Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics
Scientific paper
Jun 2009
adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/nph-data_query?bibcode=2009iaus..258..299k&link_type=abstract
The Ages of Stars, Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union, IAU Symposium, Volume 258, p. 299-306
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
1
Galaxy: Open Clusters And Associations: Individual (Ngc 7789, Ngc 6819, And Ngc 6791) – Stars: Evolution – Techniques: Photometric, Spectroscopic – White Dwarfs
Scientific paper
Much of our knowledge regarding the ages of stars derives from our understanding of the Hertzsprung-Russell Diagram. The diagram is typically dominated by hydrogen burning main-sequence stars, which historically, have been used to establish our most fundamental knowledge of stellar ages and evolution. In this brief article, I highlight how deep ground and space based imaging can uncover the stellar remnants of these hydrogen burning stars, white dwarfs. We have followed up our initial discovery of several large white dwarf populations in nearby star clusters with multiobject spectrographs. The spectroscopy allows us to characterize the properties of the remnant stars (e.g., mass, temperature, and age), which are in turn used to shed new light on fundamental astrophysical problems. Specifically, we estimate the ages of the Milky Way disk and halo, provide the inputs needed to calculate the chemical evolution of galaxies, and re-iterate the important role of HB stars in producing the UV-upturn seen in elliptical galaxies.
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