INSTANTANEOUS STARBURST OF THE MASSIVE CLUSTERS WESTERLUND 1 AND NGC 3603 YC

Journal Article · Thu May 10 00:00:00 EDT 2012 · Astrophysical Journal Letters

DOI:https://doi.org/10.1088/2041-8205/750/2/L44· OSTI ID:22047830

Kudryavtseva, Natalia; Brandner, Wolfgang; Gennaro, Mario; Rochau, Boyke; Henning, Thomas ^[1]; Stolte, Andrea ^[2]; Andersen, Morten; Da Rio, Nicola ^[3]; Tognelli, Emanuele ^[4]; Hogg, David ^[5]; Clark, Simon ^[6]; Waters, Rens ^[7]

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1. Max-Planck-Institut fuer Astronomie, Koenigstuhl 17, 69117 Heidelberg (Germany)
2. Argelander Institut fuer Astronomie, Auf dem Huegel 71, 53121 Bonn (Germany)
3. European Space Agency, Space Science Department, Keplerlaan 1, 2200 AG Noordwijk (Netherlands)
4. Department of Physics, University of Pisa, Largo Bruno Pontecorvo 3, 56127 Pisa (Italy)
5. Center for Cosmology and Particle Physics, Department of Physics, New York University, 4 Washington Place, Room 424, New York, NY 10003 (United States)
6. Department of Physics and Astronomy, The Open University, Milton Keynes MK7 6AA (United Kingdom)
7. Sterrenkundig Instituut Anton Pannekoek, University of Amsterdam, Science Park 904, 1098 Amsterdam (Netherlands)

We present a new method to determine the age spread of resolved stellar populations in a starburst cluster. The method relies on a two-step process. In the first step, kinematic members of the cluster are identified based on multi-epoch astrometric monitoring. In the second step, a Bayesian analysis is carried out, comparing the observed photometric sequence of cluster members with sets of theoretical isochrones. When applying this methodology to optical and near-infrared high angular resolution Hubble Space Telescope (HST) and adaptive optics observations of the {approx}5 Myr old starburst cluster Westerlund 1 and {approx}2 Myr old starburst cluster NGC 3603 YC, we derive upper limits for the age spreads of 0.4 and 0.1 Myr, respectively. The results strongly suggest that star formation in these starburst clusters happened almost instantaneously.

• OSTI ID: 22047830
• Journal Information: Astrophysical Journal Letters, Vol. 750, Issue 2; Other Information: Country of input: International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA); ISSN 2041-8205
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English

Related Subjects

79 ASTROPHYSICS
COSMOLOGY AND ASTRONOMY
ASTRONOMY
ASTROPHYSICS
DIAGRAMS
MONITORING
NEAR INFRARED RADIATION
OPTICS
PHOTOMETRY
RESOLUTION
SPACE
STAR CLUSTERS
STAR EVOLUTION
STARS
TELESCOPES
VISIBLE RADIATION