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Register a new userObservational dynamics of low-mass stellar systems
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Matthias J. Frank
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The last fifteen years have seen the discovery of new types of low-mass stellar systems that bridge the gap between the once well-separated regimes of galaxies and of star clusters. Whether such objects are considered galaxies depends also on the definition of the term galaxy, and several possible criteria are based on their internal dynamics (e.g. the common concept that galaxies contain dark matter). Moreover, studying the internal dynamics of low-mass stellar systems may also help understand their origin and evolutionary history. The focus of this paper is on two classes of stellar systems at the interface between star clusters and dwarf galaxies: ultra-compact dwarf galaxies (UCDs) and diffuse Galactic globular clusters (GCs). A review of our current knowledge on the properties of UCDs is provided and dynamical considerations applying to diffuse GCs are introduced. In the following, recent observational results on the internal dynamics of individual UCDs and diffuse Galactic globular clusters are presented.
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One of the fundamental tasks of dynamical astronomy is to infer the distribution of mass in a stellar system from a snapshot of the positions and velocities of its stars. The usual approach to this task (e.g., Schwarzschilds method) involves fitting parametrized forms of the gravitational potential and the phase-space distribution to the data. We review the practical and conceptual difficulties with this approach and describe a novel statistical method for determining the mass distribution that does not require determining the phase-space distribution of the stars. We show that this new estimator out-performs other distribution-free estimators for the harmonic and Kepler potentials.
Stellar fundamental properties (masses, radii, effective temperatures) can be extracted from observations of eclipsing binary systems with remarkable precision, often better than 2%. Such precise measurements afford us the opportunity to confront the validity of basic predictions of stellar evolution theory, such as the mass-radius relationship. A brief historical overview of confrontations between stellar models and data from eclipsing binaries is given, highlighting key results and physical insight that have led directly to our present understanding. The current paradigm that standard stellar evolution theory is insufficient to describe the most basic relation, that of a stars mass to its radius, along the main sequence is then described. Departures of theoretical expectations from empirical data, however, provide a rich opportunity to explore various physical solutions, improving our understanding of important stellar astrophysical processes.
Most globular clusters have half-mass radii of a few pc with no apparent correlation with their masses. This is different from elliptical galaxies, for which the Faber-Jackson relation suggests a strong positive correlation between mass and radius. Objects that are somewhat in between globular clusters and low-mass galaxies, such as ultra-compact dwarf galaxies, have a mass-radius relation consistent with the extension of the relation for bright ellipticals. Here we show that at an age of 10 Gyr a break in the mass-radius relation at ~10^6 Msun is established because objects below this mass, i.e. globular clusters, have undergone expansion driven by stellar evolution and hard binaries. From numerical simulations we find that the combined energy production of these two effects in the core comes into balance with the flux of energy that is conducted across the half-mass radius by relaxation. An important property of this `balanced evolution is that the cluster half-mass radius is independent of its initial value and is a function of the number of bound stars and the age only. It is therefore not possible to infer the initial mass-radius relation of globular clusters and we can only conclude that the present day properties are consistent with the hypothesis that all hot stellar systems formed with the same mass-radius relation and that globular clusters have moved away from this relation because of a Hubble time of stellar and dynamical evolution.
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