Table of contents

Collisionless shock heats ions very efficiently. Ion heating is a nonadiabatic process and the downstream temperature is not proportional to the upstream temperature. Ion distributions just behind the shock transition are gyrophase dependent and gradually gyrotropize. With the increase of the Mach number the contribution of reflected ions into ion heating gradually increases. Yet, directly transmitted ions may remain responsible for most of the downstream temperature. Direct transmission allows analytical treatment within the approximation of a narrow shock. We determine the gyrophase-dependent distribution just behind the magnetic jump, the gyrotropic distribution farther behind the shock, and establish the relation with the magnetic compression and the maximum overshoot magnetic field.

The random advection of passive additives in a turbulent fluid plays an important role in solar physics, astrophysics, and atmospheric sciences. We concern ourselves here with the case where the fluctuations are not statistically homogeneous in space, and, hence, where the transport coefficients vary with position. Using a numerical model in which the fluid turbulence is defined kinematically, we show that the evolution of the distribution of passive tracers in the fluid is not always governed by the ordinary diffusion equation. We find it is governed by a more general transport equation whose form depends on the nature of the turbulence, particularly on its compressibility, or divergence. The more general transport equation resembles the ordinary diffusion equation, but the transport coefficient appears in two places and is raised to a power that depends on the divergence of the fluid velocity. If the flow has zero divergence, the case for incompressible turbulence, the resulting transport equation is found to be the regular diffusion equation.

Solar wind protons undergo significant heating during the expansion of the solar wind and turbulence plays an important role in this process. It is believed that the energy is injected from the energy-containing range into the inertial range and then transferred to dissipate into heat eventually. However, the energy injection process in the heliosphere remains unclear. Here we analyze this process. We utilize Helios 2 and Ulysses measurements of the fast solar wind at different radial distances from 0.29 to 4.8 au. We obtain the perpendicular heating rate based on the gradient of the magnetic moment. We estimate for the first time the energy supply rate due to the sweeping of low-frequency break based on the identification of low-frequency break and the corresponding power spectra density profile. We find that the energy supply rate is comparable to the perpendicular heating rate of protons, which support the idea that low-frequency range becomes part of the inertial range as the solar wind turbulence ages. These results help us understand the energy supply process from the energy-containing range and the heating process of solar wind protons.

The measurements from the Venus Express spacecraft are analyzed for the basic properties of fast forward interplanetary shocks at Venus's orbit (∼0.72 au). A total of 143 fast forward interplanetary shock candidates during 2006–2014 are identified. The shock angle Θ_Bn, defined as the angle between the shock normal and the upstream magnetic field, and the magnetic compression ratio r_B, defined as the ratio of the magnetic field strength downstream to that upstream, of these shocks are determined based on the magnetic coplanarity method. The shock occurrence at Venus shows a correlated variation with the solar activity level measured by the number of sunspots, while the shock angle and magnetic compression ratio do not show such a correspondence. The shock angle spreads almost uniformly between 10° and 80° with its mean value at about 45°, and the magnetic compression ratio shows a unimodal distribution between 1.0 and 4.5 with a mean value of 2.1. In addition, we also analyze the properties of fast forward shocks driven by interplanetary coronal mass ejections (ICMEs). We found that interplanetary shocks with and without detected ICMEs showed no significant differences in terms of the shock strength and the shock angle. Further comparison with previous observational results at 1 au shows that fast forward shocks at 1 au are generally weaker than those at 0.72 au, and the shock angle Θ_Bn is more perpendicular at 1 au.

We analyze three prototypical black hole X-ray binaries, 4U 1630–472, GRO J1655–40, and H1743–322, in an effort to systematically understand the intrinsic state transition of the observed accretion disk winds between wind-on and wind-off states by utilizing state-of-the-art Chandra/HETGS archival data from multi-epoch observations. We apply our magnetically driven wind models in the context of magnetohydrodynamic (MHD) calculations to constrain (1) their global density slope (p), (2) their density (n₁₇) at the foot point of the innermost launching radius, and (3) the abundances of heavier elements (A_Fe,S,Si). Incorporating the MHD winds into xstar photoionization calculations in a self-consistent manner, we create a library of synthetic absorption spectra given the observed X-ray continua. Our analysis clearly indicates a characteristic bimodal transition of multi-ion X-ray winds; i.e., the wind density gradient is found to steepen (from p ∼ 1.2–1.4 to ∼1.4–1.5) while its density normalization declines as the source transitions from the wind-on to the wind-off state. The model implies that the ionized wind remains physically present even in the wind-off state, despite its apparent absence in the observed spectra. Supersolar abundances for heavier elements are also favored. Our global multi-ion wind models, taking into account soft X-ray ions as well as Fe K absorbers, show that the internal wind condition plays an important role in wind transitions besides photoionization changes. Simulated XRISM/Resolve and Athena/X-IFU spectra are presented to demonstrate a high fidelity of the multi-ion wind model for a better understanding of these powerful ionized winds in the coming decades.

The See Change survey was designed to make z > 1 cosmological measurements by efficiently discovering high-redshift Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) and improving cluster mass measurements through weak lensing. This survey observed twelve galaxy clusters with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST) spanning the redshift range z = 1.13–1.75, discovering 57 likely transients and 27 likely SNe Ia at z ∼ 0.8–2.3. As in similar previous surveys, this proved to be a highly efficient use of HST for supernova observations; the See Change survey additionally tested the feasibility of maintaining, or further increasing, the efficiency at yet higher redshifts, where we have less detailed information on the expected cluster masses and star formation rates. We find that the resulting number of SNe Ia per orbit is a factor of ∼8 higher than for a field search, and 45% of our orbits contained an active SN Ia within 22 rest-frame days of peak, with one of the clusters by itself yielding 6 of the SNe Ia. We present the survey design, pipeline, and supernova discoveries. Novel features include fully blinded supernova searches, the first random forest candidate classifier for undersampled IR data (with a 50% detection threshold within 0.05 mag of human searchers), real-time forward-modeling photometry of candidates, and semi-automated photometric classifications and follow-up forecasts. We also describe the spectroscopic follow-up, instrumental in measuring host galaxy redshifts. The cosmology analysis of our sample will be presented in a companion paper.

This paper studied the faint, diffuse extended X-ray emission associated with the radio lobes and the hot gas in the intracluster medium (ICM) environment for a sample of radio galaxies. We used shallow (∼10 ks) archival Chandra observations for 60 radio galaxies (7 FR I and 53 FR II) with 0.0222 ≤ z ≤ 1.785 selected from the 298 extragalactic radio sources identified in the 3CR catalog. We used Bayesian statistics to look for any asymmetry in the extended X-ray emission between regions that contain the radio lobes and regions that contain the hot gas in the ICM. In the Chandra broad band (0.5–7.0 keV), which has the highest detected X-ray flux and the highest signal-to-noise ratio, we found that the nonthermal X-ray emission from the radio lobes dominates the thermal X-ray emission from the environment for ∼77% of the sources in our sample. We also found that the relative amount of on-jet axis nonthermal emission from the radio lobes tends to increase with redshift compared to the off-jet axis thermal emission from the environment. This suggests that the dominant X-ray mechanism for the nonthermal X-ray emission in the radio lobes is due to the inverse Compton upscattering of cosmic microwave background (CMB) seed photons by relativistic electrons in the radio lobes, a process for which the observed flux is roughly redshift independent due to the increasing CMB energy density with increasing redshift.

Nearby, low-metallicity dwarf starburst galaxies hosting active galactic nuclei (AGNs) offer the best local analogs to study the early evolution of galaxies and their supermassive black holes (BHs). Here we present a detailed multiwavelength investigation of star formation and BH activity in the low-metallicity dwarf–dwarf galaxy merger Mrk 709. Using Hubble Space Telescope Hα and continuum imaging combined with Keck spectroscopy, we determine that the two dwarf galaxies are likely in the early stages of a merger (i.e., their first pass) and discover a spectacular ∼10 kpc long string of young massive star clusters (t ≲ 10 Myr; M_⋆ ≳ 10⁵M_⊙) between the galaxies triggered by the interaction. We find that the southern galaxy, Mrk 709 S, is undergoing a clumpy mode of star formation resembling that seen in high-redshift galaxies, with multiple young clusters/clumps having stellar masses between 10⁷ and 10⁸M_⊙. Furthermore, we present additional evidence for a low-luminosity AGN in Mrk 709 S (first identified by Reines et al. using radio and X-ray observations), including the detection of the coronal [Fe x] optical emission line. The work presented here provides a unique glimpse into processes key to hierarchical galaxy formation and BH growth in the early universe.

The detection of larger complex organic molecules, such as molecules consisting of several functional groups or those which show conformational flexibility, in the interstellar medium could lead to insights into the availability of biomolecules in space. We present the rotational spectroscopic study of three amino alcohols: alaninol, valinol, and leucinol. The spectra were recorded over the 2–110 GHz region, which included the utilization of a newly developed instrument operating between 18–26 GHz. We report accurately determined line lists, rotational constants, centrifugal distortion constants, and nuclear quadrupole coupling constants for two conformers of alaninol, four conformers of valinol, and three conformers of leucinol, as well as for several singly substituted heavy-atom isotopologues, which also provide structural insights. Further, a number of spectra of vibrationally excited states were assigned, and the associated motions were revealed with anharmonic frequency calculations. Accurate predictions of rotational transitions into the millimeter-wave regime for all species were made, facilitating searches for these complex molecules by observational facilities such as ALMA. Their detection would establish a new family of interstellar molecules.

We revisit the dependence of the covering factor (CF) of dust torus on physical properties of active galactic nuclei (AGNs) by taking into account an AGN polar dust emission. The CF is converted from a ratio of infrared (IR) luminosity contributed from AGN dust torus (${L}_{\mathrm{IR}}^{\mathrm{torus}}$) and AGN bolometric luminosity (L_bol), by assuming a nonlinear relation between luminosity ratio and intrinsic CF. We select 37,181 type 1 quasars at z < 0.7 from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 16 quasar catalog. Their L_bol, black hole mass (M_BH), and Eddington ratio (λ_Edd) are derived by spectral fitting with QSFit. We conduct spectral energy distribution decomposition by using X-CIGALE with a clumpy torus and polar dust model to estimate ${L}_{\mathrm{IR}}^{\mathrm{torus}}$ without being affected by the contribution of stellar and AGN polar dust to IR emission. For 5752 quasars whose physical quantities are securely determined, we perform a correlation analysis on CF and (i) L_bol, (ii) M_BH, and (iii) λ_Edd. As a result, anticorrelations for CF–L_bol, CF–M_BH, and CF–λ_Edd are confirmed. We find that incorporating the AGN polar dust emission makes those anticorrelations stronger compared to those without considering it. This indicates that polar dust wind probably driven by AGN radiative pressure is one of the key components to regulate obscuring material of AGNs.

NGC 2617 attracted a lot of attention after the detection of changes in its spectral type; the geometry and kinematics of the broad-line region (BLR) are still ambiguous. In this paper, we present the high cadence (∼2 days) reverberation mapping campaign of NGC 2617 from 2019 October to 2020 May undertaken at the Lijiang 2.4 m telescope. For the first time, the velocity-resolved reverberation signature of the object was successfully detected. Both Hα and Hβ show an asymmetrical profile with a peak in the velocity-resolved time lags. For both of the lines, the lag of the line core is longer than those of the relevant wings, and the peak of the velocity-resolved lags is slightly blueshifted. These characteristics are not consistent with the theoretical prediction of the inflow, outflow or Keplerian disk model. Our observations give the time lags of Hα, Hβ, Hγ, and He i, with a ratio of τ_Hα: τ_Hβ: τ_Hγ: τ_{He I} = 1.27:1.00:0.89:0.20, which indicates a stratified structure in the BLR of the object. It is the first time that the lags of Hα and He i are obtained. Assuming a virial factor of f = 5.5 for the dispersion width of the line, the masses of the black holes derived from Hα and Hβ are ${23.8}_{-2.7}^{+5.4}$ and ${21.1}_{-4.4}^{+3.8}\times {10}^{6}{M}_{\odot }$, respectively. Our observed results indicate the complexity of the BLR of NGC 2617.

Single AGB stars are not normally expected to be X-ray emitters due to the lack of a corona capable of powering a hot plasma. Therefore, the detection of X-ray emission in AGB stars by the ROSAT, Chandra, and XMM-Newton observatories has been interpreted as evidence for binarity. The number of X-ray-emitting AGB stars is, however, very small, and statistically sound conclusions shall be considered tentative. In this paper we aim at increasing the number of X-ray-emitting AGB stars and at providing a consistent analysis of their X-ray emission to be compared to their UV and optical properties. The XMM-Newton 4XMM-DR9 catalog has been searched for X-ray counterparts of various types of AGB stars: nearby (i.e., listed in Hipparcos), mass-losing, and S- and C-types. Seventeen X-ray counterparts of AGB stars have been found in the 4XMM-DR9. Nine of them have pointed XMM-Newton observations, whereas eight are genuine serendipitous discoveries. Together with the AGB stars detected by ROSAT, this increases the number of X-ray AGB stars to 26. Most of their X-ray spectra can be fit by the emission from an optically thin single-temperature thermal plasma with temperatures typically larger than 10⁷ K. There is no obvious correlation between the X-ray and bolometric luminosity of these stars, but the X-ray luminosity generally increases with the amount of far-UV excess. The high temperature of some X-ray-emitting plasma in AGB stars and the correlation of their X-ray luminosity with the far-UV emission supports the origin of this X-ray emission from accretion disks around unseen companions.

Waiting-time distributions of solar flares and coronal mass ejections (CMEs) exhibit power-law-like distribution functions with slopes in the range of α_τ ≈ 1.4–3.2, as observed in annual data sets during four solar cycles (1974–2012). We find a close correlation between the waiting-time power-law slope α_τ and the sunspot number (SN), i.e., α_τ = 1.38 + 0.01 × SN. The waiting-time distribution can be fitted with a Pareto-type function of the form N(τ) = N₀${({\tau }_{0}+\tau )}^{-{\alpha }_{\tau }}$, where the offset τ₀ depends on the instrumental sensitivity, the detection threshold of events, and pulse pileup effects. The time-dependent power-law slope α_τ(t) of waiting-time distributions depends only on the global solar magnetic flux (quantified by the sunspot number) or flaring rate, which is not predicted by self-organized criticality or magnetohydrodynamic turbulence models. Power-law slopes of α_τ ≈ 1.2–1.6 were also found in solar wind switchback events, as observed with the Parker Solar Probe during the solar minimum, while steeper slopes are predicted during the solar maximum. We find that the annual variability of switchback events in the heliospheric solar wind and solar flare and CME rates (originating in the photosphere and lower corona) are highly correlated.

We present X-ray and multiband optical observations of the afterglow and host galaxy of GRB 180418A, discovered by Swift/BAT and Fermi/GBM. We present a reanalysis of the GBM and BAT data deriving durations of the prompt emission of T₉₀ ≈ 2.56 and 1.90 s, respectively. Modeling the Fermi/GBM catalog of 1405 bursts (2008–2014) in the hardness–T₉₀ plane, we obtain a probability of ≈60% that GRB 180418A is a short-hard burst. From a combination of Swift/XRT and Chandra observations, the X-ray afterglow is detected to ≈38.5 days after the burst and exhibits a single power-law decline with F_X ∝ t^−0.98. Late-time Gemini observations reveal a faint r ≈ 25.69 mag host galaxy at an angular offset of ≈016. At the likely redshift range of z ≈ 1–2.25, we find that the X-ray afterglow luminosity of GRB 180418A is intermediate between short and long gamma-ray bursts (GRBs) at all epochs during which there are contemporaneous data and that GRB 180418A lies closer to the E_γ,peak–E_γ,iso correlation for short GRBs. Modeling the multiwavelength afterglow with the standard synchrotron model, we derive the burst explosion properties and find a jet opening angle of θ_j ≳ 9°–14°. If GRB 180418A is a short GRB that originated from a neutron star merger, it has one of the brightest and longest-lived afterglows along with an extremely faint host galaxy. If, instead, the event is a long GRB that originated from a massive star collapse, it has among the lowest-luminosity afterglows and lies in a peculiar space in terms of the hardness–T₉₀ and E_γ,peak–E_γ,iso planes.

Infrared interferometry has led to a paradigm shift in our understanding of the dusty structure in the central parsecs of active galactic nuclei (AGNs). The dust is now thought to comprise a hot (∼1000 K) equatorial disk, some of which is blown into a cooler (∼300 K) polar dusty wind by radiation pressure. In this paper, we utilize the new near-IR interferometer GRAVITY on the Very Large Telescope Interferometer (VLTI) to study a Type 1.2 AGNs hosted in the nearby Seyfert galaxy ESO 323-G77. By modeling the squared visibility and closure phase, we find that the hot dust is equatorially extended, consistent with the idea of a disk, and shows signs of asymmetry in the same direction. Furthermore, the data is fully consistent with the hot dust size determined by K-band reverberation mapping as well as the predicted size from a CAT3D-WIND model created in previous work using the spectral energy distribution of ESO 323-G77 and observations in the mid-IR from VLTI/MID-infrared Interferometric instrument).

Using EUV images and line-of-sight magnetograms from Solar Dynamics Observatory, we examine eight emerging bipolar magnetic regions (BMRs) in central-disk coronal holes for whether the emerging magnetic arch made any noticeable coronal jets directly, via reconnection with ambient open field as modeled by Yokoyama & Shibata. During emergence, each BMR produced no obvious EUV coronal jet of normal brightness, but each produced one or more faint EUV coronal jets that are discernible in AIA 193 Å images. The spires of these jets are much fainter and usually narrower than for typical EUV jets that have been observed to be produced by minifilament eruptions in quiet regions and coronal holes. For each of 26 faint jets from the eight emerging BMRs, we examine whether the faint spire was evidently made a la Yokoyama & Shibata. We find that (1) 16 of these faint spires evidently originate from sites of converging opposite-polarity magnetic flux and show base brightenings like those in minifilament-eruption-driven coronal jets, (2) the 10 other faint spires maybe were made by a burst of the external-magnetic-arcade-building reconnection of the emerging magnetic arch with the ambient open field, with reconnection directly driven by the arch's emergence, but (3) none were unambiguously made by such emergence-driven reconnection. Thus, for these eight emerging BMRs, the observations indicate that emergence-driven external reconnection of the emerging magnetic arch with ambient open field at most produces a jet spire that is much fainter than in previously reported, much more obvious coronal jets driven by minifilament eruptions.

We study the evolution of the binary black hole (BBH) mass distribution across cosmic time. The second gravitational-wave transient catalog (GWTC-2) from LIGO/Virgo contains BBH events out to redshifts z ∼ 1, with component masses in the range ∼5–80 M_⊙. In this catalog, the biggest BBHs, with m₁ ≳ 45 M_⊙, are only found at the highest redshifts, z ≳ 0.4. We ask whether the absence of high-mass observations at low redshift indicates that the mass distribution evolves: the biggest BBHs only merge at high redshift, and cease merging at low redshift. Modeling the BBH primary-mass spectrum as a power law with a sharp maximum mass cutoff (Truncated model), we find that the cutoff increases with redshift (> 99.9% credibility). An abrupt cutoff in the mass spectrum is expected from (pulsational) pair-instability supernova simulations; however, GWTC-2 is only consistent with a Truncated mass model if the location of the cutoff increases from ${45}_{-5}^{+13}\,{M}_{\odot }$ at z < 0.4 to ${80}_{-13}^{+16}\,{M}_{\odot }$ at z > 0.4. Alternatively, if the primary-mass spectrum has a break in the power law (Broken Power Law) at ${38}_{-8}^{+15}\,{M}_{\odot }$, rather than a sharp cutoff, the data are consistent with a nonevolving mass distribution. In this case, the overall rate of mergers, at all masses, increases with redshift. Future observations will distinguish between a sharp mass cutoff that evolves with redshift and a nonevolving mass distribution with a gradual taper, such as a Broken Power Law. After ∼100 BBH merger observations, a continued absence of high-mass, low-redshift events would provide a clear signature that the mass distribution evolves with redshift.

This article aims to draw the attention of astronomers to the ability of future cosmological surveys to put constraints on string theory. The fact that "quantum gravity" might be constrained by large-scale astrophysical observations is a remarkable fact that has recently concentrated a great amount of interest. In this work, we focus on future observatories and investigate their capability to put string theory, which is sometimes said to be "unfalsifiable," under serious pressure. We show that the combined analysis of the Square Kilometer Array, Euclid, and the Vera Rubin observatory—together with Planck results—could substantially improve the current limits on the relevant string swampland parameter. In particular, our analysis leads to a nearly model-independent prospective upper bound on the quintessence potential, $| V^{\prime} | /V\lt 0.16$, in strong contradiction of the so-called de Sitter conjecture. Some lines of improvements for the very long run are also drawn, together with generic prospective results, underscoring the efficiency of this approach. The conjectures used in this work are discussed pedagogically, together with the cosmological models chosen in the analysis.

In this work, we measure the Lyα escape fraction of 935 [O iii]-emitting galaxies between 1.9 < z < 2.35 by comparing stacked spectra from the Hubble Space Telescope/WFC3's near-IR grism to corresponding stacks from the Hobby–Eberly Telescope Dark Energy Experiment's Internal Data Release 2. By measuring the stacks' Hβ to Lyα ratios, we determine the Lyα escape fraction as a function of stellar mass, star-formation rate, internal reddening, size, and [O iii]/Hβ ratio. We show that the escape fraction of Lyα correlates with a number of parameters, such as galaxy size, star-formation rate, and nebular excitation. However, we also demonstrate that most of these relations are indirect, and that the primary variables controlling the escape of Lyα are likely to be stellar mass and internal extinction. Overall, the escape of Lyα declines from ≳16% in galaxies with $\mathrm{log}M/{M}_{\odot }\lesssim 9$ to ≲1% for systems with $\mathrm{log}M/{M}_{\odot }\gtrsim 10$, with the sample's mean escape fraction being ${6.0}_{-0.5 \% }^{+0.6 \% }$.

We use fluctuating magnetic helicity to investigate the polarization properties of Alfvénic fluctuations at ion-kinetic scales in the solar wind as a function of β_p, the ratio of proton thermal pressure to magnetic pressure, and θ_vB, the angle between the proton flow and local mean magnetic field, B₀. Using almost 15 yr of Wind observations, we separate the contributions to helicity from fluctuations with wavevectors, k, quasi-parallel and oblique to B₀, finding that the helicity of Alfvénic fluctuations is consistent with predictions from linear Vlasov theory. This result suggests that the nonlinear turbulent fluctuations at these scales share at least some polarization properties with Alfvén waves. We also investigate the dependence of proton temperature in the β_p–θ_vB plane to probe for possible signatures of turbulent dissipation, finding that it correlates with θ_vB. The proton temperature parallel to B₀ is higher in the parameter space where we measure the helicity of right-handed Alfvénic fluctuations, and the temperature perpendicular to B₀ is higher where we measure left-handed fluctuations. This finding is inconsistent with the general assumption that by sampling different θ_vB in the solar wind we can analyze the dependence of the turbulence distribution on θ_kB, the angle between k and B₀. After ruling out both instrumental and expansion effects, we conclude that our results provide new evidence for the importance of local kinetic processes that depend on θ_vB in determining proton temperature in the solar wind.

As ancient, gravitationally bound stellar populations, globular clusters represent abundant, vibrant laboratories, characterized by high frequencies of dynamical interactions, coupled to complex stellar evolution. Using surface brightness and velocity dispersion profiles from the literature, we fit 59 Milky Way globular clusters to dynamical models from the CMC Cluster Catalog. Without performing any interpolation, and without any directed effort to fit any particular cluster, 26 globular clusters are well matched by at least one of our models. We discuss in particular the core-collapsed clusters NGC 6293, NGC 6397, NGC 6681, and NGC 6624, and the non-core-collapsed clusters NGC 288, NGC 4372, and NGC 5897. As NGC 6624 lacks well-fitting snapshots on the main CMC Cluster Catalog, we run six additional models in order to refine the fit. We calculate metrics for mass segregation, explore the production of compact object sources such as millisecond pulsars, cataclysmic variables, low-mass X-ray binaries, and stellar-mass black holes, finding reasonable agreement with observations. In addition, closely mimicking observational cuts, we extract the binary fraction from our models, finding good agreement, except in the dense core regions of core-collapsed clusters. Accompanying this paper are a number of python methods for examining the publicly accessible CMC Cluster Catalog, as well as any other models generated using CMC.

We present a comparative study of four physical dust models and two single-temperature modified blackbody models by fitting them to the resolved WISE, Spitzer, and Herschel photometry of M101 (NGC 5457). Using identical data and a grid-based fitting technique, we compare the resulting dust and radiation field properties derived from the models. We find that the dust mass yielded by the different models can vary by up to a factor of 3 (factor of 1.4 between physical models only), although the fits have similar quality. Despite differences in their definition of the carriers of the mid-IR aromatic features, all physical models show the same spatial variations for the abundance of that grain population. Using the well-determined metallicity gradient in M101 and resolved gas maps, we calculate an approximate upper limit on the dust mass as a function of radius. All physical dust models are found to exceed this maximum estimate over some range of galactocentric radii. We show that renormalizing the models to match the same Milky Way high-latitude cirrus spectrum and abundance constraints can reduce the dust mass differences between models and bring the total dust mass below the maximum estimate at all radii.

In this work we explore the power of future large-scale surveys to constrain possible deviations from the standard single-field slow-roll inflationary scenario. Specifically, we parameterize possible fluctuations around the almost scale-invariant primordial scalar power spectrum in a model-independent way. We then use their imprints on the simulated matter distribution, as observed by the galaxy clustering and weak lensing probes of Euclid and the Square Kilometer Array, to construct the best constrainable patterns of fluctuations. For comparison, we make similar forecasts for a futuristic CMB-S4-like survey. The modes are found to have similar, yet shifted, patterns, with increasing number of wiggles as the mode number increases. The forecasted constraints are tightest for cosmic microwave background anisotropies and galaxy clustering, depending on the details of the specifications of the survey. As case studies, we explore how two greatly different physically motivated patterns of primordial power spectrum are reconstructed by the proposed modes. We propose a figure of merit based on the amount of information delivered by the modes to truncate the mode hierarchy, which is automatically generated by the analysis.

Neutron tunneling between neutron-rich nuclei in inhomogeneous dense matter encountered in neutron star crusts can release enormous energy on a short timescale to power explosive phenomena in neutron stars. In this work, we clarify aspects of this process that can occur in the outer regions of neutron stars when oscillations or cataclysmic events increase the ambient density. We use a time-dependent Hartree–Fock–Bogoliubov formalism to determine the rate of neutron diffusion and find that large amounts of energy can be released rapidly. The roles of nuclear binding, two-body interaction, and pairing in neutron diffusion times are investigated. We consider a one-dimensional quantum diffusion model and extend our analysis to study the impact of diffusion in three dimensions. We find that these novel neutron transfer reactions can generate energy in the amount of ≃ 10⁴⁰–10⁴⁴ erg under suitable conditions and assumptions.

Using a sample of 96,201 primary red clump stars selected from the LAMOST and Gaia surveys, we investigate the stellar structure of the Galactic disk. The sample stars show two separated sequences of high-[α/Fe] and low-[α/Fe] in the [α/Fe]–[Fe/H] plane. We divide the sample stars into five mono-abundance populations (MAPs) with different ranges of [α/Fe] and [Fe/H], named as the high-[α/Fe], high-[α/Fe] and high-[Fe/H], low-[Fe/H], solar, high-[Fe/H] MAPs, respectively. We present the stellar number density distributions in the R–Z plane, and the scale heights and scale lengths of the individual MAPs by fitting their vertical and radial density profiles. The vertical profiles, the variation trend of scale height with the Galactocentric radius, indicate that there is a clear disk flare in the outer disk both for the low-[α/Fe] and the high-[α/Fe] MAPs. While the radial surface-density profiles show a peak radius of 7 kpc and 8 kpc for the high-[α/Fe] and low-[α/Fe] MAPs, respectively. We also investigate the correlation between the mean rotation velocity and metallicity of the individual MAPs, and find that the mean rotation velocities are well separated and show different trends between the high-[α/Fe] and the low-[α/Fe] MAPs. Finally, we discuss the character of the high-[α/Fe] and high-[Fe/H] MAP and find that it is more similar to the high-[α/Fe] MAP either in the radial and vertical density profiles or in the rotation velocity.

Dust gaps and rings appear ubiquitous in bright protoplanetary disks. Disk–planet interaction with dust trapping at the edges of planet-induced gaps is one plausible explanation. However, the sharpness of some observed dust rings indicate that sub-millimeter-sized dust grains have settled to a thin layer in some systems. We test whether or not such dust around gas gaps opened by planets can remain settled by performing three-dimensional, dust-plus-gas simulations of protoplanetary disks with an embedded planet. We find planets massive enough to open gas gaps stir small, sub-millimeter-sized dust grains to high disk elevations at the gap edges, where the dust scale height can reach ∼70% of the gas scale height. We attribute this dust "puff up" to the planet-induced meridional gas flows previously identified by Fung & Chiang and others. We thus emphasize the importance of explicit 3D simulations to obtain the vertical distribution of sub-millimeter-sized grains around gas gaps opened by massive planets. We caution that the gas-gap-opening planet interpretation of well-defined dust rings is only self-consistent with large grains exceeding millimeter size.

A classical paradox in high-mass star formation is that powerful radiation pressure can halt accretion, preventing further growth of a central star. Disk accretion has been proposed to solve this problem, but the disks and the accretion process in high-mass star formation are poorly understood. We executed high-resolution (R = 35,000–70,000) iSHELL spectroscopy in K-band for 11 high-mass protostars. Br-γ emission was observed toward eight sources, and the line profiles for most of these sources are similar to those of low-mass PMS stars. Using an empirical relationship between the Br-γ and accretion luminosities, we tentatively estimate disk accretion rates ranging from ≲10⁻⁸ and ∼10⁻⁴M_⊙ yr⁻¹. These low-mass-accretion rates suggest that high-mass protostars gain more mass via episodic accretion as proposed for low-mass protostars. Given the detection limits, CO overtone emission (v = 2−0 and 3−1), likely associated with the inner disk region (r ≪ 100 au), was found toward two sources. This low-detection rate compared with Br-γ emission is consistent with previous observations. Ten out of the 11 sources show absorption at the v = 0–2 R(7) − R(14) CO R-branch. Most of them are either blueshifted or redshifted, indicating that the absorption is associated with an outflow or an inflow with a velocity of up to ∼50 km s⁻¹. Our analysis indicates that the absorption layer is well thermalized (and therefore ${n}_{{{\rm{H}}}_{2}}\gtrsim {10}^{6}$ cm⁻³) at a single temperature of typically 100–200 K, and located within 200–600 au of the star.

The ubiquitous relativistic jet phenomena associated with black holes play a major role in high and very-high-energy (VHE) astrophysics. In particular, observations have demonstrated that blazars show VHE emission with time variability from days to minutes (in the gigaelectronvolt and teraelectronvolt bands), implying very compact emission regions. The real mechanism of the particle acceleration process responsible for this emission is still being debated, but magnetic reconnection has lately been discussed as a strong potential candidate. In this work, we present the results of three-dimensional special relativistic magnetohydrodynamic simulations of the development of reconnection events driven by turbulence induced by current-driven kink instability along a relativistic jet. We have performed a systematic identification of all reconnection regions in the system, characterizing their local magnetic field topology and quantifying the reconnection rates. We obtained average rates of 0.051 ± 0.026 (in units of Alfvén speed), which are comparable to the predictions of the theory of turbulence-induced fast reconnection. A detailed statistical analysis also demonstrated that the fast reconnection events follow a log-normal distribution, which is a signature of its turbulent origin. To probe the robustness of our method, we have applied our results to the blazar Mrk 421. Building a synthetic light curve from the integrated magnetic reconnection power, we evaluated the time variability from a power spectral density analysis, obtaining good agreement with observations in the gigaelectronvolt band. This suggests that turbulent fast magnetic reconnection can be a possible process behind the high-energy emission variability phenomena observed in blazars.

We study the hydrogen ionization instability mechanism in the context of low-mass X-ray binaries with a black hole as a central object. We make numerical calculations of the predicted outbursts' light curves and compare them to the data observed by X-ray satellites. The comparison to the data is done for five sources observed by RXTE/ASM (XTE J1550−564, 4U 1630−472, XTE J1859+226, GX 339-4, XTE J1818−245) and one source observed by MAXI (MAXI J1659−152). The aim of this paper is to show that the hydrogen ionization instability operating in an accretion disk is responsible for the shape of outbursts observed in low-mass X-ray binaries. From the data fitting process, we put tight constraints on global source parameters such as black hole mass and disk accretion rate. The influence of chemical composition on the overall analysis is also shown. In the case of each outburst, we found the overall bolometric light curve shape that qualitatively matches the data. We were able to model the main outburst and secondary reflare often seen in the data, the latter one caused by the presence of metals in disk gas. In the case of 4U 1630−472, we analyzed two outbursts, which allowed us to put tight constraints on the black hole mass of 4 ± 0.5M_⊙ and on the accretion rate of ${2}_{-0.2}^{+1.4}\times {10}^{-8}{M}_{\odot }$ yr⁻¹.

Based on results by recent surveys, the number of bright quasars at redshifts z > 3 is being constantly revised upward. The current consensus is that at bright magnitudes (M₁₄₅₀ ≤ −27) the number densities of such sources could have been underestimated by a factor of 30%–40%. In the framework of the QUBRICS survey, we identified 58 bright QSOs at 3.6 ≤ z ≤ 4.2, with magnitudes i_psf ≤ 18, in an area of 12400 deg². The uniqueness of our survey is underlined by the fact that it allows us, for the first time, to extend the sampled absolute magnitude range up to M₁₄₅₀ = −29.5. We derived a bright-end slope of β = −4.025 and a space density at 〈M₁₄₅₀〉 = −28.75 of 2.61 × 10⁻¹⁰ Mpc⁻³ comoving, after taking into account the estimated incompleteness of our observations. Taking into account the results of fainter surveys, active galactic nuclei (AGNs) brighter than M₁₄₅₀ = −23 could produce at least half of the ionizing emissivity at z ∼ 4. Considering a mean escape fraction of 0.7 for the QSO and AGN population, combined with a mean free path of 41.3 proper Mpc at z = 3.9, we derive a photoionization rate of ${\rm{Log}}({\rm{\Gamma }}\left[{{\rm{s}}}^{-1}\right])=-{12.17}_{-0.07}^{+0.13}$, produced by AGNs at M₁₄₅₀ < −18, that is, ∼100% of the measured ionizing background at z ∼ 4.

Mass loss is an important activity for red supergiants (RSGs) and can influence their evolution and final fate. Previous estimations of mass-loss rates (MLRs) of RSGs exhibit significant dispersion due to differences in method and the incompleteness of samples. With the improved quality and depth of surveys including the UKIRT/WFCAM observations in the near-infrared, and LGGS and PS1 in the optical, a rather complete sample of RSGs is identified in M31 and M33 according to their brightness and colors. For about 2000 objects in either galaxy from this largest ever sample, the MLR is derived by fitting the observational optical-to-mid-infrared spectral energy distribution with the DUSTY code of a 1D dust radiative transfer model. The average MLR of RSGs is found to be around 2.0 × 10⁻⁵ M_⊙ yr⁻¹ with a gas-to-dust ratio of 100, which yields a total contribution to the interstellar dust from RSGs of about 1.1 × 10⁻³ M_⊙ yr⁻¹ in M31 and 6.0 × 10⁻⁴ M_⊙ yr⁻¹ in M33, a non-negligible source in comparison with evolved low-mass stars. The MLRs are divided into three types by the dust species, i.e., amorphous silicate, amorphous carbon, and optically thin, and the relations between MLR and stellar parameters, infrared flux, and colors are discussed and compared with previous works for the silicate and carbon dust groups.

We present a reflected reprocessing model to study the thermal lag–wavelength relationship in the AGN accretion disk. The main radiation produced from the corona assumed with the lamppost geometry on the axis of the black hole irradiates the accretion disk to affect the temperature structure via reflection processes. Considering the thermal emission of the disk responded to coronal irradiation, we obtain the lag–wavelength relationship of the disk emission by calculating the response function. We then fit the observed data of four Seyfert 1–1.5 galaxies, NGC4151 , Mrk509, NGC5548, and NGC4593, to test the reflected reprocessing model compared with the X-ray spectrum fitting, and the main results present as follows: (I) The actual geometry of the disk corona is more complex than the lamppost. (II) The option of the reference band is sensitive to fitting the observed time lags. (III) The intrinsic bolometric luminosity is larger than the observed luminosity.

We use the IllustrisTNG (TNG) simulations of galaxy formation to measure the velocity dispersion profiles of dark matter and stars in Milky Way–mass, galaxy group, and cluster-scale dark matter halos. The mean profiles calculated from both tracers are similar in shape, exhibiting a large halo-to-halo scatter around the average profile. The so-called "splashback" radius demarcates the outer boundary of the halo, and manifests as a kink in the velocity dispersion profile, located on average between ∼1.0–1.5r_200m, where r_200m is the radius within which the density of the halo equals 200 times the background density of the universe. We find that this location may also be identified as the radius at which the (stacked) dispersion profile drops to 60% of its peak value (for line-of-sight motions in TNG halos). We further show that the scatter in the dispersion profiles may be attributed to the variations in the assembly history of the host halos. In particular, this segregates the profile into two regimes: one within ∼0.1r_200m, where the scatter is set by the early assembly history of the halo; and the other beyond this radius, where the scatter is influenced more strongly by its late-time assembly. Finally, we show that a two-parameter model can be used to fit the measured velocity dispersion profiles and the fit parameters can be related directly to two fundamental halo properties: mass and concentration. We describe a simple model that allows us to express the stellar velocity dispersion profile in terms of these halo properties only.

We report the discovery of a circumstellar debris disk viewed nearly edge-on and associated with the young, K1 star BD+45° 598 using high-contrast imaging at 2.2 μm obtained at the W.M. Keck Observatory. We detect the disk in scattered light with a peak significance of ∼5σ over three epochs, and our best-fit model of the disk is an almost edge-on ∼70 au ring, with inclination angle ∼87°. Using the NOEMA interferometer at the Plateau de Bure Observatory operating at 1.3 mm, we find resolved continuum emission aligned with the ring structure seen in the 2.2 μm images. We estimate a fractional infrared luminosity of L_IR/L_tot$\simeq \,{6}_{-1}^{+2}$ × 10⁻⁴, higher than that of the debris disk around AU Mic. Several characteristics of BD+45° 598, such as its galactic space motion, placement in a color–magnitude diagram, and strong presence of lithium, are all consistent with its membership in the β Pictoris Moving Group with an age of 23 ± 3 Myr. However, the galactic position for BD+45° 598 is slightly discrepant from previously known members of the β Pictoris Moving Group, possibly indicating an extension of members of this moving group to distances of at least 70 pc. BD+45° 598 appears to be an example from a population of young circumstellar debris systems associated with newly identified members of young moving groups that can be imaged in scattered light, key objects for mapping out the early evolution of planetary systems from ∼10–100 Myr. This target will also be ideal for northern-hemisphere, high-contrast imaging platforms to search for self-luminous, planetary mass companions residing in this system.

Molecular hydrogen (H₂) is the dominant molecular species in the vast majority of interstellar environments and it plays a crucial role as a radiative coolant. In photodissociation regions (PDRs), it is one of the primary emitters in the near- to mid-infrared, which is due to lines originating from highly excited levels. The sparseness of H₂ collisional data for rotational levels J ≥ 9, particularly for H₂–H₂ collisions, has limited nonlocal thermal equilibrium (NLTE) studies in ultraviolet-irradiated regions. Utilizing new calculations for para- and ortho-H₂ high rotational collisional rate coefficients colliding with H₂ (up to the maximum value for v = 0: J = 31), existing data for H₂–H and H₂–He collisions, and approximate scaling relations for missing collisional data, we investigate the excitation properties of H₂ in a range of astrophysical environments, with the focus on PDRs (including benchmark PDR models and the Orion Bar). In these NLTE models, H₂ emission is illustrated and shown as a diagnostic for physical conditions, such as temperature and density. Furthermore, we demonstrated the effect of updates in the collisional rates on the modeling results of H₂ excitation. The resulting data sets of H₂ collisional data should find wide application to other molecular environments.

We report the likely GeV γ-ray emission from the composite supernova remnant (SNR) COMP G327.1+1.1 by analyzing ∼12.2 yr of the Fermi Large Area Telescope (Fermi-LAT) Pass 8 data. We found the features of its spectrum and luminosity are well consistent with those of the observed COMP SNRs in the Milky Way. Moreover, the position of the source matches those in radio and TeV energy bands; we propose that the γ-ray source is likely to be a GeV counterpart of COMP G327.1+1.1. Considering the case of the association from COMP G327.1+1.1 and the γ-ray source, we interpreted its broadband spectral energy distribution (SED) by using three simple stationary models including one-zone and two-zone leptonic models and a one-zone leptohadronic model. We found that the simple two-zone model dominated by leptons can better explain its SED. More high-energy data are expected to firmly confirm the association between the γ-ray source and COMP G327.1+1.1 in the future.

We present new spectrophotometric and spectropolarimetric observations of Mrk 1239, one of the 8 prototypes that defines type-1 narrow-line Seyfert galaxies (NLS1s). Unlike the other typical NLS1s though, a high degree of polarization (P ∼ 5.6%) and red optical–IR (g–W₄ = 12.35) colors suggest that Mrk 1239 is more similar to type-2 active galactic nuclei like NGC 1068. Detailed analysis of spectral energy distribution in the UV–optical–IR yields two components from the nucleus: a direct and transmitted component that is heavily obscured (E_B–V ≈ 1.6), and another indirect and scattered one with mild extinction (E_B–V ∼ 0.5). Such a two-light-paths scenario is also found in previous reports based on the X-ray data. Comparison of emission lines and the detection of He i*λ10830 BAL at [−3000, −1000] km s⁻¹ indicates that the obscuring clouds are at physical scale between the sublimation radius and that of the narrow emission line regions. The potential existence of powerful outflows is found as both the obscurer and scatterer are outflowing. Similar to many other type-2s, jet-like structure in the radio band is found in Mrk 1239, perpendicular to the polarization angle, suggesting polar scattering. We argue that Mrk 1239 is very probably a type-2 counterpart of NLS1s. The identification of 1 out of 8 prototype NLS1s as a type-2 counterpart implies that there can be a substantial amount of analogs of Mrk 1239 misidentified as type-1s in the optical band. Properties of these misidentified objects are going to be explored in our future works.

We report the detection of an Al ii line at 2669.155 Å in 11 metal-poor stars, using ultraviolet spectra obtained with the Space Telescope Imaging Spectrograph on board the Hubble Space Telescope. We derive Al abundances from this line using a standard abundance analysis, assuming local thermodynamic equilibrium (LTE). The mean [Al/Fe] ratio is −0.06 ± 0.04 (σ = 0.22) for these 11 stars spanning − 3.9 < [Fe/H] < −1.3, or [Al/Fe] = −0.10 ± 0.04 (σ = 0.18) for 9 stars spanning −3.0 < [Fe/H] < −1.3 if two carbon-enhanced stars are excluded. We use these abundances to perform an empirical test of non-LTE (NLTE) abundance corrections predicted for resonance lines of Al i, including the commonly used optical Al i line at 3961 Å. The Al ii line is formed in LTE, and the abundance derived from this line matches that derived from high-excitation Al i lines predicted to have minimal NLTE corrections. The differences between the abundance derived from the Al ii line and the LTE abundance derived from Al i resonance lines are +0.4 to +0.9 dex, which match the predicted NLTE corrections for the Al i resonance lines. We conclude that the NLTE abundance calculations are approximately correct and should be applied to LTE abundances derived from Al i lines.

We report on a coherent timing analysis of the 163 Hz accreting millisecond X-ray pulsar IGR J17062–6143. Using data collected with the Neutron Star Interior Composition Explorer and XMM-Newton, we investigated the pulsar evolution over a time span of four years. We obtained a unique phase-coherent timing solution for the stellar spin, finding the source to be spinning up at a rate of (3.77 ± 0.09) × 10⁻¹⁵ Hz s⁻¹. We further find that the 0.4–6 keV pulse fraction varies gradually between 0.5% and 2.5% following a sinusoidal oscillation with a 1210 ± 40 day period. Finally, we supplemented this analysis with an archival Rossi X-ray Timing Explorer observation and obtained a phase-coherent model for the binary orbit spanning 12 yr, yielding an orbital period-derivative measurement of (8.4 ± 2.0) × 10⁻¹² s s⁻¹. This large orbital period derivative is inconsistent with a binary evolution that is dominated by gravitational wave emission and is suggestive of highly nonconservative mass transfer in the binary system.

Spectral lines allow us to probe the thermodynamics of the solar atmosphere, but the shape of a single spectral line may be similar for different thermodynamic solutions. Multiline analyses are therefore crucial, but computationally cumbersome. We investigate correlations between several chromospheric and transition region lines to restrain the thermodynamic solutions of the solar atmosphere during flares. We used machine-learning methods to capture the statistical dependencies between six spectral lines sourced from 21 large solar flares observed by NASA's Interface Region Imaging Spectrograph. The techniques are based on an information-theoretic quantity called mutual information (MI), which captures both linear and nonlinear correlations between spectral lines. The MI is estimated using both a categorical and numeric method, and performed separately for a collection of quiet Sun and flaring observations. Both approaches return consistent results, indicating weak correlations between spectral lines under quiet Sun conditions, and substantially enhanced correlations under flaring conditions, with some line-pairs such as Mg ii and C ii having a normalized MI score as high as 0.5. We find that certain spectral lines couple more readily than others, indicating a coherence in the solar atmosphere over many scale heights during flares, and that all line-pairs are correlated to the GOES derivative, indicating a positive relationship between correlation strength and energy input. Our methods provide a highly stable and flexible framework for quantifying dependencies between the physical quantities of the solar atmosphere, allowing us to obtain a three-dimensional picture of its state.

A series of measurements of the solar diameter taken in the meridian line of the Basilica of San Petronio (Bologna, Italy) between 1655 and 1736 has been analyzed. This series is of interest because the measurement period includes the Maunder Minimum (1645–1715; hereafter MM) when solar activity was abnormally low. Some authors have suggested an increase of the solar diameter during the MM. Trying to detect these changes, statistical analyses comparing measurements taken in San Petronio during the MM (1655–1715) and other ones taken in a subsequent period (1716–1736) have been performed. Mann–Whitney U tests and Student's t-tests indicate that there is no statistically significant difference in the medians and averages of the solar diameter in both periods. In fact, we have found differences around 06 in the medians and the averages, which are below the mean accuracy of the instrument. Therefore, we conclude that there is no difference between the solar diameter value measured during the MM (1655–1715) and that for the subsequent period 1716–1736. This implies that there has not been an increase in the solar diameter of several arcseconds during the MM as has been speculated by some authors.

Tidal forces are important for understanding how close binary stars and compact exoplanetary systems form and evolve. However, tides are difficult to model, and significant uncertainties exist about the strength of tides. Here, we investigate tidal circularization in close binaries using a large sample of well-characterized eclipsing systems. We searched TESS photometry from the southern hemisphere for eclipsing binaries. We derive best-fit orbital and stellar parameters by jointly modeling light curves and spectral energy distributions. To determine the eccentricity distribution of eclipsing binaries over a wide range of stellar temperatures (3000–50,000 K) and orbital separations a/R₁ (2–300), we combine our newly obtained TESS sample with eclipsing binaries observed from the ground and by the Kepler mission. We find a clear dependency of stellar temperature and orbital separation in the eccentricities of close binaries. We compare our observations with predictions of the equilibrium and dynamical tides. We find that while cool binaries agree with the predictions of the equilibrium tide, a large fraction of binaries with temperatures between 6250 K and 10,000 K and orbital separations between a/R₁ ∼ 4 and 10 are found on circular orbits, contrary to the predictions of the dynamical tide. This suggests that some binaries with radiative envelopes may be tidally circularized significantly more efficiently than usually assumed. Our findings on orbital circularization have important implications also in the context of hot Jupiters, where tides have been invoked to explain the observed difference in the spin–orbit alignment between hot and cool host stars.

We present an analysis of 745.8 ks of archival Chandra X-Ray Observatory Advanced CCD Imaging Spectrometer data accumulated between 2000 and 2016 of the millisecond pulsar (MSP) population in the rich Galactic globular cluster Terzan 5. Eight of the 38 MSPs with precise positions are found to have plausible X-ray source matches. Despite the deep exposure, the remaining MSPs are either marginally detected or have no obvious X-ray counterparts, which can be attributed to the typically soft thermal spectra of rotation-powered MSPs, which are strongly attenuated by the high intervening absorbing column (∼10²² cm⁻²) toward the cluster, and in some instances to severe source crowding/blending. For the "redback" MSP binaries PSR J1748−2446P and PSR J1748−2446ad and the "black widow" binary system PSR J1748−2446O, we find clear evidence for large-amplitude X-ray variability at the orbital period consistent with an intrabinary shock origin. The third redback MSP in the cluster, PSR J1748−2446A, shows order-of-magnitude variations in flux on timescales of years, possibly due to state transitions or intense flaring episodes from a magnetically active secondary star.

We present a novel method to detect variable astrophysical objects and transient phenomena using anomalous excess scatter in repeated measurements from public catalogs of Gaia DR2 and Zwicky Transient Facility (ZTF) DR3 photometry. We first provide a generalized, all-sky proxy for variability using only Gaia DR2 photometry, calibrated to white dwarf stars. To ensure more robust candidate detection, we further employ a method combining Gaia with ZTF photometry and alerts. To demonstrate its efficacy, we apply this latter technique to a sample of roughly 12,100 white dwarfs within 200 pc centered on the ZZ Ceti instability strip, where hydrogen-atmosphere white dwarfs are known to pulsate. By inspecting the top 1% of the samples ranked by these methods, we demonstrate that both the Gaia-only and ZTF-informed techniques are highly effective at identifying known and new variable white dwarfs, which we verify using follow-up, high-speed photometry. We confirm variability in all 33 out of 33 (100%) observed white dwarfs within our top 1% highest-ranked candidates, both inside and outside the ZZ Ceti instability strip. In addition to dozens of new pulsating white dwarfs, we also identify five white dwarfs highly likely to show transiting planetary debris; if confirmed, these systems would more than triple the number of white dwarfs known to host transiting debris.

We probe the dusty environment of the archetypical Type 1 active galactic nucleus (AGN) in NGC 4151 with comprehensive IR reverberation mapping over several decades, in the J (∼1.22 μm), H (∼1.63 μm), K (∼2.19 μm), L (∼3.45 μm), and N bands (∼10.6 μm), plus multiple measurements at 20–40 μm. At 1–4 μm, the hot dust reverberation signals come from two distinct dust populations at separate radii (∼0.033 pc and ∼0.076 pc), with temperatures of ∼1500–2500 K and ∼900–1000 K, consistent with the expected properties of sublimating graphite and silicate dust grains. The domination of the torus infrared output by carbon and silicate grains near their sublimation temperatures and radii may account for the general similarity of AGN near-IR spectral energy distributions. The torus inner edge defined by the hottest dust remains at roughly the same radius independent of the AGN optical luminosity over ∼25 yr. The emission by hot dust warmed directly by the optical/UV AGN output has increased gradually by ∼4% yr⁻¹, indicating a possibly growing torus. A third dust component at ∼700 K does not seem to participate directly in the IR reverberation behavior, and its emission may originate deep in the circumnuclear torus. We find a reverberation signal at ∼10 μm with an inferred radius for the warm dust of ∼2.2–3.1 pc. The lack of variability at 20–40 μm indicates that the far-IR emission comes from even more extended regions. The torus properties revealed by dust reverberation analysis are inconsistent with predictions from pure clumpy torus models. Instead, the longer-wavelength emission possibly originates in a flared torus or the polar wind.

Understanding how the magnetic activity of low-mass stars depends on their fundamental parameters is an important goal of stellar astrophysics. Previous studies have shown that activity levels are largely determined by the stellar Rossby number, defined as the rotation period divided by the convective turnover time. However, we currently have little information on the role played by chemical composition. In this work, we investigate how metallicity affects magnetic activity, using photometric variability as an activity proxy. Similarly to other proxies, we demonstrate that the amplitude of photometric variability is well parameterized by the Rossby number, although in a more complex way. We also show that variability amplitude and metallicity are generally positively correlated. This trend can be understood in terms of the effect of metallicity on stellar structure, and hence the convective turnover time (or, equivalently, the Rossby number). Lastly, we demonstrate that the metallicity dependence of photometric variability results in a rotation-period detection bias, whereby the periods of metal-rich stars are more easily recovered for stars of a given mass.

With the conclusion of the third observing run for Advanced LIGO/Virgo (O3), we present a detailed analysis of both triggered and serendipitous observations of 17 gravitational-wave (GW) events (7 triggered and 10 purely serendipitous) from the Searches After Gravitational-waves Using ARizona Observatories (SAGUARO) program. We searched a total of 4935 deg² down to a median 5σ transient detection depth of 21.1 AB mag using the Mt. Lemmon 1.5 m telescope, the discovery engine for SAGUARO. In addition to triggered events within 24 hr, our transient search encompassed a time interval following GW events of <120 hr, providing observations on ∼1/2 of the events accessible to the Mt. Lemmon 1.5 m telescope. We covered 2.1%–86% of the LVC total probability (P_total) for individual events, with a median P_total ≈ 8% within <120 hr. Following improvements to our pipeline and the addition of serendipitous observations, we find a total of seven new optical candidates across five GW events, which we are unable to rule out after searching for additional information and comparing to kilonova models. Using both publicly available and our own late-time data, we investigated a total of 252 optical candidates for these 17 events, finding that only 65% were followed up in some capacity by the community. Of the total 252 candidates, we are able to rule out an additional 12 previously reported counterpart candidates. In light of these results, we discuss lessons learned from the SAGUARO GW counterpart search. We discuss how community coordination of observations and candidate follow-up, as well as the role of archival data, are crucial to improving the efficiency of follow-up efforts and preventing unnecessary duplication of effort with limited electromagnetic resources.

Relativistic magnetic reconnection is a potential particle acceleration mechanism for high-frequency BL Lac objects (HBLs). The Imaging X-ray Polarimetry Explorer (IXPE) scheduled to launch in 2021 has the capability to probe the evolution of magnetic field in HBLs, examining the magnetic reconnection scenario for the HBL flares. In this paper, we make the first attempt to self-consistently predict HBL X-ray polarization signatures arising from relativistic magnetic reconnection via combined particle-in-cell and polarized radiation transfer simulations. We find that although the intrinsic optical and X-ray polarization degrees are similar on average, the X-ray polarization is much more variable in both the polarization degree and angle (PD and PA). Given the sensitivity of the IXPE, it may obtain one to a few polarization data points for one flaring event of nearby bright HBLs Mrk 421 and 501. However, it may not fully resolve the highly variable X-ray polarization. Due to temporal depolarization, where the integration of photons with variable polarization states over a finite period of time can lower the detected PD, the measured X-ray PD can be considerably lower than the optical counterpart or even undetectable. The lower X-ray PD than the optical thus can be a characteristic signature of relativistic magnetic reconnection. For very bright flares where the X-ray polarization is well resolved, relativistic magnetic reconnection predicts smooth X-ray PA swings, which originate from large plasmoid mergers in the reconnection region.

Recent studies of warp kinematics using Gaia DR2 data have produced detections of warp precession for the first time, which greatly exceeds theoretical predictions of models. However, this detection assumes a warp model derived for a young population (few tens of megayears) to fit velocities of an average older stellar population of the thin disk (several gigayears) in Gaia-DR2 observations, which may lead to unaccounted systematic errors. Here, we recalculate the warp precession with the same approach and Gaia DR2 kinematic data, but using different warp parameters based on the fit of star counts of the Gaia DR2 sample, which has a much lower warp amplitude than the young population. When we take into account this variation of the warp amplitude with the age of the population, we find that there is no need for precession. We find the value of warp precession $\beta ={4}_{-4}^{+6}$ km s⁻¹ kpc⁻¹, which does not exclude nonprecessing warp.

We present X-ray analysis of the ejecta of supernova remnant (SNR) G350.1–0.3 observed with Chandra and Suzaku, clarify the ejecta's kinematics over a decade, and obtain a new observational clue to understanding the origin of the asymmetric explosion. Two images from Chandra X-ray Observatory taken in 2009 and 2018 are analyzed with several methods and enable us to measure the velocities in the plane of the sky. A maximum velocity is 4640 ± 290 km s⁻¹ (0.218 ± 0.014 arcsec yr⁻¹) in the eastern region in the remnant. These findings trigger us to scrutinize the Doppler effects in the spectra of the thermal emission, and the velocities in the line-of-sight direction are estimated to be 1000 km s⁻¹. The results are confirmed by analyzing the spectra of Suzaku. Combining the proper motions and line-of-sight velocities, the ejecta's 3D velocities are ∼3000–5000 km s⁻¹. The center of the explosion is more stringently constrained by finding the optimal time to reproduce the observed spatial expansion. Our findings that the age of the SNR is estimated at most to be 655 yr and the CCO is observed as a point source object against the SNR strengthen the "hydrodynamical kick" hypothesis on the origin of the remnant.

We investigate the accretion-induced spin-up of the black hole via numerical simulations. Our method is based on general relativistic magnetohydrodynamics of the slowly rotating flows in the Kerr metric, where possibly transonic shock fronts may form. We account for the changing black hole mass and spin during accretion that enforces dynamical evolution of the spacetime metric. We first study nonmagnetized flows with shocks, and we also include magnetic field endowed in the gas. The aim of this study is to verify whether the high-mass black holes may be produced with large spins, even though at birth the collapsars might have contained slowly or moderately spinning cores. In this way, we put constraints on the content of angular momentum in the collapsing massive stars. Our studies are also showing that shock fronts and magnetic fields may halt accretion and limit the black hole spin-up in the exploding supernovae.

We report the discovery of diffuse X-ray emission around the supernova remnant (SNR) G106.3+2.7, which is associated with VER J2227+608 and HAWC J2227+610 and is known as a candidate for a PeV cosmic-ray accelerator (PeVatron). We analyze observational data of Suzaku around the SNR and the adjacent pulsar PSR J2229+6114. We find diffuse X-ray emission that is represented by either thermal or nonthermal processes. However, the metal abundance for the thermal emission is <0.13 Z_⊙, which may be too small in the Milky Way and suggests that the emission is nonthermal. The intensity of the diffuse emission increases toward PSR J2229+6114 in the same way as radio emission, and it is in contrast with gamma-ray emission concentrated on a molecular cloud. The X-ray photon index does not change with the distance from the pulsar and it indicates that radiative cooling is ineffective and particle diffusion is not extremely slow. The X-ray and radio emissions seem to be of leptonic origin and the parent electrons may originate from the pulsar. The gamma-ray emission appears to be of hadronic origin because of its spatial distribution. The parent protons may be tightly confined in the cloud separately from the diffusing electrons.

Fast radio bursts (FRBs) are bright radio transient events with durations on the order of milliseconds. The majority of FRB sources discovered so far have a single peak, with the exception of a few showing multiple-peaked profiles, the origin of which is unknown. In this work, we show that the strong lensing effect of a point mass or a point mass + external shear on a single-peak FRB can produce double peaks (i.e., lensed images). In particular, the leading peak will always be more magnified and hence brighter than the trailing peak for a point-mass lens model, while the point-mass + external shear lens model can produce a less magnified leading peak. We find that, for a point-mass lens model, the combination of lens mass M and redshift z_l in the form of M(1 + z_l) can be directly computed from two observables—the delayed time Δt and the flux ratio of the leading peak to the trailing peak R. For a point-mass + external shear lens model, upper and lower limits in M(1 + z_l) can also be obtained from Δt and R for a given external shear strength. In particular, tighter lens mass constraints can be achieved when the observed R is larger. Lastly, we show the process of constraining lens mass using the observed values of Δt and R of two double-peaked FRB sources, i.e., FRB 121002 and FRB 130729, as references, although the double-peaked profiles are not necessarily caused by strong lensing.

The ratio of total losses of H and O from the atmosphere is crucial for determining the Martian atmospheric redox state. The H and O escapes are shown to be regulated in a stoichiometric 2:1 ratio in a converged model of present-day Mars over a timescale of ∼10⁵ yr, which is called self-regulation. Self-regulation timescales under different atmospheric conditions on early Mars are not well understood. Here we use a 1D photochemical model to calculate the timescales of self-regulation for denser CO₂ atmospheres with various surface temperatures as benchmark cases for early Mars. Self-regulation is driven by variations in the amount of O₂ or CO in the atmosphere, depending on the atmospheric redox state. Self-regulation timescales are likely to be controlled by the net redox balance. A 1 bar CO₂ atmosphere with a surface temperature of 240 K has a self-regulation timescale of a few million years. Denser atmospheres of early Mars have a longer regulation timescale and are less redox-stable than the atmosphere of present-day Mars. Obliquity variations cause atmospheric CO₂ fluctuations, producing a difference in the self-regulation timescale between high and low obliquity. Because an increase in CO₂ suppresses H escape, the net effect of the obliquity cycle could have driven the atmospheric redox states to be more reducing. Our results also suggest the possibility of a CO-dominated atmosphere of 10–100 mbars at 3 Ga. The redox state of ancient Mars might have fluctuated more easily than that of the present.

Protoplanetary disk evolution is strongly impacted by ionization from the central star and local environment, which collectively have been shown to drive chemical complexity and are expected to impact the transport of disk material. Nonetheless, ionization remains a poorly constrained input to many detailed modeling efforts. We use new and archival ALMA observations of N₂H⁺ 3–2 and H¹³CO⁺ 3–2 to derive the first observationally motivated ionization model for the IM Lup protoplanetary disk. Incorporating ionization from multiple internal and external sources, we model N₂H⁺ and H¹³CO⁺ abundances under varying ionization environments and compare these directly to the imaged ALMA observations by performing non-LTE radiative transfer, visibility sampling, and imaging. We find that the observations are best reproduced using a radially increasing cosmic-ray (CR) gradient, with low CR ionization in the inner disk, high CR ionization in the outer disk, and a transition at ∼80–100 au. This location is approximately coincident with the edge of spiral structure identified in millimeter emission. We also find that IM Lup shows evidence for enhanced UV-driven formation of HCO⁺, which we attribute to the disk's high flaring angle. In summary, IM Lup represents the first protoplanetary disk with observational evidence for a CR gradient, which may have important implications for IM Lup's ongoing evolution, especially given the disk's young age and large size.

Young stellar associations represent a key site for the study of star formation, but to accurately compare observations to models of stellar evolution, the age of an association must be determined. The Upper Scorpius region is the youngest section of the Scorpius–Centaurus OB association, which is the largest collection of nearby, young, low-mass stars. The true age of Upper Scorpius is not clear, and an observed mass-dependent age gradient in Upper Scorpius, as well as in other star-forming regions, complicates age measurements. The age gradient may indicate a genuine astrophysical feature or may be an artifact of unrecognized systematic effects in stellar age measurements. We have conducted a synthetic red-optical low-resolution spectroscopic survey of a simulated analog to the Upper Scorpius star-forming region to investigate the effects of unresolved binary stars (which have mass-dependent demographics) on age measurements of a stellar population. We found that the observed mass-dependent age gradient in Upper Scorpius can be explained by a population of undetected binary stars. For a simulated population with an age of 10 (rms = 2) Myr, we measured an age of 10.5 (rms = 3.5) Myr for F stars and of 7.5 (rms = 5.8) Myr for M stars. This discrepancy is caused by the mass-dependent mass ratio distribution and the variable steepness of the mass–luminosity relation. Our results support the previously suggested 10 Myr age for Upper Scorpius, with a small intrinsic age spread.

The density and temperature properties of the intergalactic medium (IGM) reflect the heating and ionization history during cosmological structure formation, and are primarily probed by the Lyα forest of neutral hydrogen absorption features in the observed spectra of background sources. We present the methodology and initial results from the Cholla IGM Photoheating Simulation (CHIPS) suite performed with the graphics process unit–accelerated Cholla code to study the IGM at high, uniform spatial resolution maintained over large volumes. In this first paper, we examine the IGM structure in CHIPS cosmological simulations that include IGM uniform photoheating and photoionization models where hydrogen reionization is completed early or by redshift z ∼ 6. Comparing with observations of the large- and small-scale Lyα transmitted flux power spectra P(k) at redshifts 2 ≲ z ≲ 5.5, the relative agreement of the models depends on scale, with the self-consistent Puchwein et al. IGM photoheating and photoionization model in good agreement with the flux P(k) at k ≳ 0.01 s km⁻¹ at redshifts 2 ≲ z ≲ 3.5. On larger scales, the P(k) measurements increase in amplitude from z ∼ 4.6 to z ∼ 2.2, faster than the models, and lie in between the model predictions at 2.2 ≲ z ≲ 4.6 for k ≈ 0.002–0.01 s km⁻¹. We argue that the models could improve by changing the He ii photoheating rate associated with active galactic nuclei to reduce the IGM temperature at z ∼ 3. At higher redshifts, z ≳ 4.5, the observed flux P(k) amplitude increases at a rate intermediate between the models, and we argue that for models where hydrogen reionization is completed late (z ∼ 5.5–6), resolving this disagreement will require inhomogeneous or "patchy" reionization. We then use an additional set of simulations to demonstrate that our results have numerically converged and are not strongly affected by varying cosmological parameters.

NASA's Parker Solar Probe mission continues to travel closer to the Sun than any prior human-made object, with an expected closest approach of <10 solar radii (<0.046 au) by 2024. On board, the Integrated Science Investigation of the Sun instrument suite makes unprecedented in situ measurements of energetic particles in the near-Sun environment. The current low level of solar activity offers a prime opportunity to measure cosmic rays closer to the Sun than ever before. We present the first observations of anomalous cosmic rays in to 36 solar radii (0.166 au), focusing specifically on helium. Our results indicate a strong radial intensity gradient of ∼25 ± 5%/au over energies of ∼4 to ∼45 MeV/nuc. These values are larger than prior observations, further out in the heliosphere, and come at a unique time in our understanding and modeling of particle transport and acceleration, particularly as both Voyagers have crossed the heliopause and IBEX has accumulated a full solar cycle of observations. Thus, continued measurements of cosmic rays by Parker Solar Probe will play a critical role in linking past observations with our present knowledge and significantly advancing our understanding of cosmic ray transport in the heliosphere.

The delay-time distribution (DTD) is the occurrence rate of a class of objects as a function of time after a hypothetical burst of star formation. DTDs are mainly used as a statistical test of stellar evolution scenarios for supernova progenitors, but they can be applied to many other classes of astronomical objects. We calculate the first DTD for RR Lyrae variables using 29,810 RR Lyrae from the OGLE-IV survey and a map of the stellar age distribution (SAD) in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). We find that ∼46% of the OGLE-IV RR Lyrae are associated with delay times greater than 8 Gyr (main-sequence progenitor masses less than 1 M_⊙), and consistent with existing constraints on their ages, but surprisingly about 51% of RR Lyrae appear to have delay times of 1.2–8 Gyr (main-sequence masses between 1 and 2 M_⊙ at LMC metallicity). This intermediate-age signal also persists outside the Bar region, where crowding is less of a concern, and we verified that without this signal the spatial distribution of the OGLE-IV RR Lyrae is inconsistent with the SAD map of the LMC. Since an intermediate-age RR Lyrae channel is in tension with the lack of RR Lyrae in intermediate-age clusters (noting issues with small-number statistics), and noting the age–metallicity constraints on LMC stars, our DTD result possibly indicates that systematic uncertainties may still exist in SAD measurements of old stellar populations, perhaps stemming from the construction methodology or the stellar evolution models used. We describe tests to further investigate this issue.

In ultraviolet (UV) spectropolarimetric observations of the solar corona, the existence of a magnetic field, solar wind velocity, and temperature anisotropies modify the linear polarization associated with resonant scattering. Unlike previous empirical models or global models, which present blended results of the above physical effects, in this work, we forward-model expected signals in the H i Lyα line (121.6 nm) by adopting an analytic model that can be adjusted to test the roles of different effects separately. We find that the impact of all three effects is most evident in the rotation of the linear polarization direction. In particular, (1) for magnetic fields between ∼10 and ∼100 G, the Hanle effect modifies the linear polarization at low coronal heights, rotating the linear polarization direction clockwise (counterclockwise) when the angle between the magnetic field and the local vertical is greater (less) than the van Vleck angle, which is consistent with the result of Zhao et al.; (2) solar wind velocity, which increases with height, has a significant effect through the Doppler dimming effect at higher coronal heights, rotating the linear polarization direction in an opposite fashion to the Hanle effect; and (3) kinetic temperature anisotropies are most significant at lower heights in open nonradial magnetic field regions, producing tilt opposite to isotropic Doppler dimming. The fact that the three effects operate differently in distinct spatial regimes opens up the possibility for using linear polarization measurements in UV lines to diagnose these important physical characteristics of the solar corona.

Radial diffusion in planetary radiation belts is a dominant transport mechanism resulting in the energization and losses of charged particles by large-scale electromagnetic fluctuations. In this study, we revisit the radial diffusion formalism by relaxing the assumption of zero correlation time in the spectrum of fluctuations responsible for the transport of charged particles. We derive a diffusion coefficient by assuming fluctuations that (1) are time homogeneous, (2) too small to trap the particles, and (3) can decorrelate on timescales comparable to the transit time of the particles. We demonstrate through self-similar solutions of the Fokker–Planck equation that autocorrelation time τ_c much larger than the linear transit time/particle drift period ${\tau }_{L}={{\rm{\Omega }}}_{D}^{-1}$ results in characteristic time for transport independent of the drift frequency and faster than for short correlation time. In both instances, that is for short (τ_L ≫ τ_c) and long (τ_L ≪ τ_c) autocorrelation time, the diffusion of particles is subdiffusive since the variance of increments along the magnetic drift shells L*, scales as 〈ΔL*²〉 ∼ t^s, with s < 1. However, in the absence of sources and sinks, particle transport for both short and long autocorrelation times result in equilibrium distribution along L* with differences of less than 10% across lower magnetic drift shells. The main consequence of incorporating finite correlation time appears in intermediate times much longer than the drift period but before the distribution function reaches equilibrium and indicates the importance of quantifying observationally the spectral properties of fluctuations for the modeling of planetary radiation belts.

Heating of neutral gas by energetic sources is crucial for the prediction of the 21 cm signal during the epoch of reionization. To investigate differences induced on the statistics of the 21 cm signal by various source types, we use five radiative transfer simulations that have the same stellar UV emission model and varying combinations of more energetic sources, such as X-ray binaries (XRBs), accreting nuclear black holes (BHs), and hot interstellar medium emission (ISM). We find that the efficient heating from the ISM increases the average global 21 cm signal while reducing its fluctuations and thus power spectrum. A clear impact is also observed in the bispectrum in terms of scale and timing of the transition between a positive and a negative value. The impact of XRBs is similar to that of the ISM, although it is delayed in time and reduced in intensity because of the less efficient heating. Due to the paucity of nuclear BHs, the behavior of the 21 cm statistics in their presence is very similar to that of a case when only stars are considered, with the exception of the latest stages of reionization, when the effect of BHs is clearly visible. We find that differences between the source scenarios investigated here are larger than the instrumental noise of SKA1-low at z ≳ 7–8, suggesting that in the future it might be possible to constrain the spectral energy distribution of the sources contributing to the reionization process.

We present newly calibrated period–ϕ₃₁–[Fe/H] relations for fundamental-mode RR Lyrae stars in the optical and, for the first time, mid-infrared. This work's calibration data set provides the largest and most comprehensive span of parameter space to date, with homogeneous metallicities from −3 ≲ [Fe/H] ≲ 0.4 and accurate Fourier parameters derived from 1980 ASAS-SN (V band) and 1083 WISE (NEOWISE extension, W1 and W2 bands) RR Lyrae stars with well-sampled light curves. We compare our optical period–ϕ₃₁–[Fe/H] relation with those available in the literature and demonstrate that our relation minimizes systematic trends in the lower and higher metallicity range. Moreover, a direct comparison shows that our optical photometric metallicities are consistent with both those from high-resolution spectroscopy and globular clusters, supporting the good performance of our relation. We found an intrinsic scatter in the photometric metallicities (0.41 dex in the V band and 0.50 dex in the infrared) by utilizing large calibration data sets covering a broad metallicity range. This scatter becomes smaller when optical and infrared bands are used together (0.37 dex). Overall, the relations derived in this work have many potential applications, including large-area photometric surveys with James Webb Space Telescope in the infrared and LSST in the optical.

The accurate measurement of stellar masses over a wide range of galaxy properties is essential for better constraining models of galaxy evolution. Emission-line galaxies (ELGs) tend to have better redshift estimates than continuum-selected objects, and have been shown to span a large range of physical properties, including stellar mass. Using data from the 3D-HST Treasury program, in this work, we construct a carefully vetted sample of 4350 ELGs at redshifts of 1.16 < z < 1.90. We combine the 3D-HST emission-line fluxes with far-UV through near-IR photometry, and use the MCSED spectral energy distribution fitting code to constrain the galaxies' physical parameters, such as their star-formation rate and stellar masses. Our sample is consistent with the z ∼ 2 mass–metallicity relation. More importantly, we show that there is a simple, but tight correlation between stellar mass and absolute magnitude in a near-IR filter, which should prove particularly useful in terms of the rapid calculation of accurate stellar masses for millions of galaxies in upcoming missions such as Euclid, and the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope.

Although stellar-mass black holes (BHs) are likely to be abundant in the Milky Way (N = 10⁸–10⁹), only 20 have been detected to date, all in accreting binary systems. Gravitational microlensing is a proposed technique to search for isolated BHs, which have not yet been detected. Two specific microlensing events, MACHO-1996-BLG-5 (M96-B5) and MACHO-1998-BLG-6 (M98-B6), initially observed near the lens-source minimum angular separation in 1996 and 1998, respectively, have long Einstein crossing times (>300 days), identifying the lenses as candidate black holes. Twenty years have elapsed since the time of lens-source closest approach for each of these events, indicating that if the lens and source are both luminous, and if their relative proper motion is sufficiently large, the two components should be spatially resolvable. In this work, we attempt to eliminate the possibility of a stellar lens for these events by: (1) using Keck near-infrared adaptive optics images to search for a potentially now-resolved, luminous lens, and (2) examining multi-band photometry of the source to search for flux contributions from a potentially unresolved, luminous lens. We combine detection limits from NIRC2 images with light-curve data to eliminate all non-BH lenses for relative lens-source proper motions above 0.81 mas yr⁻¹ for M96-B5, and 2.48 mas yr⁻¹ for M98-B6. Furthermore, we use WFPC2 broad-band images to eliminate the possibility of stellar lenses at any proper motion. We present the narrow range of non-BH possibilities permitted by our varied analyses. Finally, we suggest future observations to constrain the remaining parameter space via the methods developed in this work.

We report photometric estimates of effective temperature, T_eff, metallicity, [Fe/H], carbonicity, [C/Fe], and absolute carbon abundances, A(C), for over 700,000 stars from the Southern Photometric Local Universe Survey (S-PLUS) Data Release 2, covering a substantial fraction of the equatorial Sloan Digital Sky Survey Stripe 82. We present an analysis for two stellar populations: (1) halo main-sequence turnoff stars and (2) K-dwarf stars of mass 0.58 < M/M_⊙ < 0.75 in the Solar Neighborhood. Application of the Stellar Photometric Index Network Explorer (SPHINX) to the mixed-bandwidth (narrow- plus wide-band) filter photometry from S-PLUS produces robust estimates of the metallicities and carbon abundances in stellar atmospheres over a wide range of temperatures, 4250 < T_eff(K) < 7000. The use of multiple narrow-band S-PLUS filters enables SPHINX to achieve substantially lower levels of "catastrophic failures" (i.e., large offsets in metallicity estimates relative to spectroscopic determinations) than previous efforts using a single metallicity-sensitive narrow-band filter. We constrain the exponential slope of the Milky Way's K-dwarf halo metallicity distribution function (MDF), λ_10,[Fe/H] = 0.85 ± 0.21, over the metallicity range −2.5 < [Fe/H] < −1.0; the MDF of our local-volume K-dwarf sample is well-represented by a gamma distribution with parameters α = 2.8 and β = 4.2. S-PLUS photometry obtains absolute carbon abundances with a precision of ∼0.35 dex for stars with T_eff < 6500 K. We identify 364 candidate carbon-enhanced metal-poor stars, obtain assignments of these stars into the Yoon–Beers morphological groups in the A(C)-[Fe/H] space, and we derive the CEMP frequencies.

We searched for shocked carbon chain chemistry (SCCC) sources with C₃S abundances surpassing those of HC₅N toward the dark cloud L1251, using the Effelsberg telescope at the K band (18–26 GHz). L1251-1 and L1251-3 are identified as the most promising SCCC sources. The two sources harbor young stellar objects. We conducted mapping observations toward L1251-A, the western tail of L1251, at λ ∼ 3 mm with the Purple Mountain Observatory 13.7 m and the Nobeyama Radio Observatory 45 m telescopes in lines of C₂H, N₂H⁺, CS, HCO⁺, SO, HC₃N, and C¹⁸O as well as in CO 3–2 using the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope (JCMT). The spectral data were combined with archival data including Spitzer and Herschel continuum maps for further analysis. Filamentary substructures labeled as F1–F6 were extracted in L1251, with F1 being associated with L1251-A hosting L1251-1. The peak positions of dense gas traced by HCO⁺ are misaligned relative to those of the dust clumps. Episodic outflows are common in this region. The twisted morphology of F1 and velocity distribution along L1251-A may originate from stellar feedback. SCCC in L1251-1 may have been caused by outflow activities originated from the infrared source IRS1. The signposts of ongoing SCCC and the broadened line widths of C₃S and C₄H in L1251-1 as well as the distribution of HC₃N are also related to outflow activities in this region. L1251-1 (IRS1) together with the previously identified SCCC source IRS3 demonstrate that L1251-A is an excellent region to study SCCC.

In our companion paper (Brought to Light I: Michea et al.), we reveal spectacular spiral-galaxy-like features in deep optical imaging of nine Virgo early-type dwarf galaxies, hidden beneath a dominating smooth stellar disk. Using a new combination of approaches, we find that bar- and spiral-like features contribute 2.2%–6.4% of the total flux within 2 R_eff. In this study, we conduct high-resolution simulations of cluster harassment of passive dwarf galaxies. Following close pericenter passages of the cluster core, tidal triggering generates features in our model disks that bear a striking resemblance to the observed features. However, we find the disks must be highly rotationally supported (V_peak/σ₀ ∼ 3), much higher than typically observed. We propose that some early-type dwarfs may contain a few percent of their mass in a cold, thin disk that is buried in the light of a hot, diffuse disk and only revealed when they undergo tidal triggering. The red optical colors of our sample do not indicate any recent significant star formation, and our simulations show that very plunging pericenter passages (r_peri < 0.25r_vir) are required for tidal triggering. Thus, many cluster early-type dwarfs with less-plunging orbits may host a yet-undetected cold stellar disk component. We discuss possible origin scenarios and consider why similar-mass star-forming galaxies in the field are significantly more thin-disk dominated than in our cluster sample.

The Hubble constant (H₀) tension between Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) and Planck measurements ranges from 4 to 6σ. To investigate this tension, we estimate H₀ in the ΛCDM and ${w}_{0}{w}_{a}$CDM (cold dark matter) models by dividing the Pantheon sample, the largest compilation of SNe Ia, into 3, 4, 20, and 40 bins. We fit the extracted H₀ values with a function mimicking the redshift evolution: $g{(z)={H}_{0}(z)={\tilde{H}}_{0}/(1+z)}^{\alpha }$, where α indicates an evolutionary parameter and ${\tilde{H}}_{0}={H}_{0}$ at z = 0. We set the absolute magnitude of SNe Ia so that ${H}_{0}\,=73.5\,\mathrm{km}\,{{\rm{s}}}^{-1}\,{\mathrm{Mpc}}^{-1}$, and we fix fiducial values for ${{\rm{\Omega }}}_{0m}^{{\rm{\Lambda }}\mathrm{CDM}}=0.298$ and ${{\rm{\Omega }}}_{0m}^{{w}_{0}{w}_{a}\mathrm{CDM}}=0.308$. We find that H₀ evolves with redshift, showing a slowly decreasing trend, with α coefficients consistent with zero only from 1.2 to 2.0σ. Although the α coefficients are compatible with zero in 3σ, this however may affect cosmological results. We measure locally a variation of ${H}_{0}(z=0)-{H}_{0}(z=1)=0.4\,\mathrm{km}\,{{\rm{s}}}^{-1}\,{\mathrm{Mpc}}^{-1}$ in three and four bins. Extrapolating ${H}_{0}(z)$ to z = 1100, the redshift of the last scattering surface, we obtain values of H₀ compatible in 1σ with Planck measurements independent of the cosmological models and number of bins we investigated. Thus, we have reduced the H₀ tension in the range from 54% to 72% for both cosmological models. If the decreasing trend of ${H}_{0}(z)$ is real, it could be due to astrophysical selection effects or to modified gravity.

Following a tidal disruption event (TDE), the accretion rate can evolve from quiescent to near-Eddington levels and back over timescales of months to years. This provides a unique opportunity to study the formation and evolution of the accretion flow around supermassive black holes (SMBHs). We present 2 yr of multiwavelength monitoring observations of the TDE AT2018fyk at X-ray, UV, optical, and radio wavelengths. We identify three distinct accretion states and two state transitions between them. These appear remarkably similar to the behavior of stellar-mass black holes in outburst. The X-ray spectral properties show a transition from a soft (thermal-dominated) to a hard (power-law-dominated) spectral state around L_bol ∼ few × 10⁻²L_Edd and the strengthening of the corona over time ∼100–200 days after the UV/optical peak. Contemporaneously, the spectral energy distribution (in particular, the UV to X-ray spectral slope α_ox) shows a pronounced softening as the outburst progresses. The X-ray timing properties also show a marked change, initially dominated by variability at long (>day) timescales, while a high-frequency (∼10⁻³ Hz) component emerges after the transition into the hard state. At late times (∼500 days after peak), a second accretion state transition occurs, from the hard into the quiescent state, as identified by the sudden collapse of the bolometric (X-ray+UV) emission to levels below 10^−3.4L_Edd. Our findings illustrate that TDEs can be used to study the scale (in)variance of accretion processes in individual SMBHs. Consequently, they provide a new avenue to study accretion states over seven orders of magnitude in black hole mass, removing limitations inherent to commonly used ensemble studies.

Modeling collisionless magnetic reconnection rate is an outstanding challenge in basic plasma physics research. While the seemingly universal rate of an order ${ \mathcal O }(0.1)$ is often reported in the low-β regime, it is not clear how reconnection rate scales with a higher plasma β. Due to the complexity of the pressure tensor, the available reconnection rate model is limited to the low plasma-β regime, where the thermal pressure is arguably negligible. However, the thermal pressure effect becomes important when $\beta \gtrsim { \mathcal O }(1)$. Using first-principle kinetic simulations, we show that both the reconnection rate and outflow speed drop as β gets larger. A simple analytical framework is derived to take account of the self-generated pressure anisotropy and pressure gradient in the force balance around the diffusion region, explaining the varying trend of key quantities and reconnection rates in these simulations with different β. The predicted scaling of the normalized reconnection rate is $\simeq { \mathcal O }(0.1/\sqrt{{\beta }_{i0}})$ in the high-β limit, where β_i0 is the ion β of the inflow plasma.

While solar flares are predominantly characterized by an intense broadband enhancement to the solar radiative output, certain spectral lines and continua will, in theory, exhibit flare-induced dimmings. Observations of transitions of orthohelium He iλλ 10830 Å and the He i D3 lines have shown evidence of such dimming, usually followed by enhanced emission. It has been suggested that nonthermal collisional ionization of helium by an electron beam, followed by recombinations to orthohelium, is responsible for overpopulating those levels, leading to stronger absorption. However, it has not been possible observationally to preclude the possibility of overpopulating orthohelium via enhanced photoionization of He i by EUV irradiance from the flaring corona followed by recombinations. Here we present radiation hydrodynamics simulations of nonthermal electron-beam-driven flares where (1) both nonthermal collisional ionization of helium and coronal irradiance are included, and (2) only coronal irradiance is included. A grid of simulations covering a range of total energies deposited by the electron beam and a range of nonthermal electron-beam low-energy cutoff values were simulated. In order to obtain flare-induced dimming of the He i 10830 Å line, it was necessary for nonthermal collisional ionization to be present. The effect was more prominent in flares with larger low-energy cutoff values and longer lived in weaker flares and flares with a more gradual energy deposition timescale. These results demonstrate the usefulness of orthohelium line emission as a diagnostic of flare energy transport.

The boundaries identification of Kelvin–Helmholtz vortices in observational data has been addressed by searching for single-spacecraft small-scale signatures. A recent hybrid Vlasov–Maxwell simulation of Kelvin–Helmholtz instability has pointed out clear kinetic features that uniquely characterize the vortex during both the nonlinear and turbulent stage of the instability. We compare the simulation results with in situ observations of Kelvin–Helmholtz vortices by the Magnetospheric Multiscale satellites. We find good agreement between simulation and observations. In particular, the edges of the vortex are associated with strong current sheets, while the center is characterized by a low value for the magnitude of the total current density and strong deviation of the ion distribution function from a Maxwellian distribution. We also find a significant temperature anisotropy parallel to the magnetic field inside the vortex region and strong agyrotropies near the edges. We suggest that these kinetic features can be useful for the identification of Kelvin–Helmholtz vortices in in situ data.

Understanding the escape of ionizing (Lyman continuum) photons from galaxies is vital for determining how galaxies contributed to reionization in the early universe. While directly detecting the Lyman continuum from high-redshift galaxies is impossible due to the intergalactic medium, low-redshift galaxies in principle offer this possibility but require observations from space. The first local galaxy for which Lyman continuum escape was found is Haro 11, a luminous blue compact galaxy at z = 0.02, where observations with the FUSE satellite revealed an escape fraction of 3.3%. However, the FUSE aperture covers the entire galaxy, and it is not clear from where the Lyman continuum is leaking out. Here we utilize Hubble Space Telescope/Cosmic Origins Spectrograph spectroscopy in the wavelength range 1100–1700 Å of the three knots (A, B, and C) of Haro 11 to study the presence of Lyα emission and the properties of intervening gas. We find that all knots have bright Lyα emission. UV absorption lines, originating in the neutral interstellar medium, as well as lines probing the ionized medium, are seen extending to blueshifted velocities of 500 km s⁻¹ in all three knots, demonstrating the presence of an outflowing multiphase medium. We find that knots A and B have large covering fractions of neutral gas, making LyC escape along these sightlines improbable, while knot C has a much lower covering fraction (≲50%). Knot C also has the the highest Lyα escape fraction, and we conclude that it is the most likely source of the escaping Lyman continuum detected in Haro 11.

A sample of 1.3 mm continuum cores in the Dragon infrared dark cloud (also known as G28.37+0.07 or G28.34+0.06) is analyzed statistically. Based on their association with molecular outflows, the sample is divided into protostellar and starless cores. Statistical tests suggest that the protostellar cores are more massive than the starless cores, even after temperature and opacity biases are accounted for. We suggest that the mass difference indicates core mass growth since their formation. The mass growth implies that massive star formation may not have to start with massive prestellar cores, depending on the core mass growth rate. Its impact on the relation between core mass function and stellar initial mass function is to be further explored.

We present and discuss three extremely r-process enhanced stars located in the massive dwarf spheroidal galaxy Fornax. These stars are very unique with an extreme Eu enrichment (1.25 ≤ [Eu/Fe]≤1.45) at high metallicities (−1.3 ≤ [Fe/H]≤−0.8). They have the largest Eu abundances ever observed in a dwarf galaxy opening new opportunities to further understand the origin of heavy elements formed by the r-process. We derive stellar abundances of Co, Zr, La, Ce, Pr, Nd, Er, and Lu using one-dimensional, local thermodynamic equilibrium codes and model atmospheres in conjunction with state-of-the art yield predictions. We derive Zr in the largest sample of stars (105) known to date in a dwarf galaxy. Accurate stellar abundances combined with a careful assessment of the yield predictions have revealed three metal-rich stars in Fornax showing a pure r-process pattern. We define a new class of stars, namely, Eu-stars, as r-II stars (i.e., [Eu/Fe] > 1) at high metallicities (i.e., [Fe/H] ≳ −1.5). The stellar abundance pattern contains Lu, observed for the first time in a dwarf galaxy, and reveals that a late burst of star formation has facilitated extreme r-process enhancement late in the galaxy's history (<4 Gyr ago). Due to the large uncertainties associated with the nuclear physics input in the yield predictions, we cannot yet determine the r-process site leading to the three Eu-stars in Fornax. Our results demonstrate that extremely r-rich stars are not only associated with ultra-faint low-mass dwarf galaxies, but can be born also in massive dwarf galaxies.

There are only a few very-high-energy sources in our Galaxy that might accelerate particles up to the knee of the cosmic-ray spectrum. To understand the mechanisms of particle acceleration in these PeVatron candidates, Fermi-Large Area Telescope (LAT) and High-Energy Stereoscopic System (H.E.S.S.) observations are essential to characterize their γ-ray emission. HESS J1640–465 and the PeVatron candidate HESS J1641–463 are two neighboring (0.25°) γ-ray sources, spatially coincident with the radio supernova remnants (SNRs) G338.3–0.0 and G338.5+0.1. Detected both by H.E.S.S. and the Fermi-LAT, we present here a morphological and spectral analysis of these two sources using 8 yr of Fermi-LAT data between 200 MeV and 1 TeV with multiwavelength observations to assess their nature. The morphology of HESS J1640–465 is described by a 2D Gaussian (σ = 0.053° ± 0.011°_stat ± 0.03°_syst) and its spectrum is modeled by a power law with a spectral index Γ = 1.8 ± 0.1_stat ± 0.2_syst. HESS J1641–463 is detected as a point-like source and its GeV emission is described by a logarithmic-parabola spectrum with α = 2.7 ± 0.1_stat ± 0.2_syst and significant curvature of β = 0.11 ± 0.03_stat ± 0.05_syst. Radio and X-ray flux upper limits were derived. We investigated scenarios to explain their emission, namely, the emission from accelerated particles within the SNRs spatially coincident with each source, molecular clouds illuminated by cosmic rays from the close-by SNRs, and a pulsar/pulsar wind nebula origin. Our new Fermi-LAT results and the radio and flux X-ray upper limits pose severe constraints on some of these models.

Theoretical and numerical works indicate that a strong magnetic field should suppress fragmentation in dense cores. However, this has never been tested observationally in a relatively large sample of fragmenting massive dense cores. Here, we use the polarization data obtained in the Submillimeter Array Legacy Survey of Zhang et al. to build a sample of 18 massive dense cores where both fragmentation and magnetic field properties are studied in a uniform way. We measured the fragmentation level, N_mm, within the field of view common to all regions of ∼0.15 pc, with a mass sensitivity of ∼0.5 M_☉, and a spatial resolution of ∼1000 au. In order to obtain the magnetic field strength using the Davis–Chandrasekhar–Fermi method, we estimated the dispersion of the polarization position angles, the velocity dispersion of the H¹³CO⁺(4–3) gas, and the density of each core, all averaged within 0.15 pc. A strong correlation is found between N_mm and the average density of the parental core, although with significant scatter. When large-scale systematic motions are separated from the velocity dispersion and only the small-scale (turbulent) contribution is taken into account, a tentative correlation is found between N_mm and the mass-to-flux ratio, as suggested by numerical and theoretical works.

We present Tully–Fisher distances for 24 active galactic nucleus (AGN) host galaxies with black hole mass (M_BH) measurements from reverberation mapping, as well as the first calibration of the V-band Tully–Fisher relation. Combining our measurements of H i 21 cm emission with Hubble Space Telescope and ground-based optical and near-infrared images allows multiple distance measurements for 19 galaxies and single measurements for the remaining 5. Separation of the nucleus from its host galaxy via surface brightness decomposition yields galaxy-only luminosities, thus allowing measurements of the distance moduli free of contamination from the AGNs. For 14 AGN hosts, these are the first reported distances independent of redshift, and hence independent of peculiar velocities. For the remaining galaxies, we show good agreement between our distances and those previously reported from surface brightness fluctuations and Cepheids. We also determine the total galaxy mass enclosed within the estimated H i radius, which when compared to the baryonic content allows for constraints on the dark matter masses. We find a typical mass fraction of M_DM/M_DYN = 62%, and find significant correlations between M_BH–M_DYN and M_BH–M_DM. Finally, we scale our galaxy radii based on estimated relationships between visible and halo radii and assume a flat rotation curve out to the halo radius to approximate M_HALO. Over the range of M_BH and M_HALO in this sample, we find good agreement with observationally constrained relationships between M_BH and M_HALO and with hydrodynamical simulations.

We describe a complete, flux-density-limited sample of galaxies at redshift 0.8 < z < 1.3 selected at 16 μm. At the selection wavelength near 8 μm rest, the observed emission comes from both dust heated by intense star formation and active galactic nuclei (AGNs). Fitting the spectral energy distributions (SEDs) of the sample galaxies to local-galaxy templates reveals that more than half the galaxies have SEDs dominated by star formation. About one-sixth of the galaxy SEDs are dominated by an AGN, and nearly all of the rest of the SEDs are composite. Comparison with X-ray and far-infrared observations shows that combinations of luminosities at rest-frame 4.5 and 8 μm give good measures of both AGN luminosity and star formation rate. The sample galaxies mostly follow the established star-forming main sequence for z = 1 galaxies, but of the galaxies more than 0.5 dex above that main sequence, more than half have AGN-type SEDs. Similarly, the most luminous AGNs tend to have higher star formation rates than the main-sequence value. Galaxies with stellar masses >10¹¹M_⊙ are unlikely to host an AGN. About 1% of the sample galaxies show an SED with dust emission typical of neither star formation nor an AGN.

We analyze the 3D morphology and kinematics of 13 open clusters (OCs) located within 500 pc of the Sun, using Gaia EDR 3 and kinematic data from the literature. Members of OCs are identified using the unsupervised machine-learning method StarGO, using five parameters (X, Y, Z, ${\mu }_{\alpha }\cos \delta ,{\mu }_{\delta }$). The OC sample covers an age range of 25 Myr to 2.65 Gyr. We correct the asymmetric distance distribution that is due to parallax error using Bayesian inversion. The uncertainty in the corrected distance for a cluster at 500 pc is 3.0–6.3 pc, depending on the intrinsic spatial distribution of its members. We determine the 3D morphology of the OCs in our sample and fit the spatial distribution of stars within the tidal radius in each cluster with an ellipsoid model. The shapes of the OCs are well described with oblate spheroids (NGC 2547, NGC 2516, NGC 2451A, NGC 2451B, and NGC 2232), prolate spheroids (IC 2602, IC 4665, NGC 2422, Blanco 1, and Coma Berenices), or triaxial ellipsoids (IC 2391, NGC 6633, and NGC 6774). The semimajor axis of the fitted ellipsoid is parallel to the Galactic plane for most clusters. Elongated filament-like substructures are detected in three young clusters (NGC 2232, NGC 2547, and NGC 2451B), while tidal-tail-like substructures (tidal tails) are found in older clusters (NGC 2516, NGC 6633, NGC 6774, Blanco 1, and Coma Berenices). Most clusters may be supervirial and expanding. N-body models of rapid gas expulsion with a star formation efficiency of ≈1/3 are consistent with clusters more massive than 250 M_⊙, while clusters less massive than 250 M_⊙ tend to agree with adiabatic gas expulsion models. Only five OCs (NGC 2422, NGC 6633, NGC 6774, Blanco 1, and Coma Berenices) show clear signs of mass segregation.

The elemental and isotopic compositions of meteorites are expected to reflect several key processes that occurred in the early solar system, including the migration of gas and dust throughout the protoplanetary disk, the formation of chondrules, and the accretion of the first planetary bodies. However, the specific origins of the various compositions measured among these rocks are currently poorly constrained, limiting our understanding of these processes. Here, we use previously measured elemental and isotopic compositions of chondrites and iron meteorites to identify that carbonaceous (CC) meteorites are mixtures of noncarbonaceous (NC) material, calcium–aluminum-rich inclusion (CAI) material, and CI (Ivuna-like) material, in varying proportions. These trends indicate that chondrules in CO (Ornans-like), CM (Mighei-like), CV (Vigarano-like), and TL (Tagish Lake) chondrites share near-identical average proportions of CI material, arguing that they were generated through the remelting of preexisting NC chondrules all in the same disk environment. Because this proportion likely evolved over space and time throughout the disk, this similarity argues that these chondrules originate from a restricted spatial region and time interval, favoring their generation through a localized event. Moreover, the compositions of CR (Renazzo-like) chondrites indicate that their constituents formed through mechanisms different from those in CO, CM, CV, and TL chondrites. The recovered proportions of CI material in CC iron meteorites and chondrites together also argue for evolution in either the predominant direction of dust and gas motion in the first ∼10 au of the disk or the radial distance of planetesimal accretion throughout the CC reservoir.

We aim at estimating the dust scale height of protoplanetary disks from millimeter continuum observations. First, we present a general expression of intensity of a ring in a protoplanetary disk and show that we can constrain the dust scale height by the azimuthal intensity variation. Then, we apply the presented methodology to the two distinct rings at 68 au and at 100 au of the protoplanetary disk around HD 163296. We constrain the dust scale height by comparing the high-resolution millimeter dust continuum image obtained in the Disk Substructures at High Angular Resolution Project (DSHARP) with radiative transfer simulations using RADMC-3D. We find that h_d/h_g > 0.84 at the inner ring and h_d/h_g < 0.11 at the outer ring with 3σ uncertainties, where h_d is the dust scale height and h_g is the gas scale height. This indicates that the dust is flared at the inner ring and settled at the outer ring. We further constrain the ratio of the turbulence parameter α to the gas-to-dust-coupling parameter St from the derived dust scale height; α/St > 2.4 at the inner ring, and α/St < $1.1\times {10}^{-2}$ at the outer ring. This result shows that the turbulence is stronger or the dust is smaller at the inner ring than at the outer ring.

We have carried out a search for massive white dwarfs (WDs) in the direction of young open star clusters using the Gaia DR2 database. The aim of this survey was (1) to provide robust data for new and previously known high-mass WDs regarding cluster membership, (2) to highlight WDs previously included in the initial final mass relation (IFMR) that are unlikely members of their respective clusters according to Gaia astrometry, and (3) to select an unequivocal WD sample that could then be compared with the host clusters' turnoff masses. All promising WD candidates in each cluster color–magnitude diagram were followed up with spectroscopy from Gemini in order to determine whether they were indeed WDs and derive their masses, temperatures, and ages. In order to be considered cluster members, white dwarfs were required to (1) have proper motions and parallaxes within 2σ, 3σ, or 4σ of those of their potential parent cluster based on how contaminated the field was in their region of the sky, (2) have a cooling age that was less than the cluster age, and (3) have a mass that was broadly consistent with the IFMR. A number of WDs included in current versions of the IFMR turned out to be nonmembers, and a number of apparent members, based on Gaia's astrometric data alone, were rejected, as their mass and/or cooling times were incompatible with cluster membership. In this way, we developed a highly selected IFMR sample for high-mass WDs that, surprisingly, contained no precursor masses significantly in excess of ∼ 6 M_⊙.