This three-year period has seen considerable activity in the Commission, with a wide range of applications of radial velocities as well as a significant push toward higher precision. The latter has been driven in large part by the exciting research on extrasolar planets. This field is now on the verge of detecting Earth-mass bodies around nearby stars, as demonstrated by recent work summarized below, and radial velocities continue to play a central role.

The effects of turbulent pumping and η-quenching on Babcock-Leighton dynamo models are explored separately. Turbulent pumping seems to be important to solve several reported problems in these dynamo models related to the magnetic flux transport and to the parity. On the other hand, the suppression of the magnetic diffusivity, η, could help in the formation of long-lived, small and intense structures of toroidal magnetic field.

Forbush initiated research on solar energetic particle (SEP) events in 1946 when he reported ionization chamber observations of the first three ground level events (GLEs). The next key development was the neutron monitor observation of the GLE of 23 February 1956. Meyer, Parker and Simpson attributed this high-energy SEP event to a short time-scale process associated with a solar flare and ascribed the much longer duration of the particle event to scattering in the interplanetary medium. Thus “flare particle” acceleration became the initial paradigm for SEP acceleration at the Sun. A more fully-developed picture was presented by the Australian radio astronomers Wild, Smerd, and Weiss in 1963. They identified two distinct SEP acceleration processes in flares: (1) the first phase accelerated primarily ~100 keV electrons that gave rise to fast-drift type III emission as they streamed outward through the solar atmosphere; (2) the second phase was produced by an outward moving (~1000 km s−1) magnetohydrodynamic shock, occurring in certain (generally larger) flares. The second phase, manifested by slow-drift metric type II emission, appeared to be required for substantial acceleration of protons and higher-energy electrons. This two-stage (or two-class) picture gained acceptance during the 1980s as composition and charge state measurements strengthened the evidence for two distinct types of particle events which were termed impulsive (attributed to flare-resident acceleration process(es)) and gradual (shock-associated). Reames championed the two-class picture and it is the commonly accepted paradigm today. A key error made in the establishment of this paradigm was revealed in the late 1990s by observations of SEP composition and charge states at higher energies (>10 MeV) than previously available. Specifically, some large and therefore presumably “gradual” SEP events looked “impulsive” at these energies. One group of researchers attributes these unusual events to acceleration of high-energy SEPs by flares and another school favors acceleration of flare seed particles by quasi-perpendicular shocks. A revised SEP classification scheme is proposed to accommodate the new observations and to include ideas on geometry and seed particle composition recently incorporated into models of shock acceleration of SEPs.

We study the effect of wind inhomogeneities (clumping) on O star wind model predictions. For this purpose we artificially include clumping into our stationary NLTE wind models. As a result of the inclusion of optically thin clumps the radiative line force is increased compared to corresponding unclumped models, with a similar effect on either the mass-loss rate or the terminal velocity. When the clumps are allowed to be optically thick in continuum, on the other hand, the radiative force and consequently the mass-loss rate decreases alternatively.

The Working Group Stellar Radial Velocity Bibliography is a very small one that was created with the purpose of continuing the cataloging of bibliography of radial velocity of stars made by Mme Barbier in successive catalogues until her retirement in 1990.

The blue compact dwarf galaxy I Zw 18 holds the record of the lowest metallicity ever observed in the local universe. As such, it represents the closest analog to primordial galaxies in the early universe. More interestingly, it has recurrently been regarded as a genuinely young galaxy caught in the process of forming in the nearby universe. However, stars of increasingly older ages are found within I Zw 18 every time deeper high-resolution photometric observations are performed with the Hubble Space Telescope (HST): from the original few tens of Myrs to, possibly, several Gyrs. Here we summarize the history of I Zw 18 age and present an ongoing HST/ACS project which allowed us to precisely derive the galaxy distance by studying its Cepheid variables, and to firmly establish the age of its faintest resolved populations.

LMC clusters offer an outstanding opportunity to investigate the late stages of stellar evolution of stars in the mass range between 1.5 and 2 M⊙. In this presentation we will focus on our results on mixing events during the evolution along the Asymptotic Giant Branch (AGB). Surface abundances have been determined for a number of cluster AGB stars from high resolution near infrared spectra. We show for the first time the evolution of C/O and 12C/13C ratios along a cluster AGB. The change of both quantities due to dredge up events is compared with model predictions. Our results indicate the late occurrence of a moderate extra-mixing in some cases.

Large volume cosmological simulations succeed in reproducing the large-scale structure of the Universe. However, they lack resolution and may not take into account all relevant physical processes to test if the detail properties of galaxies can be explained by the CDM paradigm. On the other hand, galaxy-scale simulations could resolve this in a robust way but do not usually include a realistic cosmological context.

To study galaxy evolution in cosmological context, we use a new method that consists in coupling cosmological simulations and galactic scale simulations. For this, we record merger and gas accretion histories from cosmological simulations and re-simulate at very high resolution the evolution of baryons and dark matter within the virial radius of a target galaxy. This allows us for example to better take into account gas evolution and associated star formation, to finely study the internal evolution of galaxies and their disks in a realistic cosmological context.

We aim at obtaining a statistical view on galaxy evolution from z ≃ 2 to 0, and we present here the first results of the study: we mainly stress the importance of taking into account gas accretion along filaments to understand galaxy evolution.

A brief demonstration of photometric light curves solutions for eight transiting exoplanets using the Phoebe 0.29c code is presented. We determined radii and inclinations for TrES-1b, TrES-2b, Wasp-1b, XO-1b, XO-2b, OGLE-TR-10b, OGLE-TR-111b and HD 189733b. All our results are in good agreement with the last results published.

We present new chemical models of supernova (SN) ejecta based on a chemical kinetic approach. We focus on the formation of inorganic and organic molecules including gas phase dust precursors, and consider zero-metallicity progenitor, massive supernovae and nearby core-collapse supernovae such as SN1987A. We find that both types are forming large amounts of molecules in their ejecta at times as early as 200 days after explosion. Upper limits on the dust formation budget are derived. Our results on dust precursors do not agree with existing studies on dust condensation in SN ejecta. We conclude that PMSNe could be the first non-primodial molecule providers in the early universe, ejecting up to 34% of their progenitor mass under molecular form to the pristine, local gas.

The role of magnetic fields for the formation of planets is reviewed. Protoplanetary disc turbulence driven by the magnetorotational instability has a huge influence on the early stages of planet formation. Small dust grains are transported both vertically and radially in the disc by turbulent diffusion, counteracting sedimentation to the mid-plane and transporting crystalline material from the hot inner disc to the outer parts. The conclusion from recent efforts to measure the turbulent diffusion coefficient of magnetorotational turbulence is that turbulent diffusion of small particles is much stronger than naively thought. Larger particles – pebbles, rocks and boulders – get trapped in long-lived high pressure regions that arise spontaneously at large scales in the turbulent flow. These gas high pressures, in geostrophic balance with a sub-Keplerian/super-Keplerian zonal flow envelope, are excited by radial fluctuations in the Maxwell stress. The coherence time of the Maxwell stress is only a few orbits, where as the correlation time of the pressure bumps is comparable to the turbulent mixing time-scale, many tens or orbits on scales much greater than one scale height. The particle overdensities contract under the combined gravity of all the particles and condense into gravitationally bound clusters of rocks and boulders. These planetesimals have masses comparable to the dwarf planet Ceres. I conclude with thoughts on future priorities in the field of planet formation in turbulent discs.

We present here the latest results of the LCID project (Local Cosmology from Isolated Dwarfs), aimed at recovering the full star formation history (SFH) of six isolated dwarf galaxies of the Local Group (LG). Our method of analysis is based on the IAC-pop code, which derives the SFH of a resolved stellar system by comparing the observed and a model color-magnitude diagram (CMD). We summarize here basic technical issues and the main results concerning our sample of galaxies. We show that LeoA is the only object showing a clear delay in the onset of the major SF event, while all the other galaxies present a dominant component older than 10 Gyrs.

Gaia, an ESA cornerstone mission, will obtain of the order of 100 high-precision photometric observations and lower precision radial velocity measurements over five years for around a billion stars – several hundred thousand of which will be eclipsing binaries. In order to extract the characteristics of these systems, a fully automated code must be available. During the process of this development, two tools that may be of use to the transit community have emerged: a very fast, simple, detached eclipsing binary simulator/solver based on a new approach and an interacting eclipsing binary simulator with most of the features of the Wilson-Devinney and Nightfall codes, but fully documented and written in easy-to-follow and highly portable Java. Currently undergoing development and testing, this code includes an intuitive graphical interface and an optimizer for the estimation of the physical parameters of the system.

The SB9 Working Group of Commission 30 aims at compiling the 9th Catalogue of Orbits of Spectroscopic Binaries. By definition, this is a never ending task as orbits of newly discovered systems keep appearing in the literature. Despite this, the working group tries to catch up with the delay as nothing was done in between 1989 when the 8th catalogue by Batten et al. and 2000 when the WG was settled. In 2006, at its business meeting, the WG decided to focus on the completeness of systems rather than on completeness of orbits. If the latter is a valuable objective, only the former is useful to any statistical investigation of spectroscopic binaries.

Although chemical separation is generally accepted as the main physical process responsible for the anomalous surface abundances of AmFm stars, its exact behavior within the interior of these stars is still uncertain. We will explore two hydrodynamical processes which could compete with atomic diffusion: mass loss and turbulence. We will also discuss the extent to which separation occurs immediately below the surface convection zone as well as the extent to which separation occurs below 200,000 K. To do so, self-consistent stellar models with mass loss and turbulence where calculated using the Montreal stellar evolution code and compared to observations of A and F stars. It is shown that to the precision of observations available for F stars, a mass loss rate of 2×10−14M⊙ · yr−1, is compatible with observations and that no turbulence is then required.

The sensitivity of the Infrared Spectrograph on the Spitzer Space Telescope has enabled detailed surveys of mass-losing stars in the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds. Comparisons of samples from these galaxies and the Milky Way reveal how the dust produced by evolved stars depends on the metallicity of the host environment. Oxygen-rich stars show several trends with metallicity. In more metal-poor environments, fewer of them show dust excesses, the circumstellar SiO absorption grows weaker, the quantity of silicate dust decreases, and alumina dust grows rare. As carbon stars grow more metal-poor, the amount of circumstellar acetylene gas increases, while the amount of trace dust elements like SiC and MgS decreases. However, there is little dependence on metallicity in the amount of amorphous carbon dust produced by carbon stars, because they produce the carbon needed to make dust themselves. As galaxies grow more metal-poor, the composition of the dust they produce should grow more carbon rich.

Plasma turbulence at various length scales affects practically all mechanisms proposed to be responsible for particle acceleration in the heliosphere. In this paper, we concentrate on providing a synthesis of some recent efforts to understand particle acceleration in the solar corona and inner heliosphere. Acceleration at coronal and interplanetary shock waves driven by coronal mass ejections (CMEs) is the most viable mechanism for producing large gradual solar energetic particle (SEP) events, whereas particle acceleration in impulsive flares is assumed to be responsible for the generation of smaller impulsive SEP events. Impulsive events show enhanced abundances of 3He and heavy ions over the gradual SEP events. Gradual events often show charge states consistent with acceleration of ions in a dilute plasma at 1–2 MK temperature, while impulsive events have higher charge states. The division of SEP events to gradual and impulsive has been challenged by the discovery of events, which show intensity-vs.-time profiles typical for gradual events but, especially at the highest energies (above 10 MeV/nucl), abundances and charge states more typical of impulsive events. Although a direct flare component cannot be ruled out, we find that particle acceleration at quasi-perpendicular shocks in the low corona also offer a plausible explanation for the hybrid events. By carefully modeling shock acceleration and coronal turbulence and its modification by the accelerated particles, a consistent picture of gradual events thus emerges from the shock acceleration hypothesis.

We present an ISOCAM-CVF map of the ρ Oph A region, covering 3′ × 3′. For each 6 arcsec2 pixel, we extract the spectrum from 5–15 μm. We determine the fluxes of the main PAH features by fitting Lorentzian profiles to the spectrum. The peaks of the various PAH components correspond well with the known positions of the PDRs in this vicinity. The spectrum in several pixels exhibits strong rotational lines of molecular hydrogen which can be used to derive the physical properties of the cloud. The H2 emission traces the hot gas of the bipolar CO outflow from VLA1623.

Detailed models of galactic disk formation and evolution require knowledge about the initial conditions under which disk galaxies form, the boundary conditions that affect their secular evolution and the microphysical processes that drive the multi-phase interstellar medium and regulate star formation. Unfortunately, up to now, most of these ingredients are still poorly understood. The challenge therefore is to still construct realistic models of galactic disks with predictive power.

This review focuses on three topics relevant to naturally-occurring dynamos. The first considers how a common belief, that states of equipartition of magnetic and kinetic energy are preferred in nonrotating systems, is modified when Coriolis forces are influential, as in the Earth's core. The second reviews current difficulties faced by planetary and stellar dynamo theories, particularly in representing the sub-grid scales. The third discusses recent attempts to extract scaling laws from numerical integrations of the Boussinesq dynamo equations.