Related papers: The halo white dwarf population
We discuss the recent discovery by Oppenheimer et al (2001) of old, cool white dwarf stars, which may be the first direct detection of Galactic halo dark matter. We argue here that the contribution of more mundane white dwarfs of the…
With targeted imaging of groups in the local volume, the regions of collapse around bright galaxies can be clearly identified by the distribution of dwarfs and luminosity functions can be established to very faint levels. In the case of the…
The interpretation of microlensing results towards the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) still remains controversial. White dwarfs have been proposed to explain these results and, hence, to contribute significantly to the mass budget of our…
We have searched the Forth Catalogue of Nearby Stars for halo stars and identified 15 subdwarfs and a high velocity white dwarf in the solar neighbourhood. This search was motivated mainly by the recent determinations of MACHO masses of…
It has been known for a long time that stellar metallicity plays a significant role in the determination of the ages of the different Galactic stellar populations, when main sequence evolutionary tracks are employed. Here we analyze the…
Conditional luminosity function (CLF) of dark matter halos supersedes simple models on the number of galaxies as a function of the halo mass, or the so-called halo occupation number, by assigning a luminosity distribution to those galaxies.…
A sample of white dwarfs is selected from SDSS DR3 imaging data using their reduced proper motions, based on improved proper motions from SDSS plus USNO-B combined data. Numerous SDSS and followup spectra (Kilic et al. 2005) are used to…
(Summary) Using the conditional luminosity function (CLF) -- the luminosity distribution of galaxies in a dark matter halo -- as the fundamental building block, we present an empirical model for the galaxy distribution. The model…
As part of a global analysis of deep star counts to constrain scenarii of galaxy formation and evolution, we investigate possible links between the galactic spheroid and the dark matter halo. A wide set of deep star counts at high and…
We present the white dwarf sequence of the globular cluster M4, based on a 123 orbit Hubble Space Telescope exposure, with limiting magnitude V = 30, I = 28. The white dwarf luminosity function rises sharply for I >25.5, consistent with the…
There is substantial evidence that the initial mass function (IMF) may be a function of the local star formation conditions. In particular, the IMF is predicted to flatten with increasing local luminosity density, with the formation of…
We summarize recent improvements in model atmosphere and internal structure of faint white dwarfs. We derive an analytical cooling theory which illustrates the effects of various physical processes on the energy budget and the cooling…
Ultracool subdwarfs are low luminosity, late-type M and L dwarfs that exhibit spectroscopic indications of subsolar metallicity and halo kinematics. Their recent discovery and ongoing investigation have led to new insights into the role of…
Star luminosity function, already recognized as an age indicator for old galactic globular clusters, can be used to contrains the age of younger stellar systems like the nearby dwarfs spheroidal Leo I. We compare the observed luminosity…
(Abridged) Using data from the 2dFGRS we compute the conditional luminosity functions (CLFs) of early- and late-type galaxies. These functions give the average number of galaxies with luminosity L that reside in a halo of mass M, and are a…
The nature of the several microlensing events observed by the MACHO team towards the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) is still a subject of debate. Low-mass substellar objects and stars with masses larger than ~M_{sun} have been ruled out as…
Integral measures of weak gravitational lensing by dark-matter haloes, like the aperture mass, are sensitive to different physical halo properties dependent on the halo mass density profile. For isothermal profiles, the relation between…
White dwarf cooling sequences provides a useful indicator of the evolutionary time scales involved in the chronometry and star formation history of the galactic disk and, for this reason, the luminosity function of white dwarfs has become a…
In the first part of this contribution the observed velocity dispersions in Galactic halo dwarf spheroidal (dSph) galaxies are reviewed, and the consequences for dark matter content outlined. The results are suggestive of a dSph dark matter…
In this review, I will discuss a few problems which point to the need for improved stellar evolution models of halo stars. Current stellar evolution models do not match the observed $^7$Li abundance patterns, suggesting that the input…