• Title/Summary/Keyword: Galactic Center

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Climate Influences of Galactic Cosmic Rays (GCR): Review and Implications for Research Policy (우주기원의 고에너지 입자가 기후에 미치는 영향: 연구 현황과 정책적 시사점)

  • Kim, Jiyoung;Jang, Kun-Il
    • Atmosphere
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    • v.27 no.4
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    • pp.499-509
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    • 2017
  • Possible links among cosmic ray, cloud, and climate have scientific uncertainties. The reputed topics have been highly controversial during several decades. A link between the atmospheric ionization by galactic cosmic rays (GCR), which is modulated by solar activities, and global cloud cover was firstly proposed in 1997. Some researchers suggested that the GCR can stimulate the formation of cloud condensation nuclei (CCN) in the atmosphere, and then the higher CCN concentrations may lead to an increase of cloud cover, resulting in a cooling of the Earth's climate, and vise versa. The CLOUD (Cosmic leaving outdoor droplets) experiment was designed to study the effect of GCR on the formation of atmospheric aerosols and clouds under precisely controlled laboratory conditions. A state-of-the-art chamber experiment has greatly advanced our scientific understanding of the aerosol formation in early stage and its nucleation processes if the GCR effect is considered or not. Many studies on the climate-GCR (or space weather) connection including the CLOUD experiment have been carried out during the several decades. Although it may not be easy to clarify the physical connection, the recent scientific approaches such as the laboratory experiments or modeling studies give some implications that the research definitively contributed to reduce the scientific uncertainties of natural and anthropogenic aerosol radiative forcing as well as to better understand the formation processes of fine particulate matters as an important parameter of air quality forecast.

Z-Distribution and Period Gradient of Classical Cepheids in the Galactic Plane

  • Kim, Chul-Hee
    • Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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    • v.3 no.2
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    • pp.81-92
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    • 1986
  • The z-coordinate distribution of cepheids was studied and the finding of Fernie(1968) that the cepheid layer is inclined to ward a formal Galactic plane and the Sun is located above the cepheid plane was confirmed. It was found that the z-distribution fits better to the parabolic form than a barometric form and a scale height of 54 pc was found. The well known phenomenon that the periods of classical cepheids decrease away from the Galactic center was crudely interpreted as due to an age gradient rater than an abundance gradient under the assumption that relations between the period and galactocentric distance, and between the abundance and period are linear.

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The Shape and Virial Theorem of a Star Cluster in the Galactic Tidal Force Field

  • Lee, See-Woo;Rood, Herbert J.
    • Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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    • v.2 no.1
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    • pp.1-9
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    • 1969
  • On the instantaneous tidal relaxation approximation, formulae are derived for the ellipticities and virial theorem of a slightly flattened homogeneous rotating cluster (the largest axis of the cluster is directed towards the Galactic center), in terms of the Galactic tidal force and the characteristic intrinsic plus orbital angular velocity. The expression for a purely tidally-determined ellipticity is identical to that for an incompressible fluid body of uniform density. Orbital motion generally contributes significantly to the shape of the cluster. The virial theorem is identical to that for an isolated cluster except that the gravitational potential energy is multiplied by (1-${\chi}$), where ${\chi}$ is a positive tidal correction term. To obtain the actual mass of a cluster, the virial theorem mass based on an isolated cluster should be multiplied by the factor 1/(1-${\chi}$). The formulae are applied to open star clusters, the globular cluster ${\omega}$ Centauri, and dwarf elliptical galaxies in the Local Group.

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Cepstrum Analysis of Terrestrial Impact Crater Records

  • Chang, Heon-Young;Han, Cheong-Ho
    • Journal of Astronomy and Space Sciences
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    • v.25 no.2
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    • pp.71-76
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    • 2008
  • Study of terrestrial impact craters is important not only in the field of the solar system formation and evolution but also of the Galactic astronomy. The terrestrial impact cratering record recently has been examined, providing short- and intermediate-term periodicities, such as, ${\sim}26$ Myrs, ${\sim}37$ Myrs. The existence of such a periodicity has an implication in the Galactic dynamics, since the terrestrial impact cratering is usually interpreted as a result of the environmental variation during solar orbiting in the Galactic plane. The aim of this paper is to search for a long-term periodicity with a novel method since no attempt has been made so far in searching a long-term periodicity in this research field in spite of its great importance. We apply the cepstrum analysis method to the terrestrial impact cratering record for the first time. As a result of the analysis we have found noticeable peaks in the Fourier power spectrum appear ing at periods of ${\sim}300$ Myrs and ${\sim}100$ Myrs, which seem in a simple resonance with the revolution period of the Sun around the Galactic center. Finally we briefly discuss its implications and suggest theoretical study be pursued to explain such a long-term periodicity.

Quantifying galactic morphological transformations in the cluster environment

  • Cervantes-Sodi, Bernardo;Park, Chang-Bom;Hernandez, X.
    • The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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    • v.35 no.2
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    • pp.39.1-39.1
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    • 2010
  • We study the effects of the cluster environment on galactic morphology by defining a dimensionless angular momentum parameter ld, to obtain a quantitative and objective measure of galaxy type. The use of this physical parameter allows us to take the study of morphological transformations in clusters beyond the measurements of merely qualitative parameters, e.g. S/E ratios, to a more physical footing. To this end, we employ an extensive SDSS sample, with galaxies associated with Abell galaxy clusters. The sample contains 93 relaxed Abell clusters and over 34,000 individual galaxies. We find that the median ld value tends to decrease as we approach the cluster center, with different dependences according to the mass of the galaxies and the hosting cluster; low and intermediate mass galaxies showing a strong dependence, while massive galaxies seems to show, at all radii, low ld values. By analysing trends in ld as functions of the nearest galactic neighbour environment, clustercentric radius and velocity dispersion of clusters, we can identify clearly the leading physical processes at work. We find that in massive clusters (s > 700 km/s), the interaction with the cluster central region dominates, whilst in smaller clusters galaxy-galaxy interactions are chiefly responsible for driving galactic morphological transformations.

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The Chemical Abundances of Hypervelocity Stars in the Milky Way Disk

  • Yeom, Bum-Suk;Lee, Young Sun;Kim, Young Kwang;Han, Doo-Ri
    • The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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    • v.41 no.1
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    • pp.77.2-77.2
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    • 2016
  • We present preliminary results of the analysis of chemical abundances for seven hypervelocity star (HVS) candidates. These objects are G and K dwarfs in the Galactic disk selected from the Sloan Extension for Galactic Understanding and Exploration. Unlike other HVSs discovered thus far, their stellar orbits and kinematics suggest that they do not originate in the Galactic center or in an accretion event. These factors imply yet-unknown mechanisms that give rise to these kinematically-extreme disk stars. In order to study in detail their progenitors and possible formation mechanisms, we obtained spectra of these stars at a resolving power of R~6000, with the Dual Imaging Spectrograph at the Apache Point Observatory. We derive the abundances of chemical elements, C, Mg, Ca, Ti, Cr, Fe, and Ba from the observed spectra, using MOOG. We compare them with the ones of typical Galactic disk stars and discuss discrepancies between them to search for clues to their origin.

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JCMT-CHIMPS2 Survey

  • Kim, Kee-Tae;Moore, Toby;Minamidani, Tetsuhiro;OscarMorata, OscarMorata;Rosolowski, Erik;Su, Yang;Eden, David
    • The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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    • v.44 no.1
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    • pp.69.3-69.3
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    • 2019
  • The CHIMPS2 survey is to extend the JCMT HARP $^{13}CO/C^{18}O$ J=3-2 Inner Milky-Way Plane Survey (CHIMPS) and the ${12}^CO$ J=3-2 survey (COHRS) into the inner Galactic Plane, the Central Molecular Zone (CMZ), and a section of the Outer Plane. When combined with the complementary $^{12}CO/^{13}CO/C^{18}O$ J=1-0 survey at the Nobeyama 45m (FUGIN) at matching 15" resolution and sensitivity, and other current CO surveys, the results will provide a complete set of transition data with which to calculate accurate column densities, gas temperatures and turbulent Mach numbers. These will be used to: analyze molecular cloud properties across a range of Galactic environments; map the star-formation efficiency (SFE) and dense-gas mass fraction (DGMF) in molecular gas as a function of position in the Galaxy and its relation to the nature of the turbulence within molecular clouds; determine Galactic structure as traced by molecular gas and star formation; constrain cloud-formation models; study the relationship of filaments to star formation; test current models of the gas kinematics and stability in the Galactic center region and the flow of gas from the disc. It will also provide an invaluable legacy data set for JCMT that will not be superseded for several decades. In this poster, we will present the current status of the CHIMPS2.

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THE PROCESSING OF CLUMPY MOLECULAR GAS AND STAR FORMATION IN THE GALACTIC CENTER

  • LIU, HAUYU BAOBAB;MINH, YOUNG CHOL;MILLS, ELISABETH
    • Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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    • v.30 no.2
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    • pp.133-137
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    • 2015
  • The Galactic center uniquely provides opportunities to resolve how star clusters form in neutral gas overdensities engulfed in a large-scale accretion flow. We have performed sensitive Green Bank 100m Telescope (GBT), Karl G. Jansky Very Large Array (JVLA), and Submillimeter Array (SMA) mapping observations of molecular gas and thermal dust emission surrounding the Galaxy's supermassive black hole (SMBH) Sgr $A^{\ast}$. We resolved several molecular gas streams orbiting the center on ${\gtrsim}10$ pc scales. Some of these gas streams appear connected to the well-known 2-4 pc scale molecular circumnuclear disk (CND). The CND may be the tidally trapped inner part of the large-scale accretion flow, which incorporates inflow via exterior gas filaments/arms, and ultimately feeds gas toward Sgr $A^{\ast}$. Our high resolution GBT+JVLA $NH_3$ images and SMA+JCMT 0.86 mm dust continuum image consistently reveal abundant dense molecular clumps in this region. These gas clumps are characterized by ${\gtrsim}100$ times higher virial masses than the derived molecular gas masses based on 0.86 mm dust continuum emission. In addition, Class I $CH_3OH$ masers and some $H_2O$ masers are observed to be well associated with the dense clumps. We propose that the resolved gas clumps may be pressurized gas reservoirs for feeding the formation of 1-10 solar-mass stars. These sources may be the most promising candidates for ALMA to probe the process of high-mass star-formation in the Galactic center.