Estimation of the Low-End Mass Function of the Arches Cluster
Jihye Shin; Sungsoo S Kim; Jihye Shin; Department of Astronomy and Space Science, Kyung Hee University, Yongin-shi, Kyungki-do 449-701, South Korea; Sungsoo S Kim; Department of Astronomy and Space Science, Kyung Hee University, Yongin-shi, Kyungki-do 449-701, South Korea
Журнал:
Journal of Physics: Conference Series
Дата:
2006-12-01
Аннотация:
It has been suggested that the nonstandard star formation environment near the Galactic Center (GC) may lead to an initial mass function (IMF) skewed toward relatively massive stars and having an elevated mass cutoff. Two GC star clusters, the Arches and the Quintuplet, may give an answer to this hypothesis, but the most recent high-resolution IR, observations for these clusters can only resolve stars with masses down to ∼5M<sub>⊙</sub>. Here, we present a new method for estimating the low-end mass function (MF) from a background-limited observation of a star cluster. We empirically find the mass function that gives the best match between the pixel intensity histograms of the observed image and the model image that is constructed for an assumed mass function. This method also employs Fokker-Planck (FP) models to reproduce the spatial distribution of stars as a function of mass.
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