Final Activity Report Summary - ORION (The Young Stellar Population in the Solar Neighbourhood)
The main goal of the project involved in this ERG was the determination of the properties of the stars in the solar neighbourhood. In particular, the researcher intended to distinguish between the two scenarios proposed for the excess of stars observed in shallow X-ray surveys by different authors in the past: that the excess comes from a young stellar population coming from nearby star-forming regions that were active in the past, or binary (X-ray emitting) stars not accounted for by the typical models of star formation and galactic evolution.
This work was begun by the researcher during his two-year contract under the Marie Curie Action (Transfr of Knowledge) at the Osservatorio Astronomico di Palermo, and finished during the past months. The study required a large number of observations from large telescopes on the stellar sample of the Bright Serendipitous Sample (BSS: a sample from a survey of X-ray sources, galaxies and stars, with high levels of X-ray flux using the European mission XMM-Newton).
The first results of the work indicate that there are noticeable large numbers of young stars in the sample. Thus, the first scenario seems to be more plausible. Taking this result into account, the researcher began a study on the X-ray properties of young stellar associations and moving groups in the solar vicinity that has concluded with the publication of a new paper (recently accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysics). The results of this study will be used in an immediate future to constraint the properties of the BSS stellar sample to clearly distinguish between the two scenarios proposed.
This work was begun by the researcher during his two-year contract under the Marie Curie Action (Transfr of Knowledge) at the Osservatorio Astronomico di Palermo, and finished during the past months. The study required a large number of observations from large telescopes on the stellar sample of the Bright Serendipitous Sample (BSS: a sample from a survey of X-ray sources, galaxies and stars, with high levels of X-ray flux using the European mission XMM-Newton).
The first results of the work indicate that there are noticeable large numbers of young stars in the sample. Thus, the first scenario seems to be more plausible. Taking this result into account, the researcher began a study on the X-ray properties of young stellar associations and moving groups in the solar vicinity that has concluded with the publication of a new paper (recently accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysics). The results of this study will be used in an immediate future to constraint the properties of the BSS stellar sample to clearly distinguish between the two scenarios proposed.