Two distinct sequences of blue straggler stars in the globular cluster M 30

F. R. Ferraro (), G. Beccari, E. Dalessandro, B. Lanzoni, A. Sills, R. T. Rood, F. Fusi Pecci, A. I. Karakas, P. Miocchi and S. Bovinelli
Additional contact information
F. R. Ferraro: University of Bologna, Via Ranzani 1, 40127 Bologna, Italy
G. Beccari: ESA, Keplerlaan 1, 2200 AG Noordwijk, Netherlands
E. Dalessandro: University of Bologna, Via Ranzani 1, 40127 Bologna, Italy
B. Lanzoni: University of Bologna, Via Ranzani 1, 40127 Bologna, Italy
A. Sills: McMaster University, 1280 Main Street West, Hamilton, Ontario L8S 4M1, Canada
R. T. Rood: University of Virginia, PO Box 400325, Charlottesville, Virginia 22904, USA
F. Fusi Pecci: INAF, Osservatorio Astronomico di Bologna, Via Ranzani 1, 40127 Bologna, Italy
A. I. Karakas: Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Mt Stromlo Observatory, Weston Creek, Australian Capital Territory 2611, Australia
P. Miocchi: University of Bologna, Via Ranzani 1, 40127 Bologna, Italy
S. Bovinelli: University of Bologna, Via Ranzani 1, 40127 Bologna, Italy

Nature, 2009, vol. 462, issue 7276, 1028-1031

Abstract: Two shades of blue straggler 'Blue stragglers' are massive stars in clusters — where all the stars are pretty much the same age — that at their luminosity, should have evolved to become giants and white dwarfs. They are thought to be normal main-sequence stars that have gained mass through either transfer between binary companions or direct collision and merger between two stars. A study of the highly crowded star cluster M 30 suggests that both of these mechanisms are at work during the dramatic phase of the cluster core collapse. Two distinct parallel sequences of blue stragglers are present in M 30, a 'bluer' population arising from direct stellar collisions and a 'redder' one from the evolution of close binaries. Observations of the 21 blue stragglers in the old open cluster NGC 188 show that 16 (76%) are currently in binary systems, a frequency three times that found among normal solar-type main-sequence stars. Most of the NGC 188 blue stragglers are rotating faster than normal main-sequence stars of the same surface temperatures. In News & Views, Melvyn Davies reflects on what these two studies say about the origin of blue stragglers.

Date: 2009
References: Add references at CitEc
Citations: View citations in EconPapers (1)

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.nature.com/articles/nature08607 Abstract (text/html)
Access to the full text of the articles in this series is restricted.

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:nat:nature:v:462:y:2009:i:7276:d:10.1038_nature08607

Ordering information: This journal article can be ordered from
https://www.nature.com/

DOI: 10.1038/nature08607

Access Statistics for this article

Nature is currently edited by Magdalena Skipper

More articles in Nature from Nature
Bibliographic data for series maintained by Sonal Shukla () and Springer Nature Abstracting and Indexing ().