Related papers: The future of massive variability searches
Galaxies represent the visible fabric of the Universe and there has been considerable progress recently in both observational and theoretical studies. The underlying goal is to understand the present-day diversity of galaxy forms, masses…
Microlensing experiments today have a tantalizing result; they have detected an excess of microlensing events beyond what is expected from known stellar populations. These events could be due to a possible form of Halo dark matter. However,…
With the new discoveries enabled thanks to the recent space missions, stellar physics is going through a revolution. However, these discoveries opened the door to many new questions that require more observations. The European Space…
Spectral evolution models are a widely used tool for determining the stellar content of galaxies. I provide a review of the latest developments in stellar atmosphere and evolution models, with an emphasis on massive stars. In contrast to…
The majority of stars more massive than the Sun is found in binary or multiple star systems and many of them will interact during their evolution. Specific interactions, where progenitors and post-mass transfer (MT) systems are clearly…
Despite their paucity, massive hot stars are real cosmic engines of fundamental importance in shaping our Universe, from its very early stages up to its current appearance. Understanding the physics of massive stars is then a key issue for…
Supernovae play a critical role in observational cosmology as well as in astrophysics of stars and galaxies. Recent era has seen dramatic progress in the research of supernovae. Several programs to search systematically supernovae in nearby…
Looking ahead to the next decade and imagining the landscape of astronomy in 2020, it is clear that astronomical surveys, large and small, plus extensive follow-up projects, will be a great engine of progress in our profession. Surveys have…
MATISSE represents a great opportunity to image the environment around massive and evolved stars. This will allow one to put constraints on the circumstellar structure, on the mass ejection of dust and its reorganization , and on the…
Evolved stars dominate galactic spectra, enrich the galactic medium, expand to change their planetary systems, eject winds of a complex nature, produce spectacular nebulae and illuminate them, and transfer material between binary…
We propose and evaluate the feasibility of a new strategy to search for planets via microlensing observations. This new strategy is designed to detect planets in "wide" orbits, i.e., with orbital separation, a, greater than ~1.5 R_E.…
This paper outlines astrophysical issues related to the long term fate of the universe. We consider the evolution of planets, stars, stellar populations, galaxies, and the universe itself over time scales which greatly exceed the current…
We describe observations in the nearby universe (<100 Mpc) with a 10-m or larger space-based telescope having imaging and spectral capabilities in the range 912-9000 \AA that would enable advances in the fields of massive stars, young…
Stellar fundamental properties (masses, radii, effective temperatures) can be extracted from observations of eclipsing binary systems with remarkable precision, often better than 2%. Such precise measurements afford us the opportunity to…
The next generation of multi-object spectrographs (MOS) will deliver comprehensive surveys of the Galaxy, Magellanic Clouds and nearby dwarfs. These will provide us with the vast samples, spanning the full extent of the Hertzsprung-Russell…
The study of eclipsing binaries is our primary source of measured properties of normal stars, achieved through analysis of light and radial velocity curves of eclipsing systems. The study of oscillations and pulsations is increasingly vital…
Massive stars are among the most important objects in the Universe and many (most?) of them are formed in binaries. A selection of observational and theoretical facts that illustrate the importance of binaries and the evolution of massive…
It has been argued that a substantial fraction of massive stars may end their lives without an optically bright supernova (SN), but rather collapse to form a black hole. Such an event would not be detected by current SN surveys, which are…
We investigate the possibility of measuring the Hubble constant, the fractional energy density components and the equation of state parameter of the ``dark energy'' using lensed multiple images of high-redshift supernovae. With future…
As astronomers, we are living an exciting time for what concerns the search for other worlds. Recent discoveries have already deeply impacted our vision of planetary formation and architectures. Future bio-signature discoveries will…