• 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.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.45 no.1
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• pp.50.3-50.3
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• 2020

We present deep UBVIc and Hα photometry for the young open cluster IC 1590 which is at the center of the HII region NGC 281. From Ha index, 39 Hα emission stars and 15 Hα emission candidates are selected. The reddening law toward IC 1590 is slightly abnormal (RV,cl = 3.6 ± 0.2). The distance modulus of IC 1590 obtained from the reddening-free (Q', QVλ) diagrams is 12.4 ± 0.1 mag (d = 3.02 ± 0.14 kpc), which is consistent with distance d = 2.91 ± 0.42 kpc from the parallax of Gaia DR2 catalogue within the error range. We also determined the age and mass function of IC 1590 using the stellar evolution models and PMS evolutionary tracks. The median age of PMS stars is 2.4 ± 2.2 Myr. The initial mass function (IMF) of IC 1590 is the Salpeter-type IMF with a slope of �� = -1.26 ± 0.14 for m > 1 M⊙ stars.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.45 no.1
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• pp.63.1-63.1
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• 2020

We investigate the effect of recent star formation (RSF) on the α-elements-to-iron ratio ([α/Fe]) estimation for galaxies. Measuring galactic [α/Fe] is a powerful tool to pinpointing the timescale of chemical evolution and star formation. Our working hypothesis is that, with increasing stellar surface temperature, absorption equivalent width (EW) of α-elements decreases faster than that of Fe-peak elements, and thus RSF will lower the line ratio of EW(α)/EW(Fe). Moreover, young stars outshine, effectively lowering EW(α)/EW(Fe) of integrated light of RSF galaxies. Here we test our hypothesis using SDSS (optical spectrophotometric), GALEX (UV photometric) and IllustrisTNG datasets, and show that, if RSF is not considered thoroughly, EW(α)/EW(Fe) lowered by RSF can be routinely misinterpreted as low [α/Fe]. We discuss possible implications of the result in the context of the conventional [α/Fe]-mass relation of galaxies.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.46 no.2
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• pp.80.2-80.2
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• 2021

Galactic young massive clusters are the ideal laboratories to study massive stellar evolution. Unfortunately, such objects are rare. Of particular interest are so-called Red Supergiant Clusters (RSGCs) that are currently only found toward the Scutum-Crux Galactic arm. Confirming their nature as RSGC is often not straight-fortward as distinguishing RSGs from AGB stars is still difficult even with high spectral resolution spectra. Here we report that broad band colors using 2MASS JHK and GAIA G band data can be useful in reducing the AGB contamination, thus providing selection criteria that effectively reveal the known RSGCs with negligible false positives. On the other hand, we suggest that RSGC4, one of the proposed RSGC candidates, may not be a cluster of RSGs as their colors are not compatible with our selection criteria. We discuss the nature of these stars together with our IGRINS spectroscopic observations. We also employ the same selection criteria to search for RSGC candidates in other parts of the plane, resulting in no prominent candidates.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.40 no.2
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• pp.32.3-33
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• 2015

There exist scaling relations that link the mass of supermassive black holes with both the velocity dispersion and the mass of the central stellar cusp of their host galaxies. This implies that these two components grow in tandem. Feedback from actively accreting supermassive black holes (AGN), in the form of multi-phase gas outflows, has been argued to be the agent of this co-evolution. Here we employ the powerful GMOS integral field spectroscopy unit on the 8.2m Gemini-North telescope to investigate ionized gas outflows of luminous Type 2 AGN in the local Universe (z<0.1). Our sample of 6 galaxies is drawn from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) and was selected based on their [OIII] dust-corrected luminosity (>1042 erg/s) and signatures of outflows in the [OIII] line profile of their spatially integrated SDSS spectra. These are arguably the best candidates to explore AGN feedback in action since they are < 1% of a large local type 2 AGN SDSS sample selected based on their [OIII] kinematics. We combine a careful spectral decomposition of the [OIII] and $H{\alpha}$ line profiles with spatial information on ~0.5kpc scales to understand the outflow kinematics and energetics in these objects. We find clear evidence for strong outflows in [OIII] and occasionally $H{\alpha}$ that are clearly driven by the ionizing radiation of the AGN. We kinematically and spatially decompose outflowing and rotating ionized gas components. We find [OIII] to be a better tracer of AGN outflows, while $H{\alpha}$ appears to be strongly affected by both stellar rotation and outflows induced by ongoing star formation. The observed kinematics and spatial distribution of the ionized gas imply a large opening angle for the outflow. Finally, we find the projected outflow velocity to decrease as a function of distance, while its dispersion shows a more complex structure with a potentially initially increasing trend (out to 0.5-1kpc distances).

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.52 no.3
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• pp.57-69
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• 2019

We present an analysis of the chemical abundances and kinematics of six low-mass dwarf stars, previously claimed to be candidate hypervelocity stars (HVSs). We obtained moderate-resolution (R ~ 6000) spectra of these stars to estimate the abundances of several chemical elements (Mg, Si, Ca, Ti, Cr, Fe, and Ni), and derived their space velocities and orbital parameters using proper motions from the Gaia Data Release 2. All six stars are shown to be bound to the Milky Way, and in fact are not even considered high-velocity stars with respect to the Galactic rest frame. Nevertheless, we attempt to characterize their parent Galactic stellar components by simultaneously comparing their element abundance patterns and orbital parameters with those expected from various Galactic stellar components. We find that two of our program stars are typical disk stars. For four stars, even though their kinematic probabilistic membership assignment suggests membership in the Galactic disk, based on their distinct orbital properties and chemical characteristics, we cannot rule out exotic origins as follows. Two stars may be runaway stars from the Galactic disk. One star has possibly been accreted from a disrupted dwarf galaxy or dynamically heated from a birthplace in the Galactic bulge. The last object may be either a runaway disk star or has been dynamically heated. Spectroscopic follow-up observations with higher resolution for these curious objects will provide a better understanding of their origin.

• Journal of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.54 no.1
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• pp.17-35
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• 2021

We study galaxies undergoing ram pressure stripping in the Virgo cluster to examine whether we can identify any discernible trend in their star formation activity. We first use 48 galaxies undergoing different stages of stripping based on H i morphology, H i deficiency, and relative extent to the stellar disk, from the VIVA survey. We then employ a new scheme for galaxy classification which combines H i mass fractions and locations in projected phase space, resulting in a new sample of 365 galaxies. We utilize a variety of star formation tracers, which include g - r, WISE [3.4]-[12] colors, and starburstiness that are defined by stellar mass and star formation rates to compare the star formation activity of galaxies at different stripping stages. We find no clear evidence for enhancement in the integrated star formation activity of galaxies undergoing early to active stripping. We are instead able to capture the overall quenching of star formation activity with increasing degree of ram pressure stripping, in agreement with previous studies. Our results suggest that if there is any ram pressure stripping induced enhancement, it is at best locally modest, and galaxies undergoing enhancement make up a small fraction of the total sample. Our results also indicate that it is possible to trace galaxies at different stages of stripping with the combination of H i gas content and location in projected phase space, which can be extended to other galaxy clusters that lack high-resolution H i imaging.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.44 no.2
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• pp.77.3-77.3
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• 2019

We present an analysis of the stellar population of compact elliptical galaxies (cEs) in various environments. Following conventional selection criteria of cEs, we created a list of cE candidates in the redshift range of z < 0.05 using SDSS DR12 catalog. We finally selected cEs with low-luminosity (Mg > 18.7 mag), small effective radius (Re < 600 pc), and high velocity dispersion (> 60 kms-1). We divide our cE sample into those inside and outside of the one virial radius of the bright (Mr < -21 mag) nearby host galaxy which is then defined as cEs with (cEw) and without (cEw/o) host galaxy, respectively. We investigated the stellar population properties of cEs based on the Hb, Mgb, Fe 5270, and Fe 5335 line strengths from the OSSY catalog. We found that cEw has a systematically higher metallicity than cEw/o. In the velocity dispersion-Mgb distribution, while cEw/o follows the relation of early-type galaxies, cEw are found to have a systematically higher metallicity than cEw/o at a given velocity dispersion. The different feature in the metallicity between cEw and cEw/o can suggest that two different scenarios can be provided in the formation of cEs. cEw would be the remnant cores of the massive progenitor galaxies that their outer parts have been tidally stripped by massive neighbor galaxies (i.e., nurture origin). On the other hand, cEw/o are likely to be faint-end of early-type galaxies maintaining in-situ evolution (i.e., nurture origin).

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.39 no.2
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• pp.95-95
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• 2014

The mass measurement of neutron stars or black holes is of fundamental importance in our understanding of the evolution of massive stars and core-collapse supernova explosions as well as some exotic physics of the extreme conditions. Despite the importance, however, it's very difficult to measure mass of these objects directly. One way to do this, if they are in binary systems, to measure their binary motions (i.e., Doppler shifts) which can give us direct information on their mass. Recently many new highly-obscured massive X-ray binaries have been discovered by new hard X-ray satellites such as INTEGRAL and NuSTAR. The new highly-obscured massive X-ray binaries are faint in the optical, but bright in the infrared with many emission lines. Based on the near-infrared spectroscopy, one can first understand the nature of stellar companions to the compact objects, determining its spectral types and luminosity classes as well as mass losses and conditions of (potential) circumstellar material. Next, spectroscopic monitoring of these objects can be used to estimate the mass of compact objects via measuring the Doppler shifts of the lines. For the former, broad-band spectroscopy is essential; for the latter, high-resolution spectroscopy is critical. Therefore, IGRINS appears to be an ideal instrument to study them. An IGRINS survey of these new highly-obscured massive X-ray binaries can give us a rare opportunity to carry out population analyses for understanding the evolution of massive binary systems and formation of compact objects and their mass ranges. In this talk, we will present a sample near-infrared high resolution spectra of HMXB, IGR J19140+0951 and discuss about its spectral feature. These spectra are obtained on 13th July, 2014 from IGRINS commissioning run at McDonald 2.7m telescope. And at final, we will introduce the upgrade plan of IGRINS Operation Software (IGOS), to gather the input from IGRINS observer.

• The Bulletin of The Korean Astronomical Society
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• v.37 no.1
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• pp.36.2-36.2
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• 2012

The aim of this study was to explore the role of galaxy mergers on the formation and evolution of galaxies in galaxy clusters. For this purpose, u', g', r' deep optical imaging and multi-object spectroscopic observation were done for four rich Abell clusters at z ${\lesssim}$ 0.1 (A119, A2670, A3330, and A389) with a MOSAIC 2 CCD and Hydra spectrograph mounted on a Blanco 4-m telescope at CTIO. With the deep images, we found that about 25% of the bright red-sequence galaxies exhibited post-merger signatures in a cluster environment. This fraction was much higher than what was expected from the results of the field environment (-35%, van Dokkum 2005) and significantly low on-going merger fractions (about one-fifth of the field) appeared in the clusters currently. Taking advantage of the most up-to-date semi-analytic model, the results indicate that most of the post-merger galaxies may have carried over their merger features from their previous halo environment. All the brightest cluster galaxies in our cluster samples revealed faint structures in their halos as well as multiple nuclei in their centers seen in the deep optical images. We suggest that the mass of the BCGs increased mainly though major mergers at recent epochs based on their post-merger signatures and the large gaps in the total magnitudes between the BCGs and the second-rank BCGs. A UV bright tidal tail and tidal dwarf galaxy (TDG) candidates around the post-merger galaxy, NGC 4922, were discovered in the outskirts of the Coma cluster using the GALEX UV data. We did two-component stellar population modeling for the TDG candidates and the results indicate that they are an early form of dwarf galaxies frequently found around massive early-type galaxies in clusters. In conclusion, we suggest that the mergers of galaxies are an important driving force behind galaxy formation and evolution in cluster environments even until recent epochs.