Photometric membership and metallicities of red giant candidates in selected open clusters

As part of a long‐term project to determine abundances and astrophysical properties of evolved red stars in open clusters, we present high‐precision DDO photoelectric observations for a sample of 33 red giant candidates projected in the fields of nine Galactic open clusters. These data are supplemented with UBV photoelectric photometry of 24 of these stars as well as with CORAVEL radial‐velocity observations for 13 red giant candidates in four of the clusters. We also present Washington photoelectric photometry of a small sample of red giant candidates of the open cluster Ruprecht 97. The likelihood of cluster membership for each star photometrically observed and for 23 additional red giant candidates with UBV and DDO data available in the literature, is evaluated by using two independent photometric criteria. Nearly 82% of the analysed stars are found to have a high probability of being cluster giants. Photometric membership probabilities show very good agreement with those obtained from CORAVEL radial velocities. While E (B –V) colour excesses were determined from combined B – V and DDO colours, calibrations of the DDO system were used to derive MK spectral types, effective temperatures and metallicities. The derived DDO metallicities range between values typical of moderately metal‐poor clusters ([Fe/H] = –0.19) to moderately metal‐rich ([Fe/H] = 0.25) ones. (© 2008 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Photometric study of 9 doubtful open clusters

We present results of a photometric investigation of 9 poorly studied apparent open clusters. While the aim of our survey was to determine structural and astrophysical parameters for these objects, they were found not to be physical groups of stars. BV wide‐field CCD photometry combined with the near‐infrared JHK_S data from the 2MASS and proper motions were used to study their nature. Detailed analysis of radial density profiles, morphology of decontaminated colourmagnitude diagrams, and proper motion distributions indicate that these stellar ensembles are projective chance alignments of physically unrelated stars. (© 2008 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)     

Integrated spectral properties of four previously unstudied small angular size galactic open clusters

We have derived fundamental parameters for the previously unstudied concentrated Galactic open clusters Berkeley 77, NGC2587, BH58 and ESO324‐SC15 by means of integrated spectroscopy in the range 3800–6800 Å. The cluster integrated spectra are compared with those of solar metallicity template spectra of Galactic open clusters with known parameters. The spectra were obtained at CASLEO (San Juan, Argentina) with a resolution of 14 Å.We estimated simultaneously age and foreground interstellar reddening by comparing the continuum distribution and line strengths of the cluster spectra with those of template spectra. Berkeley 77 was found to be an old cluster of 3–4 Gyr, while the remaining three clusters are between 400 and 1000 Myr old. The derived foreground reddening values range from E (B – V) = 0.0 in NGC2587 and ESO324‐SC15 to approximately 0.30 in Berkeley 77. (© 2008 WILEY‐VCH Verlag GmbH & Co. KGaA, Weinheim)