The system of the Milky Way, LMC and SMC

A simple sticky-particle numerical model has been developed in order to check whether extended structures of gas created due to the dynamical evolution of the Galaxy and the Magellanic Clouds system can be explained as remnants of a tidal interaction. Influence of dissipative nature of gaseous medium has been taken into account. The most remarkable features are: the Magellanic Stream, the common HI envelope surrounding both the LMC and SMC and the bridge extended between the Clouds. In contrast to previous works of Murai and Fujimoto (1980), Gardiner et al. (1994) and H and Rohlfs (1994) no presumptions were done on the actual galactocentric velocities of the Magellanic Clouds. The mean values of the LMC and SMC velocity vectors obtained from the Hipparcos proper motion measurements (Kroupa and Bastian, 1997) were used in order to verify whether they allow to reproduce the observed HI distribution. Numerical simulations showed that tidal forces are really significant for the evolution of extended structures such as the Magellanic Stream but this approach becomes unsufficient for the internal regions of galaxies where self-gravity and dissipative properties of the gas cannot be neglected. More precise proper motion measurements are urgently needed. This revised version was published online in August 2006 with corrections to the Cover Date.     

Interstellar Extinction and the Intrinsic Colors of Classical Cepheids in the Galaxy, the LMC, and the SMC

New methods are applied to samples of classical cepheids in the galaxy, the Large Magellanic Cloud, and the Small Magellanic Cloud to determine the interstellar extinction law for the classical cepheids, R _B:R _V:R _I:R _J:R _H:R _K= 4.190:3.190:1.884:0.851:0.501:0.303, the color excesses for classical cepheids in the galaxy, E(B-V)=-0.382-0.168logP+0.766(V-I), and the color excesses for classical cepheids in the LMC and SMC, E(B-V)=-0.374-0.166logP+0.766(V-I). The dependence of the intrinsic color (B-V)₀ on the metallicity of classical cepheids is discussed. The intrinsic color (V-I)₀ is found to be absolutely independent of the metallicity of classical cepheids. A high precision formula is obtained for calculating the intrinsic colors of classical cepheids in the galaxy: (<B>-<V>)₀=0.365(±0.011)+0.328(±0.012)logP.     

DDO photometry and metallic abundances of E and SO galaxies and globular clusters of the LMC and SMC

Metallicity of 8 E and SO galaxies as well as that of red globulars of the LMC and SMC were obtained by means of DDO integrated photometry calibrated with galactic globular clusters (Bica and Pastoriza, 1983; hereafter referred to as Paper I). A correction was obtained in order to reduce the colors of the galaxies to zero redshift. The relation metallicity vsM _V for the galaxies is analyzed (adding to our sample the observations of McClure and Van den Bergh, 1968; and Faber, 1973a). For the Magellanic Clouds we found metallicity ranging from intermediate to poor.     

Distance estimate of M31 based on the size distribution of Hii regions and dark clouds

The size distribution of dark clouds and of H II regions were used to derive a distance of 440±22 kpc for M31. Some galactic H II regions and dark clouds were combined with the same ingredients in M31 to study the mass spectrum of both phenomena. A gas to dust ratio of 10001 has been derived for M31. Radii of the classical H II regions as derived in this work using distance of 440 kpc agrees with the galactic classical H II region radii.     

On the spiral structure of M33

The spiral structure of M33 has been examined on the basis of 197 associations. The parameters of the orientation of the plane are derived. It is supposed to be a system consisting of seven logarithmic spirals. Two principal arms have been interpreted through the use of the density-wave theory. The remaining multiple arm features of M33 may be explained with the stochastic self-propagating model. The distribution of surface brightness segments speaks for the existence of different mechanisms of star formation in M33.     

On the mass and density of the stellar disk of M33

The disk surface density of the nearby spiral galaxy M33 is estimated assuming that it is marginally stable against gravitational perturbations. For this purpose we used the radial profile of line-of-sight velocity dispersion of the disk planetary nebulae obtained by Ciardullo et al. (2004). The surface density profile we obtained is characterized by the radial scalelength which is close to the photometrical one and is in a good agreement with the rotation curve of M33 and with the mass-to-light ratio which follows from the stellar population model. However at the galactocentric distance r > 7 kpc the dynamical overheating of the disk remains quite possible. The thickness of the stellar disk of M33 should increase outwards from the center. The dark halo to total mass ratio is estimated as a function of r. The effective oxygen yield obtained in the frame of instantaneous recycling approximation using the disk surface density and the observed gradient of O/H increases with radius. It may indicate that the role of accretion of metalpoor gas in the chemical evolution of interstellar medium decreases outwards.     

Velocity Distance of the Open Cluster M11

On the reasonable hypothesis that the internal motions of member stars of a cluster are random and isotropic, a method which can be used to estimate the velocity distance of the cluster and its uncertainty is developed. The velocity distance so determined is an absolute distance estimate, and is completely independent of the (widely used) luminosity distance, which is a relative distance estimate. Using the published high-accuracy observational data of radial velocities and proper motions of the stars in the open cluster M11 region, we have determined the distance of M11 to be 1.89 ± 0.52kpc. This is in quite good agreement with the published luminosity distances of the cluster. We briefly discuss the problems concerned, including the sources of errors in the method and its applicable range.     

Estimating the Metallicity of Old Star Clusters in M33

1 INTRODUCTION Globular clusters are thought to be among the oldest radiant objects in the Universe. Thestudies of these systems have played a key role in the development of our understanding of theUniverse, including the fundamental question of the age of the Universe. The globular clustersof Milky Way can be used to probe the way in which our Galaxy formed. Studies of similarclusters in other galaxies can also provide us the properties of those galaxies in the early periodafter their …     

A photometric study of the bright stars in M33

TheUBV photometry of 105 bright stars and theU magnitudes of 36 bright stars in M33 taken by the 2 m RCC telescope of the Rozhen Observatory at the Bulgarian Academy of Sciences were used to obtain colour-magnitude and colour-colour diagrams. A criterion forV, B-V, andU-B is suggested which facilitates the separation of the member stars from the foreground stars. The vast majority of the bright blue stars with strong negativeU-B are M33 members. The existence of objects with an unusual combination of colours (B-V>0.5 and strong negativeU-B) has been confirmed.     

The mass and radius of the M dwarf companion to GD 448

We present spectroscopy and photometry of GD 448, a detached white dwarf – M dwarf binary with a period of 2.47 h. We find that the Na  I  8200-Å feature is composed of narrow emission lines, owing to irradiation of the M dwarf by the white dwarf, within broad absorption lines that are essentially unaffected by heating. Combined with an improved spectroscopic orbit and gravitational redshift measurement from spectra of the Hα line, we are able to derive masses for the white dwarf and M dwarf directly (0.41 ± 0.01 and 0.096 ± 0.004 M_⊙, respectively). We use a simple model of the Ca II emission lines to establish the radius of the M dwarf assuming the emission from its surface to be proportional to the incident flux per unit area from the white dwarf. The radius derived is 0.125 ± 0.020 R_⊙. The M dwarf appears to be a normal main-sequence star in terms of its mass and radius, and is less than half the size of its Roche lobe. The thermal time-scale of the M dwarf is much longer than the cooling age of the white dwarf, so we conclude that the M dwarf was unaffected by the common-envelope phase. The anomalous width of the Hα emission from the M dwarf remains to be explained, but the strength of the line may be due to X-ray heating of the M dwarf owing to accretion on to the white dwarf from the M dwarf wind.     

The extended rotation curve and the dark matter halo of M33

We present the 21-cm rotation curve of the nearby galaxy M33 out to a galactocentric distance of 16 kpc (13 disc scalelengths). The rotation curve keeps rising out to the last measured point and implies a dark halo mass ≳5×10¹⁰ M_⊙. The stellar and gaseous discs provide virtually equal contributions to the galaxy gravitational potential at large galactocentric radii, but no obvious correlation is found between the radial distribution of dark matter and the distribution of stars or gas.
Results of the best fit to the mass distribution in M33 picture a dark halo which controls the gravitational potential from 3 kpc outward, with a matter density which decreases radially as R ^−1.3. The density profile is consistent with the theoretical predictions for structure formation in hierarchical clustering cold dark matter (CDM) models, and favours lower mass concentrations than those expected in the standard cosmogony.     

Systematic variation in the apparent burning area of thermonuclear bursts and its implication for neutron star radius measurement

Precision measurements of neutron star radii can provide a powerful probe of the properties of cold matter beyond nuclear density. Beginning in the late 1970s, it was proposed that the radius could be obtained from the apparent or inferred emitting area during the decay portions of thermonuclear (type I) X-ray bursts. However, this apparent area is generally not constant, preventing a reliable measurement of the source radius. Here, we report for the first time a correlation between the variation of the inferred area and the burst properties, measured in a sample of almost 900 bursts from 43 sources. We found that the rate of change of the inferred area during decay is anticorrelated with the burst decay duration. A Spearman rank correlation test shows that this relation is significant at the  <10⁻⁴⁵  level for our entire sample, and at the  7 × 10⁻³⁷  level for the 625 bursts without photospheric radius expansion. This anticorrelation is also highly significant for individual sources exhibiting a wide range of burst durations, such as 4U 1636–536 and Aql X-1. We suggest that variations in the colour factor, which relates the colour temperature resulted from the scattering in the neutron star atmosphere to the effective temperature of the burning layer, may explain the correlation. This in turn implies significant variations in the composition of the atmosphere between bursts with long and short durations.     

The radius of the Sun at centimeter waves and the brightness distribution across the disk

We report observations of the solar radio radius at wavelengths between 1.2 and 11 cm performed with the Bonn 100 m-telescope. In combination with former measurements of the centre-to-limb variation of the solar brightness these observations are discussed in terms of atmospheric models. We consider the solar disk to be covered by arches at low latitudes, while at the poles coronal holes are located. The temperature dependence on height is taken from EUV-line intensities, hydrostatic equilibrium is adopted, spicules are assumed to be responsible for the relatively low brightening. The interpretation of our measurements demands certain values of the brightness temperature of spicules as a function of wavelength within a modest interval.     

The stellar content of associations and star complexes in M33

A list of 289 stellar associations and 47 star complexes has been compiled. This study is based on a photographicUBV photometry carried out with the 3.6 m CFHT by W. L. Freedman and the 2 m Bulgarian telescope. The identification charts of stellar associations and star complexes are presented. The photographs reveal new appearance for associations. They are seen as clustering within the classical OB associations. The boundaries of the associations were delineated using a cluster analysis. The problems related to the age and size distribution of associations are discussed. The stellar associations provide a good observational test for shock wave across the southern spiral arm. The star complexes in the central region and in the southern spiral arm are rich in WR, O and luminous stars and poor in red supergiants while in the outer region is quite contrary. There is a brief discussion whether the different stellar content of star complexes could be explained with radial metal abundance, in M33 or with variations of the luminosity function from one complex to another. M33 is compared with other nearby galaxies.