Globular Clusters are among the oldest objects in the Galaxy, thus their researchers are key to understanding the processes of evolution and formation that the galaxy has experienced in early stages. Spectroscopic studies allow us to carry out detailed analyzes on the chemical composition of Globular Clusters. The aim of our research is to perform a detailed analysis of chemical abundances to a sample of stars of the Bulge Globular Cluster NGC 6553, in order to determine chemical patterns that allow us to appreciate the phenomenon of Multiple Population in one of the most metal-rich Globular Clusters in the Galaxy. This analysis is being carried out with data obtained by FLAMES/GIRAFFE spectrograph, VVV Survey and DR2 of Gaia Mission. We analyzed 20 Red Horizontal Branch Stars, being the first extensive spectroscopic abundance analysis for this cluster and measured 8 chemical elements (O, Na, Mg, Si, Ca, Ti, Cr and Ni), deriving a mean iron content of $[Fe/H] = -0.10\pm0.01$ and a mean of $[α/Fe] = 0.21\pm0.02$, considering Mg, Si, Ca and Ti (errors on the mean). We found a significant spread in the content of Na but a small or negligible in O. We did not find an intrinsic variation in the content of $α$ and iron-peak elements, showing a good agreement with the trend of the Bulge field stars, suggesting a similar origin and evolution.
We present near-IR Colour-Magnitude diagrams and physical parameters for a sample of 12 galactic globular clusters located toward the inner Bulge region. For each cluster we provide measurements of the reddening, distance, photometric metallicity, luminosity of the horizontal branch red clump, and of the red giant branch bump and tip. The sample discussed here together with that presented in Valenti, Ferraro & Origlia (2007) represent the largest homogeneous catalog of Bulge globular clusters (comprising ~ 80% of the entire Bulge cluster population) ever studied. The compilation is available i…
A view of the Galactic bulge by means of their globular clusters is necessary for a deep understanding of its formation and evolution. Connections between the globular cluster and field star properties in terms of kinematics, orbits, chemical abundances and ages should shed light on different stellar population components. Based on spatial distribution and metallicity, we define a probable best list of bulge clusters, containing 43 entries. Future work on newly discovered objects, mostly from the VVV survey, is suggested. These candidates might alleviate the issue of missing clusters on the fa…
It has been suggested that the oldest stellar populations in the Milky Way Galaxy are tightly bound and confined to the central regions of the Galaxy. This is one of the reasons why a handful of globular clusters located in the bulge region are thought to be remnants of the primeval formation stages of the Milky Way. The globular cluster, ESO 456-SC38 (Djorgovski~2) is one such cluster; it has a blue horizontal branch, is projected very close to the center of the Galaxy, and has an orbit confining it to the bulge/bar region. The first alpha abundances of seven stars in this heavily reddened cl…
The information on Galactic assembly time is imprinted on the chemodynamics of globular clusters. This makes them important probes that help us to understand the formation and evolution of the Milky Way. Discerning between in-situ and ex-situ origin of these objects is difficult when we study the Galactic bulge, which is the most complex and mixed component of the Milky Way. To investigate the early evolution of the Galactic bulge, we analysed the globular cluster NGC 6355. We derived chemical abundances and kinematic and dynamic properties by gathering information from high-resolution spectro…
Aims. We present a new technique to estimate the relative ages of multiple stellar populations hosted by five globular clusters: NGC 104 (47 Tuc), NGC 6121 (M4), NGC 6352, NGC 6362 and NGC 6723. Methods. We used the catalogs of the database "HST UV Globular cluster Survey (HUGS)" to create color-magnitude and two-color diagrams of the Globular Clusters. We identified the multiple populations within each globular cluster, and we divided them into two main stellar populations: POPa or first generation (1G) and POPb, composed of all the successive generations of stars. The new technique allows us…
We present DECam imaging for the peculiar Galactic globular clusters NGC1851, NGC1904 (M79), NGC2298 and NGC2808. Our deep photometry reveals that all the clusters have an important contribution of stars beyond their King tidal radii and present tails with different morphologies. We have also explored the surroundings of the clusters where the presence of the Canis Major overdensity and/or the low Galactic latitude Monoceros ring at d~8kpc is evident. A second stellar system is found at d~17kpc and spans at least 18deg x 15deg in the sky. As one of the possible scenarios to explain that featur…
We derived Potassium abundances in red giant branch stars in the Galactic globular clusters NGC104 (144 stars), NGC6752 (134 stars) and NGC6809 (151 stars) using high-resolution spectra collected with FLAMES at the ESO - Very Large Telescope. In the considered samples we do not find significant intrinsic spreads in [K/Fe] (confirming the previous findings by Carretta et al.), at variance with the cases of the massive clusters NGC2419 and NGC2808. Additionally, marginally significant [K/Fe]-[O/Fe] anti-correlations are found in NGC104 and NGC6809, and [K/Fe]-[Na/Fe] correlations are found in NG…
We explore the possibility of searching for extratidal features around the Galactic globular cluster NGC362 using the Gaia DR2 together with a modified version of a classical statistical decontamination algorithm. Our results suggest that an important stellar component is associated with this globular cluster, which is perfectly distinguishable from the populations in the Small Magellanic Cloud and that of the nearby NGC104 (47 Tucanae). We thus confirm once again the power of Gaia to disentangle different stellar components along the same line-of-sight.
The low-latitude globular clusters Terzan 10 and Djorgovski 1 are vprojected in the Galactic bulge, in a Galactic region highly affected by extinction. A discrepancy of a factor of ~2 exists in the literature in regards to the distance determination of these clusters. We revisit the colour-magnitude diagrams (CMDs) of these two globular clusters with the purpose of disentangling their distance determination ambiguity and, for the first time, of determining their orbits to identify whether or not they are part of the bulge/bar region. We use Hubble Space Telescope CMDs, with the filters F606W f…
Recently, Kundu et al (2019) reported that the globular cluster NGC 5024 (M53) possesses five extra-tidal RR Lyrae. In fact, four of them were instead known members of a nearby globular cluster NGC 5053. The status of the remaining extra-tidal RR Lyrae is controversial depending on the adopted tidal radius of NGC 5024. We have also searched for additional extra-tidal RR Lyrae within an area of $\sim8$~deg$^2$ covering both globular clusters. This includes other known RR Lyrae within the search area, as well as stars that fall within the expected range of magnitudes and colors for RR Lyrae (and…
Globular clusters associated with the Galactic bulge are important tracers of stellar populations in the inner Galaxy. High resolution analysis of stars in these clusters allows us to characterize them in terms of kinematics, metallicity, and individual abundances, and to compare these fingerprints with those characterizing field populations. We present iron and element ratios for seven red giant stars in the globular cluster NGC~6723, based on high resolution spectroscopy. High resolution spectra ($R\sim48~000$) of seven K giants belonging to NGC 6723 were obtained with the FEROS spectrograph…
NGC 2419 is a massive outer halo Galactic globular cluster whose stars have previously been shown to have somewhat peculiar abundance patterns. We have observed seven luminous giants that are members of NGC 2419 with Keck/HIRES at reasonable SNR. One of these giants is very peculiar, with an extremely low [Mg/Fe] and high [K/Fe] but normal abundances of most other elements. The abundance pattern does not match the nucleosynthetic yields of any supernova model. The other six stars show abundance ratios typical of inner halo Galactic globular clusters, represented here by a sample of giants in t…
The Galactic globular clusters (GGCs) located towards the Galactic bulge have generally been excluded from large-scale photometric GGC surveys due to severe total and differential extinction. Here, we present an overview of a Hubble Space Telescope program designed to obtain deep, high spatial resolution multiband imaging of 16 poorly studied GGCs located towards the inner Galactic bulge and disk. In this first paper of a series resulting from these observations, we give an overview of target cluster selection, observations and data reduction procedures for optimizing the resulting photometric…
Recent studies show that the inner Galactic regions host genuine bulge globular clusters, but also halo intruders, complex remnants of primordial building blocks, and objects likely accreted during major merging events. In this study we focus on the properties of M 28, a very old and massive cluster currently located in the Galactic bulge. We analysed wide-field infrared photometry collected by the VVV survey, VVV proper motions, and intermediate-resolution spectra in the calcium triplet range for 113 targets in the cluster area. Our results in general confirm previous estimates of the cluster…
In the present work we analyzed seven globular clusters selected from their location in the Galactic bulge and with metallicity values in the range $-1.30\lesssim\rm{[Fe/H]}\lesssim-0.50$. The aim of this work is first to derive cluster ages assuming single stellar populations, and secondly, to identify the stars from first (1G) and second generations (2G) from the main sequence, subgiant and red giant branches, and to derive their age differences. Based on a combination of UV and optical filters used in this project, we apply the Gaussian mixture models to distinguish the multiple stellar pop…
In this paper we present photometric CCD observations of the globular cluster NGC 6093 (M80) in filters B, V , R and I. We produce the colour-magnitude diagrams for this object and obtain values for its metallicity [Fe/H], reddening E(V-B), E(V-I) and distance modulus (m - M)_0.
Globular clusters are tracers of the history of star formation and chemical enrichment in the early Galaxy. Their abundance pattern can help understanding their chemical enrichment processes. In particular, the iron-peak elements have been relatively little studied so far in the Galactic bulge. The abundances of iron-peak elements are derived for the sample clusters, and compared with bulge field, and thick disk stars. We derive abundances of the iron-peak elements Sc, V, Mn, Cu, and Zn in individual stars of five bulge globular clusters (NGC 6528, NGC 6553, NGC 6522, NGC 6558, HP1), and of th…
We present metallicities for red giant stars in the globular cluster NGC 6273 based on intermediate resolution GMOS-S spectra of the calcium triplet region. For the 42 radial velocity members with reliable calcium triplet line strength measurements, we obtain metallicities, [Fe/H], using calibrations established from standard globular clusters. We confirm the presence of an intrinsic abundance dispersion identified by Johnson et al. (2015). The total range in [Fe/H] is ~1.0 dex and after taking into account the measurement errors, the intrinsic abundance dispersion is σ[Fe/H] = 0.17 dex. Among…
The object ESO456-SC38 (Djorgovski 2) is one of the globular clusters that is closest to the Galactic center. It is on the blue horizontal branch and has a moderate metallicity of [Fe/H]~-1.0. It is thus similar to the very old inner bulge globular clusters NGC 6522, NGC 6558, and HP 1, and therefore appears to be part of the primeval formation stages of the Milky Way. The aim of this work is to determine an accurate distance and metallicity for ESO456-SC38, as well as orbital parameters, in order to check similarities with other clusters in the inner bulge that have previously been well studi…
We present radial velocities and chemical abundances for red giant branch stars in the Galactic bulge globular clusters NGC 6342 and NGC 6366. The velocities and abundances are based on measurements of high resolution (R > 20,000) spectra obtained with the MMT-Hectochelle and WIYN-Hydra spectrographs. We find that NGC 6342 has a heliocentric radial velocity of +112.5 km/s (sigma = 8.6 km/s), NGC 6366 has a heliocentric radial velocity of -122.3 km/s (sigma = 1.5 km/s), and that both clusters have nearly identical metallicities ([Fe/H] ~ -0.55). NGC 6366 shows evidence of a moderately extended …
We computed proper motions of a selected sample of globular clusters projected on the central bulge, employing CCD images gathered along the last 25 years at the ESO-NTT, ESO-Danish and HST telescopes. We presented a method to derive their proper motions, and a set of coordinate transformations to obtain 3D Galactic velocity vectors of the clusters. We analysed 10 globular clusters, namely Terzan 1, Terzan 2, Terzan 4, Terzan 9, NGC 6522, NGC 6558, NGC 6540, AL~3,ESO456--SC38 and Palomar 6. For comparison purposes we also studied the outer bulge cluster NGC 6652. We discuss the general propert…
We present new and accurate optical photometry of the Bulge globular cluster NGC 6528. The images were collected with ACS at HST and together with WFC3 (UVIS, IR) allowed us to measure the proper motion to separate cluster and field stars. We adopted two empirical calibrators and we found that NGC 6528 is coeval with and more metal-rich than 47 Tuc. Moreover, it appears older and more metal-poor than the super-metal-rich old open cluster NGC 6791. We also performed a preliminary analysis of field stellar populations located around NGC 6528 and NGC 6522 by using ground-based near-infrared photo…
The Bulge Globular Clusters (GCs) are key tracers of this central ancient component of our Galaxy. It is essential to understand their formation and evolution to study that of the bulge, as well as their relationship with the other Galactic GC systems (halo and disk GCs). Our main goals are to obtain detailed abundances for a sample of seven red giant members of NGC 6528 in order to characterize its chemical composition and study the relationship of this GC with the bulge, and with other bulge, halo and disk GCs. Moreover, we analyze this cluster$'$s behavior associated with the Multiple Popul…
We present results of time series photometry to search for variable stars in the field of metal-poor globular cluster NGC 4590 (M68). Periods have been revised for 40 known variables and no significant changes were found. A considerable change in Blazhko effect for V25 has been detected. Among nine newly discovered variable candidates, 5 stars are of RRc Bailey type variables while 4 stars are unclassified. The variable stars V10, V21, V50 and V51 are found to be cluster members based on the radial velocity data taken from literature.
We present a study of variable stars in globular cluster NGC 6401. The cluster is only $5.3\degr$ away from the Galactic centre and suffers from strong differential reddening. The photometric precision afforded us by difference image analysis resulted in improved sensitivity to variability in formerly inaccessible interior regions of the cluster. We find 23 RRab and 11 RRc stars within one cluster radius (2.4$\arcmin$), for which we provide coordinates, finder-charts and time-series photometry. Through Fourier decomposition of the RR Lyrae star light curves we derive a mean metallicity of [Fe/…
Using parallaxes from Gaia DR2, we estimate the distance to the globular clusters 47 Tuc and NGC 362, taking advantage of the background stars in the Small Magellanic Cloud and quasars to account for various parallax systematics. We found the parallax to be dependent on the Gaia DR2 G apparent magnitude for stars with $13<\textrm{G}<18$ , where brighter stars have a lower parallax zero point than fainter stars. The distance to 47 Tuc was found to be $4.45\pm0.01\pm0.12$ kpc, and for NGC 362 $8.54\pm0.20\pm0.44$ kpc with random and systematic errors listed respectively. This is the first time a…
Galactic orbits have been constructed over long time intervals for ten globular clusters located near the Galactic center. A model with an axially symmetric gravitational potential for the Galaxy was initially applied, after which a non-axially symmetric potential corresponding to the central bar was added. Variations in the trajectories of all these globular clusters in the XY plane due to the influence of the bar were detected. These were greatest for the cluster Terzan 4 in the meridional (RZ) plane. The globular clusters Terzan 1, Terzan 2, Terzan 4, Terzan 9, NGC 6522, and NGC 6558 always…
The globular cluster HP1 is projected on the bulge, very close to the Galactic center. The Multi-Conjugate Adaptive Optics (MCAO) Demonstrator (MAD) at the Very Large Telescope (VLT) allowed to acquire high resolution deep images that, combined with first epoch New Technology Telescope (NTT) data, enabled to derive accurate proper motions. The cluster and bulge field stellar contents were disentangled by means of this process, and produced unprecedented definition in the color-magnitude diagrams for this cluster. The metallicity of [Fe/H] ~ -1.0 from previous spectroscopic analysis is confirme…
We present detailed morphological, photometric, and stellar-kinematic analyses of the central regions of two massive, early-type barred galaxies with nearly identical large-scale morphologies. Both have large, strong bars with prominent inner photometric excesses that we associate with boxy/peanut-shaped (B/P) bulges; the latter constitute ~ 30% of the galaxy light. Inside its B/P bulge, NGC 4608 has a compact, almost circular structure (half-light radius R_e approx. 310 pc, Sérsic n = 2.2) we identify as a classical bulge, amounting to 12.1% of the total light, along with a nuclear star clust…
We used the new ESO VLT instrument MUSE to obtain spectral and imaging coverage of NGC 4710. The wide area and excellent sampling of the MUSE integral field spectrograph allows us to investigate the dynamical properties of the X-shaped bulge of NGC 4710 and compare it with the properties of the Milky Way's own X-shaped bulge. We measured the radial velocities, velocity dispersion, and stellar populations using a penalized pixel full spectral fitting technique adopting simple stellar populations models, on a 1' x 1' area centred on the bulge of NGC 4710. We have constructed the velocity maps of…
In this work a search was carried out for globular clusters belonging to the Sagittarius (Sgr) tidal stream using the analysis of spatial positions, radial velocities relative to the Galactic Standard of Rest (V_{GSR}),proper motions and ratio of "age -- metallicity" ([Fe/H]) for globular clusters and for stars in the tidal stream. As a result, three categories of globular clusters were obtained: A -- most certainly in the stream: Terzan 8, Whiting 1, Arp 2, NGC 6715, Terzan 7, Pal 12; B -- kinematic outliers: Pal 5, NGC 5904, NGC 5024, NGC 5053, NGC 5272, NGC 288; C -- lowest rank candidates:…
We investigate the spatial density configuration of stars around four metal-poor globular clusters (NGC 6266, NGC 6626, NGC 6642 and NGC 6723) in the Galactic bulge region using wide-field deep J, H, and K imaging data obtained with the WFCAM near-infrared array on United Kingdom Infrared Telescope. Statistical weighted filtering algorithm for the stars on the color-magnitude diagram is applied in order to sort cluster member candidates from the field star contamination. In two-dimensional isodensity contour maps of the clusters, we find that all of the four globular clusters exhibit strong ev…
We present an abundance analysis of eight potential member stars of the old Galactic bulge globular cluster NGC6522. The same stars have previously been studied by Chiappini et al. (2011), who found very high abundances of the slow neutron capture elements compared with other clusters and field stars of similar metallicity, which they interpreted as reflecting nucleosynthesis in rapidly rotating, massive Population III stars. In contrast to their analysis, we do not find any unusual enhancements of the neutron capture elements Sr, Y, Ba and Eu and conclude that previous claims result mainly fr…
This work reports the discovery of three new globular clusters (GCs) towards the Galactic bulge - Camargo 1107, 1108, and 1109. The discovery was made using the WISE, 2MASS, VVV, and Gaia-DR2 photometry. The new findings are old (12.0-13.5 Gyr) and metal-poor GCs ([Fe/H] < -1.5 dex) located in the bulge area close to the Milky Way (MW) mid-plane. Although the old ages and low metallicities suggest that the newly discovered GCs are likely associated with the inner halo the possibility of these clusters being part of a primordial bulge GC subpopulation cannot be ruled out. Camargo 1107, for inst…
The RR Lyrae (RRL) rich globular cluster M 62 (NGC 6266) is one of the most massive globular clusters in the Milky Way, located in the dense region of the Galactic bulge, where dynamical processes that affect the survival of globular clusters are maximised. Using Gaia DR2 data we have found clear evidence for an excess of RRLs beyond the cluster tidal radius of M 62, associated partly with stars stripped into the Galaxy field. This is confirmed with new VVVX survey observations, that discard any differential reddening effect as the possible cause of the observed RRL density excess. We also det…
Passing through the Galactic disk, a massive object such as a globular cluster, can trigger star formation process leading to the birth of open clusters. Here, we analyze such possible evolutionary relationship between globular and open clusters. To search for the closest rapprochement between objects we computed backwards the orbits of 150 Galactic globular and 232 open clusters (younger than 100 Myr) with proper motions, derived from the Gaia DR2 Catalog. The orbits were computed using the recently modified three-component (disk, bulge and halo) axisymmetric Navarro-Frenk-White potential, wh…
Based on a large sample of 133 Galactic globular clusters we obtained a new estimate of the frequency of globular-cluster impacts onto the Galactic plane, which we found to be equal to three events per 1 Myr. Our computations involving new kinematical data do not support the well-known hypothesis about the possible origin of the open cluster Stephenson~2 as a result of the massive globular cluster $ω$ Cen crossing the Galactic disk. Our results also do not support the well-known hypothesis that the globular cluster NGC6397 could trigger the formation of the open cluster NGC6231. We found for t…
Recent investigations of the double red clump in the color-magnitude diagram of the Milky Way bulge cast serious doubts on the structure and formation origin of the outer bulge. Unlike previous interpretation based on an X-shaped bulge, stellar evolution models and CN-band observations have suggested that this feature is another manifestation of the multiple stellar population phenomenon observed in globular clusters (GCs). This new scenario requires a significant fraction of the outer bulge stars with chemical patterns uniquely observed in GCs. Here we show from homogeneous high-quality spect…
We study the kinematics and the stellar populations of the bulge and disc of the spiral galaxy NGC 3521. At each position in the field of view, we separate the contributions of the bulge and the disc from the total observed spectrum and study their kinematics, age, and metallicities independently. Their properties are clearly distinct: the bulge rotates more slowly, has a higher velocity dispersion, and is less luminous than the disc. We identify three main populations of stars in NGC 3521: old ($\geq7$ Gyr), intermediate ($\approx$ 3 Gyr), and young ($\leq$1 Gyr). The mass and light of NGC 35…
We propose that the rotational kinematics of the globular cluster system (GCS) in M31 can result from a past major merger event that could have formed its bulge component. We numerically investigate kinematical properties of globular clusters (GCs) in remnants of galaxy mergers between two disks with GCs in both their disk and halo components. We find that the GCS formed during major merging can show strongly rotational kinematics with the maximum rotational velocities of 140 - 170 km/s for a certain range of orbital parameters of merging. We also find that a rotating stellar bar, which can be…
We present orbit analysis for a sample of 8 inner bulge globular clusters, together with one reference halo object. We used proper motion values derived from long time base CCD data. Orbits are integrated in both an axisymmetric model and a model including the Galactic bar potential. The inclusion of the bar proved to be essential for the description of the dynamical behavior of the clusters. We use the Monte Carlo scheme to construct the initial conditions for each cluster, taking into account the uncertainties in the kinematical data and distances. The sample clusters show typically maximum …
We propose an evolutionary model to describe the dynamical evolution of star cluster systems in tidal fields, in which we calibrated the parametric equations defining the model by running direct N-body simulations of star clusters with a wide range of initial masses and set of orbital parameters, living within the external tidal field generated by a disc-like galaxy. We derived a new method to solve numerically the evolutionary equations, allowing us to infer constraints on the mass of a star cluster from its age, present-day mass, orbital parameters and external gravitational potential. The r…
We review our recent studies of the globular cluster system of NGC 5128. First, we have obtained low-resolution, high signal-to-noise spectroscopy of 72 globular clusters using Gemini-S/GMOS to obtain the ages, metallicities, and the level of alpha enrichment of the metal-poor and metal-rich globular cluster subpopulations. Second, we have explored the rotational signature and velocity dispersion of the galaxy's halo using over 560 globular clusters with radial velocity measurements. We have also compared the dependence of these properties on galactocentric distance and globular cluster age an…
We calculate orbits, tidal radii, and bulge-bar and disk shocking destruction rates for 63 globular clusters in our Galaxy. Orbits are integrated in both an axisymmetric and a non-axisymmetric Galactic potential that includes a bar and a 3D model for the spiral arms. With the use of a Monte Carlo scheme, we consider in our simulations observational uncertainties in the kinematical data of the clusters. In the analysis of destruction rates due to the bulge-bar, we consider the rigorous treatment of using the real Galactic cluster orbit, instead of the usual linear trajectory employed in previou…
We present dynamical models of the star-forming galaxy NGC 5474 based on $N$-body hydrodynamical numerical simulations. We investigate the possible origin of the compact round stellar structure, generally interpreted as the bulge of the galaxy, but unusually off-set by $\simeq1$ kpc in projection from the visual and the kinematic centres of both the star and the gas discs. We argue that it is very unlikely that the putative bulge is in a co-planar orbit in the disc plane, showing that such a configuration would be hardly compatible with its smooth and regular spatial distribution, and, in case…
As tracers of star formation, galaxy assembly and mass distribution, globular clusters have provided important clues to our understanding of early-type galaxies. But their study has been mostly constrained to galaxy groups and clusters where early-type galaxies dominate, leaving the properties of the globular cluster systems (GCSs) of isolated ellipticals as a mostly uncharted territory. We present Gemini-South/GMOS $g'i'$ observations of five isolated elliptical galaxies: NGC 3962, NGC 2865, IC 4889, NGC 2271 and NGC 4240. Photometry of their GCSs reveals clear color bimodality in three of th…
We study the stellar populations and assembly of the nearby spiral galaxy NGC 2903's bulge, bar, and outer disc using the VIRUS-P Exploration of Nearby Galaxies IFS survey. We observe NGC 2903 with a spatial resolution of 185 pc using the Mitchell Spectrograph's 4.25 arcsec fibres at the 2.7 Harlan J. Smith telescope. Bulge-bar-disc decomposition on the 2MASS Ks-band image of NGC 2903 shows that it has ~6%, 6%, and 88%, of its stellar mass in the bulge, bar, and outer disc, respectively, and its bulge has a low Sersic index of ~0.27, suggestive of a disky bulge. We perform stellar population s…
We present preliminary results of the variability survey in the field of the glo bular cluster NGC 4833. We observed all 34 variable stars known in the cluster. In add ition, we have found two new SX Phoenicis stars, one new RR Lyrae star, twelve new ecli psing systems mostly of the W Ursae Majoris type, nine new variable red giants, and ten new field-stars showing irregular variations. Properties of RR Lyrae stars indicate that NGC 4833 is an Oosterhoff's type II globular cluster.
We present NGC 4565 and NGC 5746 as structural analogs of our Milky Way. All three are giant, SBb - SBbc galaxies with two pseudobulges, i. e., a compact, disky, star-forming pseudobulge embedded in a vertically thick, "red and dead", boxy pseudobulge that really is a bar seen almost end-on. The stars in the boxy bulge of our Milky Way are old and enhanced in alpha elements, indicating that star formation finished within ~ 1 Gyr of when it started. Here, we present Hobby-Eberly Telescope spectroscopy of the boxy pseudobulges of NGC 4565 and NGC 5746 and show that they also are made of old and …
The two red clumps (RCs) observed in the color-magnitude diagram of the Milky Way bulge is widely accepted as evidence for an X-shaped structure originated from the bar instability. A drastically different interpretation has been suggested, however, based on the He-enhanced multiple stellar population phenomenon as is observed in globular clusters (GCs). Because these two scenarios imply very different pictures on the formation of the bulge and elliptical galaxies, understanding the origin of the double RC is of crucial importance. Here we report our discovery that the stars in the two RCs sho…
Even after decades of research, the origin of multiple stellar populations in globular clusters remains enigmatic. The question as to whether the galaxy environment plays a role in their formation remains unanswered. To that extent, we analysed two classical (> 10 Gyr old) Large Magellanic Cloud globular clusters namely, NGC 1786 and NGC 1898, using imaging data from Hubble Space Telescope to compare and contrast them with ancient Galactic globular clusters to assess systematic differences that might exist between their abundance variations. We calculated their Red Giant Branch width, subtract…
NGC 6522 has been the first metal-poor globular cluster identified in the bulge by W. Baade. Despite its importance, very few high resolution abundance analyses of stars in this cluster are available in the literature. The bulge metal-poor clusters may be important tracers of the early chemical enrichment of the Galaxy. The main purpose of this study is the determination of metallicity and elemental ratios in individual stars of NGC 6522. High resolution spectra of 8 giants of the bulge globular cluster NGC 6522 were obtained at the 8m VLT UT2-Kueyen telescope with the FLAMES+GIRAFFE spectrogr…
N-body simulations show that "box-shaped bulges" of edge-on galaxies are not bulges at all: they are bars seen side-on. The two components that we readily see in edge-on Sb galaxies like NGC 4565 are a disk and a bar, but face-on SBb galaxies always show a disk, a bar, and a (pseudo)bulge. Where is the (pseudo)bulge in NGC 4565? We use archival Hubble Space Telescope K-band and Spitzer Space Telescope 3.6 um images to penetrate the dust in NGC 4565. We find a high surface brightness, central stellar component, distinct from the boxy bar and from the galaxy's disk. Its minor-axis profile has a …
