International Research Fellowship Program: Using Kinematics to Identify Juvenile-Aged Cool Stars in Nearby Moving Groups.

国际研究奖学金计划使美国科学家和工程师能够在国外进行9到24个月的研究。该计划的奖项提供了联合研究的机会，并利用国外独特或互补的设施、专业知识和实验条件。该奖项将支持Jacqueline K.Faherty博士为期24个月的研究奖学金，与智利大学的Maria T.Ruiz博士和Nicole van der Bliek博士以及波士顿大学的Andrew West博士在美国合作。恒星形成研究解决现代天体物理学中心的问题，产生从银河系行星频率到第一批恒星诞生的原始宇宙条件等主题的结果。银河系中最丰富的恒星是最低温度的M矮星，因此它们是了解化学、环境和/或空间条件如何影响恒星形成过程的关键。天文学家长期以来一直非常详细地研究猎户座、蛇夫座、金牛座等区域，我们对恒星形成的许多物理特征的知识来自对这些密集和高度活跃的天空区域的研究。不幸的是，由于距离这些恒星形成区很远，直接探测和分辨圆盘，寻找低质量的伴星--本质上微弱的M矮星--的详细研究就变得困难了。在当前和未来的恒星和行星形成研究中，最有希望的M矮星目标将在最近发现的少年年龄(8-50 Myr)、近距离(100%)、共同移动的恒星集合中找到，这些恒星被称为移动群。移动星团的年轻使它们成为寻找环绕恒星和/或吸积盘的诱人目标，而靠近太阳使它们很容易成为成像和光谱分析的目标，以解析盘结构和伴星。这项拟议的研究的目的是利用M矮星独特的运动学数据集，并调查太阳附近地区潜在的中年活动群体的新成员。这些新成员填补了我们对行星和恒星发展过程的理解上的巨大空白。

0965192FahertyThe International Research Fellowship Program enables U.S. scientists and engineers to conduct nine to twenty-four months of research abroad. The program's awards provide opportunities for joint research, and the use of unique or complementary facilities, expertise and experimental conditions abroad.This award will support a twenty-four-month research fellowship by Dr. Jacqueline K. Faherty to work with Dr. Maria T. Ruiz and Dr. Nicole van der Bliek at the University of Chile and with Dr. Andrew West at Boston University in the US.Star formation studies address questions at the center of modern astrophysics producing results on topics ranging from the planetary frequency in the Galaxy to the conditions of the primordial Universe under which the first stars were born. The most abundant stars in the Galaxy are the lowest-temperature M dwarfs therefore they are a key to understanding how chemical, environmental and/or spatial conditions affect the processes of star formation. Astronomers have long studied regions such as Orion, Ophiucus, Taurus etc, in great detail and our knowledge of many physical characteristics of star formation come from studies of these dense and highly active areas on the sky. Unfortunately, the distances to these star-forming regions make detailed studies--directly detecting and resolving disks, looking for low-mass companions--of the intrinsically faint M dwarfs, difficult. The most promising M dwarf targets for current and future star and planetary formation studies will be found in the recently identified juvenile aged (8-50 Myr), close (100pc), co-moving collections of stars called moving groups. The youthfulness of moving groups makes them appealing targets for searching for circumstellar and/or accretion disks and the proximity to the Sun makes them easy targets for imaging and spectroscopy to resolve disk structure and companions. The objective of the proposed research is to take advantage of a unique kinematic dataset of M dwarfs, and investigate potential new members of intermediate-aged moving groups in the local vicinity of the Sun. These new members fill large gaps in our understanding of the processes of planetary and stellar development.