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| Paper: |
Luminous Stars in Galaxies Beyond 3 Mpc |
| Volume: |
440, UP2010: Have Observations Revealed a Variable Upper End of the Initial Mass Function? |
| Page: |
161 |
| Authors: |
Whitmore, B. C.; WFC3 Science Oversight Committee |
| Abstract: |
I am mainly interested in the formation and destruction of young
star clusters in nearby star forming galaxies such as the Antennae,
M83, and M51. One of the first analysis steps is to throw out all those
pesky stars that keep contaminating my young cluster samples. Recently,
spurred on by our new Wide Field Camera 3 (WFC3) Early Release Science data of galaxies including
M83, NGC 4214, M82, NGC 2841, and Cen A, we began taking a closer look
at the stellar component. Questions we are addressing are: 1)
what are the most luminous stars, 2) how can we use them to help
study the destruction of star clusters and the population of the
field, 3) what fraction of stars, at least the bright stars, are
formed in the field, in associations, and in compact clusters.
In this contribution we describe some of the beginning steps in this process.
More specifically, we describe how we separate stars from clusters in our
galaxies, and describe how candidate Luminous Blue Variables (LBVs) and “Single
Star” HII (SSHII) regions have been identified. |
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