• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.16 no.1
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• pp.7-17
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• 1983

During the period between January and November in 1982, UBV photoelectric observations were made for 48 stars in NGC 2264, 66 stars in IC 1805 and 22 stars in IC 348. From these observations, various physical parameters such as distance, mean color excess, total-to-selective extinction ratio and mean age of the clusters were determined. Making use of these parameters, the star formation rates were examined for IC 348 and NGC 2264. The overall formation rate is found to be increase rapidly during the period of the active star formation. The age spread (ranging from $5\times10^6$ yrs to $10^7$ yrs) of stars in a given cluster appears to be real which occurs in the extremely young open clusters.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.40 no.2
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• pp.57.3-57.3
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• 2015

The formation of the Milky Way stellar halo is thought to be the result of merging and accretion of building blocks such as dwarf galaxies and massive globular clusters. Recently, Deason et al. (2015) suggested that the Milky Way outer halo formed mostly from big building blocks, such as dwarf spheroidal galaxies, based on the similar number ratio of blue straggler (BS) stars to blue horizontal-branch (BHB) stars. Here we demonstrate, however, that this result is seriously biased by not taking into detailed consideration on the formation mechanism of BHB stars from helium enhanced second-generation population. In particular, the high BS-to-BHB ratio observed in the outer halo fields is most likely due to a small number of BHB stars provided by GCs rather than to a large number of BS stars. This is supported by our dynamical evolution model of GCs which shows preferential removal of first generation stars in GCs. Moreover, there are sufficient number of outer halo GCs which show very high BS-to-BHB ratio. Therefore, the BS-to-BHB number ratio is not a good indicator to use in arguing that more massive dwarf galaxies are the main building blocks of the Milky Way outer halo. Several lines of evidence still suggest that GCs can contribute a signicant fraction of the outer halo stars.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.42 no.2
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• pp.43.2-43.2
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• 2017

We report our discovery of a significant population of CN-enhanced red clump stars in the classical bulge component of the Milky Way. Since CN-rich stars trace a population with enhanced Helium, Nitrogen, and Sodium originated in globular clusters (GCs), this is a direct evidence that proto-GCs were the major building blocks in the formation of the classical bulges and early-type galaxies in the hierarchical merging paradigm.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.44 no.2
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• pp.75.2-75.2
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• 2019

This poster introduces the ongoing "Narrow-band Ca Photometry for Dwarf Spheroidal Galaxies" project and presents the latest results. The project aims to explain the formation and evolution of dwarf spheroidal galaxies by examining the structural properties of stellar populations as a function of metallicity. To overcome the lack of stars with known spectroscopic metallicities for dwarf spheroidal galaxies, we apply the hk index as a photometric metallicity indicator to three galaxies-Draco, Sextans, and Canes Venatici I. For all three galaxies, we found that metal-poor and metal-rich groups of red-giant-branch stars have distinct spatial distributions, in which metal-rich stars are centrally concentrated while metal-poor stars are relatively dispersed. In Sextans, we found an off-centered peak of metal-poor stars which is presumed to be a disrupting star cluster in this galaxy. We will discuss the implications of our results for the dwarf galaxy formation and possible directions on future work of this project.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.47 no.6
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• pp.219-233
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• 2014

The main site of dust formation is believed to be the cool envelopes around AGB stars. Nearly all AGB stars can be identified as long-period variables (LPVs) with large amplitude pulsation. Shock waves produce by the strong pulsation and radiation pressure on newly formed dust grains drive dusty stellar winds with high mass-loss rates. IR observations of AGB stars identify various dust species in different physical conditions. Radio observations of gas phase materials are helpful to understand the overall properties of the stellar winds. In this paper, we review (i) classification of AGB stars; (ii) IR two-color diagrams of AGB stars; (iii) pulsation of AGB stars; (iv) dust around AGB stars including dusty stellar winds; (v) dust envelopes around AGB stars; (vi) mass-loss and evolution of AGB stars; and (vii) contribution of AGB dust to galactic environments. We discuss various observational evidences and their theoretical interpretations.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.40 no.4
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• pp.137-140
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• 2007

Triggered star formation is not a new idea - it's been around for at least the last 30 years. Although it has never disappeared from the scene, it seems to be enjoying something of a renaissance in recent years, in both observational and theoretical studies. Here we give a brief discussion of the background of triggered star formation, describe some of our own recent observational efforts in this regard, and briefly mention some initial conclusions that may be drawn.

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.32 no.1
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• pp.73-75
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• 2017

Debris disks are important observational clues to understanding on-going planetary system formation. They are usually identified by significant mid-infrared excess on top of the photospheric emission of a central star on the basis of prediction from J-, H-, and Ks-band fluxes and the stellar model spectra. For bright stars, 2MASS near-infrared fluxes suffer large uncertainties due to the near-infrared camera saturation. Therefore we have performed follow-up observations with the IRSF 1.4 m near-infrared telescope located in South Africa to obtain accurate J-, H-, and Ks-band fluxes of the central stars. Among 754 main-sequence stars which are detected in the AKARI $18{\mu}m$ band, we have performed photometry for 325 stars with IRSF. As a result, we have successfully improved the flux accuracy of the central stars from 9.2 % to 0.5 % on average. Using this dataset, we have detected $18{\mu}m$ excess emission from 57 stars in our samples with a $3{\sigma}$ level. We find that some of them have high ratios of the excess to the photospheric emission even around very old stars, which cannot be explained by the current planet-formation theories.

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.30 no.2
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• pp.93-97
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• 2015

How high-mass stars form is currently unclear. Calculations suggest that the radiation pressure of a forming star can halt spherical infall, preventing further growth when it reaches $10M_{\odot}$. Two major theoretical models on the further growth of stellar mass have been proposed. One model suggests the merging of less massive stellar objects, and the other is through accretion, but with the help of a disk. Inflow motions are key evidence for how forming stars gain further mass to build up massive stars. Recent developments in technology have boosted the search for inflow motion. A number of high-mass collapse candidates were obtained with single dish observations, and mostly showed blue profiles. Infalling signatures seem to be more common in regions which have developed radiation pressure than in younger cores, which is the opposite of the theoretical prediction and is also very different from observations of low mass star formation. Interferometer studies so far confirm this tendency with more obvious blue profiles or inverse P Cygni profiles. Results seem to favor the accretion model. However, the evolution of the infall motion in massive star forming cores needs to be further explored. Direct evidence for monolithic or competitive collapse processes is still lacking. ALMA will enable us to probe more detail of the gravitional processes.

• Publications of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.33 no.2
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• pp.21-30
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• 2018

Formation processes of high-mass stars have been long-standing issues in astronomy and astrophysics. This is mainly because of major difficulties in observational studies such as a smaller number of high-mass young stellar objects (YSOs), larger distances, and more complex structures in young high-mass clusters compared with nearby low-mass isolated star-forming regions (SFRs), and extremely large opacity of interstellar dust except for centimeter to submillimeter wavelengths. High resolution and high sensitivity observations with Atacama Large Millimeter/Submillimeter Array (ALMA) at millimeter/submillimeter wavelengths will overcome these observational difficulties even for statistical studies with increasing number of high-mass YSO samples. This review will summarize recent progresses in high-mass star-formation studies with ALMA such as clumps and filaments in giant molecular cloud complexes and infrared dark clouds (IRDCs), protostellar disks and outflows in dense cores, chemistry, masers, and accretion bursts in high-mass SFRs.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.29 no.spc1
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• pp.201-204
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• 1996

Magnetic fields are thought to playa role in a wide variety of important astrophysical processes, from angular momentum transport and jet formation in accretion disks to corona formation in stars. Unfortunately, the dynamics of magnetic fields in astrophysical plasmas are extremely complicated, and the success of current theoretical models and computer simulations seems to be inversely correlated with the amount of observational detail available to us. Here I will discuss some of the more striking conflicts between numerical simulations and observations, and present an explanation for them based on an important dynamical process which is not adequately modeled in current numerical simulations. These processes will lead to the formation of flux tubes in stars and accretion disks, in accordance with observations. I will discuss some of the implications of flux tube formation for stellar and accretion disk dynamos.