar halos may hold some of the best preserved fossils of the formation history of galaxies. They are a natural product of the merging processes that probably take place during the assembly of a galaxy, and hence may well be the most…
The star formation rate history of the Milky Way is derived using the chromospheric age distribution for 552 stars in the solar neighborhood. The stars sample birthsites distributed over a very large range of distances because of orbital…
In chemodynamical evolution models it is usually assumed that the Milky Way galaxy forms from the inside-out implying that gas inflows onto the disk decrease with galactocentric distance. Similarly, to reproduce differences between chemical…
If we are to develop a comprehensive and predictive theory of galaxy formation and evolution, it is essential that we obtain an accurate assessment of how and when galaxies assemble their stellar populations, and how this assembly varies…
The star formation history of a galaxy, explicitely here our Milky Way Galaxy, where the most detailed information is attainable, is the convolution of two functions. One function describes the rate of formation of the stars which are today…
The evolution of galaxies results from a combination of internal and external processes. The star formation is an internal process transforming cold and dense cores of molecular clouds to stars. It may be triggered internally by expanding…
The cosmic history of star formation is briefly reviewed, starting with the Milky Way and then discussing observations relevant to the closed box and hierarchical build-up models. Observations of local star formation are reviewed for…
We study the long-term evolution of the Milky Way (MW) over cosmic time by modeling the star formation, cosmic rays, metallicity, stellar dynamics, outflows and inflows of the galactic system to obtain various insights into the galactic…
Stars, and collections of stars, encode rich signatures of stellar physics and galaxy evolution. With properties influenced by both their environment and intrinsic nature, stars retain information about astrophysical phenomena that are not…
The evolution of irregular galaxies is examined from two points of view: on the one hand, models of galactic chemical evolution have been computed and their predictions compared with the corresponding observational data on the element…
The basic principles underlying galactic chemical evolution and the most important results of chemical evolution models are discussed. In particular, the chemical evolution of the Milky Way galaxy, for which we possess the majority of…
In this review, we present a brief description of observational efforts to understand the Galactic thick disk and its relation to the other Galactic components. This review primarily focused on elemental abundance patterns of the thick disk…
As stellar compositions evolve over time in the Milky Way, so will the resulting planet populations. In order to place planet formation in the context of Galactic chemical evolution, we make use of a large ($N = 5\,325$) stellar sample…
I set the stage for discussion of the stellar populations in interacting galaxies by looking back over the slow development of our understanding of these systems. From early anecdotal collections, to systematic cataloging, and finally to…
The Milky Way is a unique laboratory, where stellar properties can be measured and analyzed in detail. In particular, stars in the older populations encode information on the mechanisms that led to the formation of our Galaxy. In this…
The goal of this investigation is to reconstruct the cosmic star formation rate density history from local observations and in doing so to gain insight into how galaxies might have formed and evolved. A new chemical evolution model is…
The combination of huge databases of galaxy spectra and advances in evolutionary synthesis models in the past few years has renewed interest in an old question: How to estimate the star formation history of a galaxy out of its integrated…
The Milky Way has distinct structural stellar components linked to its formation and subsequent evolution, but disentangling them is nontrivial. With the recent availability of high-quality data for a large numbers of stars in the Milky…