Star Cluster Disintegration

Project Description

Stars form in groups out of dense molecular cloud cores. With time, these “cosmic families” continue to disintegrate either because member stars interact with each other with some ejected, or by external tidal disruption. With members formed at the same time, occupying the same volume and moving coherently in space, and have the same chemical composition, star clusters serve as excellent testbeds for star formation and evolution theories, and also for N-body dynamics. Some members, however, seem to defy canonical single-star evolution. These include blue stragglers, sub-subdwarfs, extreme horizontal-branch stars, etc. The summer student will join the ongoing effort to diagnose the nature of these stellar oddities.