Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astronomy
Scientific paper
Jan 2011
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2011aas...21732706o&link_type=abstract
American Astronomical Society, AAS Meeting #217, #327.06; Bulletin of the American Astronomical Society, Vol. 43, 2011
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astronomy
Scientific paper
We present HST/ACS observations of six field OB stars that appeared isolated in ground-based images of the Small Magellanic Cloud. Half of these targets show the statistically significant presence of a few companion stars having masses in the range 1 - 4 Msun; the remaining three targets remain candidates for OB stars that formed in true isolation, although there is a possibility that they are runaway stars. To explore the clustering parameter space occupied by our sparse clusters, we carry out Monte Carlo simulations of a cluster population based on a -2 power law distribution in the cluster membership number (N_*) or cluster mass (M_cl), plus a constant IMF. The upper-mass limits (< 100 Msun) for our observed objects generally fall within a fairly well-populated parameter space within the simulations, although this is somewhat model-dependent. Thus, the existence of these sparse groups may demonstrate that clusters with massive stars can form over a range of at least 2 - 3 orders of magnitude in M_cl. This suggests that the IMF, and hence, the stellar upper-mass limit, is independent of M_cl, which bears directly on the integrated galaxy IMF (IGIMF) and theories for star formation.
Ingleby Laura D.
Lamb J. B.
Oey Sally M.
Werk Jessica K.
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