Recent Talks

Se revisará el estado de los instrumentos instalados en los telescopios del Observatorio del Roque de Los Muchachos (ORM) y del Observatorio del Teide (OT). Se hará una breve introducción para hablar sobre las diferentes maneras de acceder a tiempo de telescopio (anuncios de oportunidad normales, noches de servicio y DDT). El objetivo de esta charla es ayudar a preparar propuestas de observación para el semestre 14A. Habrá tiempo para preguntas y comentarios.

In the last years star-forming regions and massive protostars have been suggested to be gamma-ray emitters. Isolated massive protostars present powerful outflows interacting with the surrounding medium. Some of these sources power non-thermal radio jets, indicative of particle acceleration up to relativistic energies. At the jet-termination region strong shocks form which can lead to gamma-ray emission, as theoretical models predict. It has also been prognosticated that the combined effect of several low-mass protostellar objects may produce significant amount of gamma rays. We present here two studies: IRAS 16547- 4247, an isolated protostar showing non-thermal radio emission; and Monoceros R2, a star forming region coincident with a source of the 2nd Fermi-LAT catalog. In the first case, we analized archival X-ray data and detected the source. We also studied the system in a broad- band one-zone model context and tried to fit the X-ray detection with a non-thermal model. In the second case, we analyzed 3.5 years of Fermi-LAT data and confirmed the source with a detection above 12 sigma. Our results are compatible with the source being the result the combined effect of multiple young stellar objects in Monoceros R2.

Dark matter makes up most of the mass of the Universe but remains mysterious. I discuss recent progress in constraining its properties by measuring its distribution in the Universe from tiny dwarf galaxies to giant galaxy clusters, and comparing this with numerical simulations. The latest results favour a cold, collisionless particle that must lie beyond the standard model of particle physics. I discuss the known small scale problems with this model: the cusp-core and missing satellites problems, and I argue that these are likely due to baryonic "feedback" during galaxy formation. I conclude with a discussion of experiments underway to detect dark matter particles, and the role that astrophysics has to play in these too. There is an exciting a very real prospect of detecting a dark matter particle in the next five years.

3- Other spectroscopic surveys and analysis strategies

- eBOSS, BigBOSS, HETDEX, WEAVE, 4MOST

- data mashup: astrometry,  photometry and spectroscopy together

- reconstructing the Galaxy

- 'observing' galaxy simulations

- discovery and follow-up of interesting/exotic targets: HVS, UMPS, CEMPS, RCrBs...

5- Some current problems and opportunities

- simulating kinematics

- simulating variables

- simulating non-solar scaled populations

- simulating rare and extreme populations (e.g. X-ray sources, PNe,

  hot-WDs, AGB-manque', C stars, IR-emission by mass-losing stars)

- opportunities opened by asteroseismology

5-   The Galactic halo

- mass, extent, shape

- substructure, inner/outer halo

5- The Galactic bulge

- observational status on bulge kinematics and chemical properties in the context of other bulges

- ideas about the formation of the bulge

5- SPH basics

- numerical viscosity

- Kelvin-Helmholtz instabilities

- other problems and their amelioration

2- Spectra

- APOGEE, RAVE, SDSS/SEGUE/BOSS, Gaia-ESO

- Spectral classification

- radial velocities

- automated data analysis

4- From external galaxies to the Milky Way

- basic equation of stellar statistics, computational methods

- overview of available MW codes

- expected populations X photometric depth and galactic coordinates