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| The protoplanetary disk of HL Tau, as observed by the ALMA Observatory. Discs like those would be continually eroded by close encounters in dense star clusters like the Orion Nebula Cluste (Credit: APOD) |
Friday, 19 February 2016
Planet-forming discs around young stars truncated by close encounters in Orion
Tuesday, 16 February 2016
Why are we interested in star clusters?
This blog is all about star clusters, which are pretty stunning and amazing astronomical objects, but some of you might be wondering why astronomers are so interested in them. So in this post I thought I'd give my Top 5 Reasons to Study Star Clusters! I hope you enjoy it!
1. Star formation. Perhaps the most important reason to study star clusters is because we believe the majority of stars form in groups or clusters and so by studying young star clusters we hope to learn something about how stars form. For example, by measuring the masses of all the stars in a cluster we can study the mass distribution of recently-formed stars (known as the initial mass function), which is one of the most important products of the star formation process.
2. The impact of environment on star formation. Stars form in many different environments, from small groups of only a handful of stars, up to dense clusters with millions of stars and many thousands of luminous and massive OB stars. In dense clusters young stars are very close to each other, which can lead to close encounters that might disrupt binary systems or planetary systems. The bright OB stars that are present in the most massive clusters can also erode the disks around stars in which planets form, potentially hindering the creation of a full solar system like our own. Understanding how the environment that stars form in affects their final properties is therefore very important!
3. Stellar evolution. Just like humans, stars change as they age in many different ways, from subtle changes in their luminosity and slowing their rotation, to dramatic changes as they switch their source of nuclear fuel. To study these changes we need to know how old the stars are, but unfortunately its very difficult to measure how old individual stars are (we can't ask stars how old they are like we do with humans!). If you have a group of stars, however, you can often work out how old the group is by studying which stars have come to the ends of their lives and which haven't. This allows you to estimate the age of the cluster, and therefore all the stars in it. Once you know their ages you can study how the stars have evolved over time, an area of research known as stellar evolution.
4. Star clusters can be used to study star formation in distant galaxies. Its easy to study star formation in our own galaxy, the Milky Way, because we can observe stars forming deep within molecular clouds and the young stars that have recently formed. But in distant galaxies these things are too small and too faint to observe, so our understanding of star formation in other galaxies, whether it is different in any way, and how much star formation has been occurring, is limited. Star clusters however are bright and we can easily observe them in distant galaxies. Its also relatively simple to get a good estimate of their mass, the type of stars in them, and how old they are. This is really useful for astronomers because it means we can study not just the current star formation in these galaxies, but also star formation that occurred in the past. Astronomers call this the star formation history of a galaxy and its useful for understanding how galaxies evolve over cosmic time.
5. Star clusters are an important step on the cosmic distance ladder. In actual fact, they're two steps! The first step is a 'local' step on the cosmic distance ladder, and it comes from a process known as the moving cluster method, which is essentially a perspective effect whereby if you know the direction that all the stars in a cluster are moving you can estimate how far away it is. The second step is a much more 'distant' step on the ladder, which uses the luminosity of globular clusters to estimate the distance of the galaxy that they're in. The method stems from the assumption that the brightness globular cluster in a galaxy usually has the same luminosity as the brightest globular cluster in another galaxy. Based on this, if you can measure how bright the globular clusters in a galaxy are, you can estimate how far away the galaxy is.
There are many other reasons to study star clusters, but these are some of the most important and wide-ranging, spanning the formation of planetary systems to the size of the Universe!
So next time you hear about star clusters or new research into our understanding of these amazing objects, think about all the different scientific topics that might be influenced by those new results!
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| The Orion Nebula Cluster, seen in X-rays and optical light. By estimating the masses of the young stars formed here we can study the distribution of stellar masses that form (Credit: Chandra X-ray Observatory) |
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| Hubble Space Telescope image of an evaporating protoplanetary disk (known as a proplyd) in the Orion Nebula. The disk (dark silhouette in the centre) is being eroded by radiation from a nearby bright O-type star leading to the tail of material stripped off(Credit: NASA/HST) |
2. The impact of environment on star formation. Stars form in many different environments, from small groups of only a handful of stars, up to dense clusters with millions of stars and many thousands of luminous and massive OB stars. In dense clusters young stars are very close to each other, which can lead to close encounters that might disrupt binary systems or planetary systems. The bright OB stars that are present in the most massive clusters can also erode the disks around stars in which planets form, potentially hindering the creation of a full solar system like our own. Understanding how the environment that stars form in affects their final properties is therefore very important!
3. Stellar evolution. Just like humans, stars change as they age in many different ways, from subtle changes in their luminosity and slowing their rotation, to dramatic changes as they switch their source of nuclear fuel. To study these changes we need to know how old the stars are, but unfortunately its very difficult to measure how old individual stars are (we can't ask stars how old they are like we do with humans!). If you have a group of stars, however, you can often work out how old the group is by studying which stars have come to the ends of their lives and which haven't. This allows you to estimate the age of the cluster, and therefore all the stars in it. Once you know their ages you can study how the stars have evolved over time, an area of research known as stellar evolution.
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| The life cycle of a star like our Sun (upper row) and a more massive OB-type star (lower row). Both types of star form in star forming regions and star clusters, but evolve through different phases. By studying this process in star clusters with known ages, astronomers can calculate how long this evolution takes (Image credit: SciOly.org) |
4. Star clusters can be used to study star formation in distant galaxies. Its easy to study star formation in our own galaxy, the Milky Way, because we can observe stars forming deep within molecular clouds and the young stars that have recently formed. But in distant galaxies these things are too small and too faint to observe, so our understanding of star formation in other galaxies, whether it is different in any way, and how much star formation has been occurring, is limited. Star clusters however are bright and we can easily observe them in distant galaxies. Its also relatively simple to get a good estimate of their mass, the type of stars in them, and how old they are. This is really useful for astronomers because it means we can study not just the current star formation in these galaxies, but also star formation that occurred in the past. Astronomers call this the star formation history of a galaxy and its useful for understanding how galaxies evolve over cosmic time.
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| The Antennae Galaxies, two interacting galaxies with a rich and vibrant star formation history. Astronomers have been able to study its star formation history by observing the many star clusters (bright blue dots surrounded by red clouds) (Credit: Hubble Space Telescope) |
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| The Jewel box Cluster (NGC 4755), one of many clusters that are important for measuring distances in astronomy! (Credit: APOD) |
There are many other reasons to study star clusters, but these are some of the most important and wide-ranging, spanning the formation of planetary systems to the size of the Universe!
So next time you hear about star clusters or new research into our understanding of these amazing objects, think about all the different scientific topics that might be influenced by those new results!
Monday, 1 February 2016
Improving our census of star clusters in the Large Magellanic Cloud
A new paper published last week by Romita et al. presents results of a search for new star clusters in the nearest galaxy to the Milky Way, the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC).
The LMC is a dwarf satellite galaxy currently orbiting our galaxy that has a number of key differences to the Milky Way. For a start the LMC is much smaller than the Milky Way, but critically it is also less chemically evolved, meaning that it has fewer 'metals', which is the name astronomers give to anything other than hydrogen or helium. By studying the distribution of star clusters in this galaxy we can try to understand whether star formation and the evolution of star clusters has proceeded any differently in this environment compared to in our own Galaxy.
The authors have targeted a 1.65 square degree area of the LMC that includes the massive star forming region 30 Doradus, the largest region of star formation in the LMC, and larger than anything in our own galaxy. It's a rich field of star formation as the images below show, and a good place to be hunting for new star clusters.
Using infrared images of the LMC the authors identify 65 embedded star clusters, 45 of which are new discoveries. Using their observations the authors are able to estimate the sizes, masses and luminosities of these clusters, all key properties of star clusters.
The authors compare the distribution of these star cluster properties with their distribution in our own Galaxy, and find that the LMC clusters are generally larger, more massive, and more luminous. Since these three quantities are often well-correlated with each other, it's not a surprise that all three properties are bigger in the LMC, but this does clearly show that LMC star clusters are typically more massive than those in our galaxy.
The authors also find the density of clusters in the LMC is 3 times higher than in the Milky Way, and that the mass of clusters in this area of the LMC is 40 times higher than an equivalent area in out galaxy. Both these results suggest that the LMC is producing star clusters at a much higher rate than in our own Galaxy.
These two results are actually linked. If a galaxy is forming more stars and producing more star clusters then it is likely that it will, on average, produce larger and more massive clusters than a galaxy that it is forming fewer star clusters. It is clear that the LMC is very actively forming stars and clusters at the moment.
However the authors note that this shouldn't surprise us because the LMC contains many more molecular clouds than the Milky Way, and since stars form in molecular clouds then more molecular clouds should mean more star clusters! They find that both galaxies display the same relationship (known as the star formation rate scaling law) between the amount of dense gas and the amount of stars (and star clusters) that are forming.
This means that while the environments of the two galaxies may be different, the star formation process that takes place within them isn't. We can therefore take what we've learnt about star formation in the Milky Way and apply it to other galaxies. This is an important step forward for understanding star formation across the Universe!
The LMC is a dwarf satellite galaxy currently orbiting our galaxy that has a number of key differences to the Milky Way. For a start the LMC is much smaller than the Milky Way, but critically it is also less chemically evolved, meaning that it has fewer 'metals', which is the name astronomers give to anything other than hydrogen or helium. By studying the distribution of star clusters in this galaxy we can try to understand whether star formation and the evolution of star clusters has proceeded any differently in this environment compared to in our own Galaxy.
The authors have targeted a 1.65 square degree area of the LMC that includes the massive star forming region 30 Doradus, the largest region of star formation in the LMC, and larger than anything in our own galaxy. It's a rich field of star formation as the images below show, and a good place to be hunting for new star clusters.
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| Images of the area of the LMC studied in this paper. On the left is a colour image compiled from the infrared observations used in the study, while on the right a black and white image is marked with the positions of the newly-discovered star clusters (red dots) relative to the positions of known molecular clouds (black ellipses). (Credit: Romita et al. 2016) |
The authors compare the distribution of these star cluster properties with their distribution in our own Galaxy, and find that the LMC clusters are generally larger, more massive, and more luminous. Since these three quantities are often well-correlated with each other, it's not a surprise that all three properties are bigger in the LMC, but this does clearly show that LMC star clusters are typically more massive than those in our galaxy.
The authors also find the density of clusters in the LMC is 3 times higher than in the Milky Way, and that the mass of clusters in this area of the LMC is 40 times higher than an equivalent area in out galaxy. Both these results suggest that the LMC is producing star clusters at a much higher rate than in our own Galaxy.
These two results are actually linked. If a galaxy is forming more stars and producing more star clusters then it is likely that it will, on average, produce larger and more massive clusters than a galaxy that it is forming fewer star clusters. It is clear that the LMC is very actively forming stars and clusters at the moment.
However the authors note that this shouldn't surprise us because the LMC contains many more molecular clouds than the Milky Way, and since stars form in molecular clouds then more molecular clouds should mean more star clusters! They find that both galaxies display the same relationship (known as the star formation rate scaling law) between the amount of dense gas and the amount of stars (and star clusters) that are forming.
This means that while the environments of the two galaxies may be different, the star formation process that takes place within them isn't. We can therefore take what we've learnt about star formation in the Milky Way and apply it to other galaxies. This is an important step forward for understanding star formation across the Universe!
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