The Slope of the Upper End of the IMF and the Upper Mass Limit: An Observer's Perspective

Details The Slope of the Upper End of the IMF and the Upper Mass Limit: An Observer's Perspective The Slope of the Upper End of the IMF and the Upper Mass Limit: An Observer's Perspective

2010-08-05

arxiv.org/abs/1008.1014v2

Astronomy and Astrophysics

Astrophysics

Solar and Stellar Astrophysics

To appear in "UP: Have Observations Revealed a Variable Upper End of the Initial Mass Function?", Astronomical Society of the

Scientific paper

There are various ways of measuring the slope of the upper end of the IMF. Arguably the most direct of these is to place stars on the H-R diagram and compare their positions with stellar evolutionary models. Even so, the masses one infers from this depend upon the exact methodology used. I briefly discusssome of the caveats and go through a brief error analysis. I conclude that the current data suggest that the IMF slopes are the same to within the errors. Similarly the determination of the upper mass "limit" is dependent upon how well one can determine the masses of the most massive stars within a cluster. The recent finding by Crowther et al (2010) invalidates the claim that there is a 150Mo upper limit to the IMF, but this is really not surprising given the weakness of the previous evidence.

Affiliated with

Also associated with

No associations

Rating

The Slope of the Upper End of the IMF and the Upper Mass Limit: An Observer's Perspective does not yet have a rating. At this time, there are no reviews or comments for this scientific paper.

If you have personal experience with The Slope of the Upper End of the IMF and the Upper Mass Limit: An Observer's Perspective, we encourage you to share that experience with our LandOfFree.com community. Your opinion is very important and The Slope of the Upper End of the IMF and the Upper Mass Limit: An Observer's Perspective will most certainly appreciate the feedback.

Rate now

Comments { 0 }

Profile ID: LFWR-SCP-O-438755