15020605
The type Ia supernova 1997br in ESO 576-G40
The peculiar type Ia supernova SN 1997br in ESO 576-G40 was extensively observed at Beijing Astronomical Observatory and Lick Observatory. In this paper, we present and discuss the BVRI photometry and the spectra collected over 3 months, beginning 9 days before maximum brightness. The light curves of SN 1997br are similar to those of SN 1991T, with slow decline rates after the B maximum. Well-sampled data before the B maximum show unambiguously that SN 1997br rises more slowly and has a wider peak than normal type Ia supernovae. The optical color evolution of SN 1997br is also similar to that of SN 1991T. We estimate the extinction of SN 1997br to be E(B-V) = 0.35 ± 0.10 mag by comparing its BVRI light curves with those of SN 1991T and by measuring the equivalent width of interstellar Na I D absorption lines. We have conducted a thorough comparison of the spectroscopic evolution of SN 1997br, SN 1991T, and SN 1994D. Although SN 1997br is generally very similar to SN 1991T, it shows some interesting differences at various epochs. Spectra of SN 1997br seem to indicate an earlier transition to the dominant phase of Fe-peak elements after the B maximum. Si II lines in SN 1997br show a very short duration after the B maximum. We discuss the implications of our observations of SN 1997br for models of type Ia supernovae. Specifically, we suggest that some SNe Ia may result from decelerated detonations of white dwarfs.
118411365
The photometric system of the Tsinghua-NAOC 80-cm telescope at NAOC Xinglong Observatory
The Tsinghua-NAOC (National Astronomical Observatories of China) Telescope (hereafter, TNT) is an 80-cm Cassegrain reflecting telescope located at the Xinglong Observatory of NAOC, with the main scientific goals of monitoring various transients in the universe such as supernovae, gamma-ray bursts, novae, variable stars, and active galactic nuclei. We present a systematic test and analysis of the photometric performance of this telescope. Based on the calibration observations taken on 12 photometric nights, spanning the period from 2004 to 2012, we derived an accurate transformation equation between the instrumental ubvri magnitudes and standard Johnson UBV and Cousins RI magnitudes. In particular, the color terms and the extinction coefficients of different passbands are well determined. With these data, we also obtained the limiting magnitudes and the photometric precision of TNT. It is worthwhile to point out that the sky background at the Xinglong Observatory became gradually worse over the period from 2005 to 2012 (e.g., ~21.4 mag vs. ~20.1 mag in the V band).
2927391
A large sample of low surface brightness disc galaxies from the SDSS – I. The sample and the stellar populations
We present the properties of a large sample (12 282) of nearly face-on low surface brightness (LSB) disc galaxies selected from the main galaxy sample of SDSS-DR4. These properties include B-band central surface brightness μ 0 (B), scalelengths h, integrated magnitudes, colours and distances D. This sample has μ 0 (B) values from 22 to 24.5 mag arcsec -2 with a median value of 22.42 mag arcsec -2 , and disc scalelengths ranging from 2 to 19 kpc. They are quite bright with M B taking values from -18 to -23 mag with a median value of -20.08 mag. There exist clear correlations between log h and M B , log h and log D, log D and M B . However, no obvious correlations are found between μ 0 (B) and log h, colours, etc. The correlation between colours and log h is weak even though it exists. Both the optical-optical and optical-NIR colour-colour diagrams indicate that most of them have a mixture of young and old stellar populations. They also satisfy colour-magnitude relations, which indicate that brighter galaxies tend generally to be redder. The comparison between the LSBGs and a control sample of nearly face-on disc galaxies with higher surface brightness (HSB) with μ 0 (B) from 18.5 to 22 mag arcsec -2 show that, at a given luminosity or distance, the observed LSB galaxies tend to have larger scalelengths. These trends could be seen gradually by dividing both the LSBGs and HSBGs into two subgroups according to surface brightness. A volume-limited subsample was extracted to check the incompleteness of surface brightness. The only one of the property relations having an obvious change is the relation of log h versus μ 0 (B), which shows a correlation in this subsample.
14830508
SDSS J121811.0+465501.2: A New Low Surface Brightness Galaxy with Low Metallicity
We have serendipitously found a new nearby low surface brightness (LSB) galaxy from the SDSS database. We estimate the oxygen abundance of its H II region SDSS J121811.0+465501.2 from its electron temperature, as well as that of another H II region, SDSS J135440.5+535309.6, located in the irregular LSB galaxy UGC 8837. These two extragalactic H II regions were classified as stars in the SDSS DR4 database and were found occasionally by us in the automatic recognition and classification of stellar spectra. Their optical spectra show obvious emission lines, i.e., strong [O III] λλ4959, 5007 and Balmer emission lines, but very weak [N II] λλ6548, 6583 and [S II] λλ6317, 6731, which could indicate that they are metal-poor star-forming regions. The derived oxygen abundances of the two objects are 12 + log(O/H) ~ 7.88 ± 0.30 and 7.70 ± 0.30, respectively. The host of the H II region SDSS J121811.0+465501.2 is identified as a new nearly edge-on LSB disk galaxy (almost without a bulge), with a B-band central surface brightness μ0(B) of 23.68 mag arcsec-2 and an inclination angle of ~75° by using the GIM2D software to analyze its g- and r-band images independently. It is a nearby dwarf galaxy with redshift z ~ 0.00157, disk scale length ~0.40 kpc, and B-band absolute magnitude MB ~ -13.51 mag. The very low oxygen abundances of these two objects confirm the low metallicities of LSB galaxies.
18487685
Triggered Star Formation in the Orion Bright-rimmed Clouds
We have developed an empirical and effective set of criteria, based on the Two Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS) colors, to select candidate classical T Tauri stars (CTTSs). This provides a useful tool to study the young stellar population in star-forming regions. Here we present our analysis of the bright-rimmed clouds (BRCs) B35, B30, IC 2118, LDN 1616, LDN 1634, and Ori East to show how massive stars interact with molecular clouds to trigger star formation. Our results support the radiation-driven implosion model, in which the ionization fronts from OB stars compress a nearby cloud until the local density exceeds the critical value, thereby inducing the cloud to collapse to form stars. We find that only BRCs associated with strong IRAS 100 μm emission (a tracer of high density) and Hα emission (a tracer of ionization fronts) show signs of ongoing star formation. Relevant timescales, including the ages of O stars, expanding H II regions, and the ages of CTTSs, are consistent with sequential star formation. We also find that CTTSs are only seen between the OB stars and the BRCs, with those closer to the BRCs being progressively younger. There are no CTTSs leading the ionization fronts, i.e., within the molecular clouds. All of these findings provide strong evidence of triggered star formation and show the major roles massive stars play in sustaining the star-forming activities in the region.
119237976
A large sample of low surface brightness disc galaxies from the SDSS – II. Metallicities in surface brightness bins
We study the spectroscopic properties of a large sample of low surface brightness galaxies (LSBGs) [with B-band central surface brightness μ0(B) > 22 mag arcsec −2 ] selected from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 4 (SDSS-DR4) main galaxy sample. A large sample of disc-dominated high surface brightness galaxies [HSBGs, with μ0(B) < 22 mag arcsec −2 ] are also selected for comparison simultaneously. To study them in more details, these sample galaxies are further divided into four subgroups according to μ0(B) (in units of mag arcsec −2 ): very low surface brightness galaxies (vLSBGs) (24.5–22.75), intermediate low surface brightness galaxies (iLSBGs) (22.75–22.0), intermediate high surface brightness galaxies (iHSBGs) (22.0–21.25) and very high surface brightness galaxies (vHSBGs) (<21.25). The diagnostic diagram from spectral emission-line ratios shows that the active galactic nucleus fractions of all the four subgroups are small (<9 per cent). The 21 032 star-forming galaxies with good-quality spectroscopic observations are further selected for studying their dust extinction, strong-line ratios, metallicities and stellar mass–metallicity relations. The vLSBGs have lower extinction values and have less metal-rich and massive galaxies than the other subgroups. The oxygen abundances of our LSBGs are not as low as those of the H II regions in LSBGs studied in literature, which could be because our samples are more luminous, and because of the different metallicity calibrations used. We find a correlation between 12 + log(O/H) and μ0(B) for vLSBGs, iLSBGs and iHSBGs but show that this could be a result of correlation between μ0(B) and stellar mass and the well-known mass–metallicity relation. This large sample shows that LSBGs span a wide range in metallicity and stellar mass, and they lie nearly on the stellar mass versus metallicity and N/O versus O/H relations of normal galaxies. This suggests that LSBGs and HSBGs have not had dramatically different star formation and chemical enrichment histories.
120532642
Configuration dependence of moments of inertia in the odd-A nucleus from BCS theory
The moments of inertia (Mol) of odd-A and even-even rare-earth nuclei are calculated using the Nilsson + BCS method with and without the blocking effect taken into account. The calculated MoIs with blocking considered is smaller than that without blocking considered. The Mor of an odd-A nucleus depends strongly on which orbital is occupied by the odd nucleon. Although the calculated MoI's are systematically smaller than the data, the large fluctuations in the experimental odd-even differences in MoI's can be reproduced qualitatively. This is contrary to the common assertion that the MoI of an odd-A nucleus is some 15% larger than those of its neighboring even-even nuclei with the BCS theory and is helpful to understand the appearance of normally deformed identical bands in an odd-A nucleus and its even-even neighbors under the mean-field (BCS) approximation.
123336656
The importance of pion and extended Brueckner–Hartree–Fock theory
Abstract The pion is important in nuclear physics. The fact that the pion is a pseudoscalar particle makes it very difficult to treat explicitly in the nuclear many-body problem. Matrix elements of the tensor component in the pion exchange interaction vanish in the spin-saturated Hartree–Fock (HF) state. Hence, we are forced to include 2 p − 2 h excitations from the HF state in the model space and use the variational principle to get an extended differential equation for single particle states in the HF state. The structure of this differential equation resembles to that of the Brueckner–Hartree–Fock (BHF) theory and we name the new many-body framework as extended BHF (EBHF) theory. We discuss the similarity and difference between the BHF and EBHF theories. We apply the EBHF theory to nuclear matter and study the equation of state (EOS) and the occupation probability of high momentum states.
32197965
Optical Afterglow Observations of the Unusual Short-Duration Gamma-Ray Burst GRB 040924
The 1 m telescope at Lulin Observatory and the 0.76 m Katzman Automatic Imaging Telescope at Lick Observatory were used to observe the optical afterglow of the short-duration (1.2-1.5 s) gamma-ray burst GRB 040924. This object has a soft high-energy spectrum, thus making it an exceptional case, perhaps actually belonging to the short-duration tail of the long-duration GRBs. Our data, combined with other reported measurements, show that the early R-band light curve can be described by two power laws with index α = -0.7 (at t = 16-50 minutes) and α = -1.06 (at later times). The rather small difference in the spectral indices can be explained more easily by an afterglow model invoking a cooling break than by one with a jet break.
123828193
Effective Λn potential from relativistic Brueckner-Hartree-Fock theory
14520300
Distance Determination of Variable Galactic Sources
We have developed a timing analysis method to determine the distances of variable galactic X-ray sources based on the method advanced by Trumper and Schonfelder in 1973. The light-curve of the halo produced by the scattering of X-rays off the interstellar dust is delayed and smeared by the dust grains. This method utilizes the differences between the power density spectra of the point source and the halo. We present the details of this method and our first applications of this method to the Chandra data of X-ray binary Cyg X-3.