Since soon after the discovery of hot Jupiters, it had been suspected that interaction of these massive bodies with their host stars could give rise to observable signals. We discuss the observational evidence for star-planet interactions (SPI) of tidal and magnetic origin observed in X-rays and FUV. Hot Jupiters can significantly impact the activity of their host stars through tidal and magnetic interaction, leading to either increased or decreased stellar activity – depending on the internal structure of the host star and the properties of the hosted planet. In HD 189733, X-ray and FUV flares are preferentially in a very restricted range of planetary phases. Matsakos et al. (2015) show, using MHD simulations, planetary gas can be liberated, forming a stream of material that gets compressed and accretes onto the star with a phase lag of 70-90 degrees. This scenario explains many features observed both in X-rays and the FUV (Pillitteri et al. 2015). On the other hand, WASP-18 – an F6 star with a massive hot Jupiter, shows no signs of activity in X-rays or UV. Several age indicators (isochrone fitting, Li abundance) point to a young age (~0.5 –1.0 Gyr) and thus significant activity was expected. In this system, tidal SPI between the star and the very close-in and massive planet appears to destroy the formation of magnetic dynamo and thus nullify the stellar activity.

Neutron star mergers are one of the candidate astrophysical site(s) of r-process. Several chemical evolution studies however pointed out that the observed abundance of r-process is difficult to reproduce by neutron star mergers. In this study, we aim to clarify the enrichment of r-process elements in the Local Group dwarf galaxies. We carry out numerical simulations of galactic chemo-dynamical evolution using an N-body/smoothed particle hydrodynamics code, ASURA. We construct a chemo-dynamical evolution model for dwarf galaxies assuming that neutron star mergers are the major source of r-process elements. Our models reproduce the observed dispersion in [Eu/Fe] as a function of [Fe/H] with neutron star mergers with a merger time of 100 Myr. We find that star formation efficiency and metal mixing processes during the first ≲ 300 Myr of galaxy evolution are important to reproduce the observations. This study supports that neutron star mergers are a major site of r-process.

Results are presented from a deep imaging survey with the Spitzer Space Telescope which was designed to identify and measure the faint stellar populations around nearby galaxies. The Extended Disk Galaxy Exploration Science (EDGES) Survey includes a sample of 92 nearby galaxies with a range of morphological types and environments. The observations include a field-of-view of at least 5 times the optical size and are deep enough to detect stellar mass surface densities of several hundredths of a solar mass per square parsec. The observations reveal extended stellar features, such as stellar disks and stellar streams, around many of the target galaxies, as expected from hierarchical galaxy formation scenarios.

Understanding our Galactic Center is easier with insights from nearby galactic nuclei. Both the star formation activity in nuclear gas disks, driven by bars and nuclear bars, and the fueling of low-luminosity AGN, followed by feedback of jets, driving molecular outflows, were certainly present in our Galactic Center, which appears now quenched. Comparisons and diagnostics are reviewed, in particular of m = 2 and m = 1 modes, lopsidedness, different disk orientations, and fossil evidences of activity and feedback.

Type Ib/c supernovae (SNe Ib/c) are characterized by the lack of prominent hydrogen lines in thespectra, implying that their progenitors have lost most of their hydrogen envelopes by the time of the iron corecollapse. Binary interactions provide an important evolutionary chanel for SNe Ib/c, and recent observations indicatethat the inferred ejecta masses of SNe Ibc are more consistent with the prediction of the binary scenario than that ofthe single star scenario that invokes mass loss as the key evolutionary factor for SNe Ib/c progenitors. So far,theoretical predictions on the detailed properties of SNe Ib/c progenitors in binary systems have been made mostlywith models using solar metallicity. However, unlike the single star scenario, where SNe Ib/c are expected only forsufficiently high metallicity, hydrogen-deficent SN progenitors can be produced via binary interactions at anymetallicity. In this talk, I will discuss theoretical predictions on the metallicity dependence of the SNe Ib/c progenitorstructure, based on evolutionary models of massive binary stars. Sepefically, I will address how the ejecta masses ofSNe Ib and Ic and the ratio of SN Ib/c to SN IIb as well as SN Ib to SN Ic would systematically change as a function ofmetallicity, and which new types of SNe are expected in binary systems at low metallicity.

We have developed a new method to approach the missing baryons problem. We assume that the missing baryons reside in a form of Warm Hot Intergalactic Medium, i.e. the WHIM. Our method consists of (a) detecting the coherent large scale structure in the spatial distribution of galaxies that traces the Cosmic Web and that in hydrodynamical simulations is associated to the WHIM, (b) mapping its luminosity into a galaxy luminosity density field, (c) using numerical simulations to relate the luminosity density to the density of the WHIM, (d) applying this relation to real data to trace the WHIM using the observed galaxy luminosities in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and 2dF redshift surveys. In our application we find evidence for the WHIM along the line of sight to the Sculptor Wall, at redshifts consistent with the recently reported X-ray absorption line detections. Our indirect WHIM detection technique complements the standard method based on the detection of characteristic X-ray absorption lines, showing that the galaxy luminosity density is a reliable signpost for the WHIM. For this reason, our method could be applied to current galaxy surveys to optimise the observational strategies for detecting and studying the WHIM and its properties. Our estimates of the WHIM hydrogen column density NH in Sculptor agree with those obtained via the X-ray analysis. Due to the additional NH estimate, our method has potential for improving the constrains of the physical parameters of the WHIM as derived with X-ray absorption, and thus for improving the understanding of the missing baryons problem.

CARMENES (Calar Alto high-Resolution search for M dwarfs with Exo-earths with Near-infrared and optical Echelle Spectrographs) is a new instrument currently undergoing commissioning at the 3.5 m telescope of the Calar Alto Observatory. It has been constructed by a consortium of eleven Spanish and German institutions. The scientific goal of the project is a 600-night radial-velocity survey targeting 300 M dwarfs with sufficient precision to detect terrestrial planets in their habitable zones. The CARMENES instrument consists of two separate échelle spectrographs covering the wavelength range from 0.55 to 1.7 μm at a spectral resolution of R = 82,000, fed by fibers from the Cassegrain focus of the telescope. Both spectrographs are housed in a temperature-stabilized environment in vacuum tanks, to enable a long-term radial velocity precision of 1 m s−1. The wavelength calibration will be done with Th-Ne and U-Ne emission line lamps, and with Fabry-Pérot etalons.

We have used dedicated 0.7m telescopes in California and Israel to image the halos of ~ 200 galaxies in the Local Volume to 29 mag/sq arcsec, the sample mainly drawn from the 2MASS Large Galaxy Atlas (LGA). We supplement the LGA sample with dwarf galaxies and more distant giant ellipticals. Low surface brightness halos exceeding 50 kpc in diameter are found only in galaxies more luminous than L*, and classic interaction signatures are relatively infrequent. Halo diameter is correlated with total galaxy luminosity. Extended low surface brightness halos are present even in galaxies as faint as MV = - 18. Edge-on galaxies with boxy bulges tend to lack extended spheroidal halos, while those with large classical bulges exhibit extended round halos, supporting the notions that boxy or barlike bulges originate from disks. Most face-on spiral galaxies present features that appear to be irregular extensions of spiral arms, although rare cases show smooth boundaries with no sign of star formation. Although we serendipitously discovered a dwarf galaxy undergoing tidal disruption in the halo of NGC 4449, we found no comparable examples in our general survey. A search for similar examples in the Local Volume identified hcc087, a tidally disrupting dwarf galaxy in the Hercules Cluster, but we do not confirm an anomalously large half-light radius reported for the dwarf VCC 1661.

We use the SDSS Stripe 82 to study the stellar-mass growth that is triggered by minor mergers in local disk galaxies. Since major mergers destroy disks and create spheroids, morphologically disturbed spirals are likely remnants of minor mergers (since the disk remains intact). Disturbed spirals exhibit enhanced specific star formation rates (SSFRs), with the enhancement increasing in galaxies with ‘later’ morphological type (that have larger gas reservoirs and smaller bulges). By combining the SSFR enhancements with the fraction of time spirals in various morphological classes spend in this ‘enhanced’ mode, we estimate that ~40% of the star formation activity in local spirals is directly triggered by minor mergers. Combining our results with the star formation in local early-type galaxies – which is almost completely driven by minor mergers – suggests that around half the star formation activity at the present day is likely to be triggered by the minor-merger process.

Gaia will have a revolutionary impact on most fields of astronomy. However, its scanning law is too sparse for traditional transit detection approaches (de Bruijne 2012). Practically, only stars brighter than 16th magnitude are relevant for follow-up of transiting exoplanets. For those stars, Gaia's precision is of the order of 1 mmag (Eyer et al. 2015). On average, Gaia will have sampled each target 70 times, but certain stars may be observed as many as 200 times (Voss et al. 2013). Hipparcos scanning law was similar, but its precision much worse. Nevertheless the transit of HD209458 could be seen, aposteriori, in Hipparcos' data (Söderhelm 1999). This inspired our GATE initiative.

Recent UV absorption line studies suggest that a large fraction of missing baryons are in the warm ionized and neutral phases, with about half of Milky Way-mass galaxies containing absorption systems with HI column densities of 1018 cm−2 or greater. This HI gas, which would have been difficult to detect with previous instruments, could be a significant contributor to the missing baryons. The Green Bank Telescope (GBT) presents a unique opportunity to detect this emission. We present results from GBT 21 cm observations of a sample of ten nearby optically luminous spirals, which reveal extended HI gas in half of our sample. The column densities of this extended HI are typically ~ 1 × 1019 cm−2, as measured at distances of 100 kpc from the center of the galaxies.

A dominant astrophysical site for r-process, which is responsible for producing heavy neutron-capture elements, is unknown. Dwarf spheroidal galaxies around the Milky Way halo provide ideal laboratories to investigate the origin and evolution of r-process elements. We carried out high-resolution spectroscopic observations of three giant stars in the Draco dwarf spheroidal galaxy to estimate their europium abundances. We found that the upper-limits of [Eu/H] are very low in the range [Fe/H] < −2, while this ratio is nearly constant at higher metallicities. This trend is not well reproduced with models which assume that Eu is produced together with Fe by SNe, and may suggest the contribution from other objects such as neutron-star mergers.

Observed massive galaxies in the distant Universe form stars at much higher rates than today. High levels of star formation are sustained by a continuous supply of fresh gas and high molecular gas fractions. But after a peak around redshift z=2-3, the star formation rate decreases by an order of magnitude. Is this evolution mostly driven by the available cold gas reservoir, or are the star formation processes qualitatively different near the star formation peak? The Kennicutt-Schmidt relation enables to characterize the star formation efficiency at low and high redshift, but resolved measurements at the scale of the star-forming regions themselves are still challenging at high redshift. Molecular gas observations carried out at the IRAM Plateau de Bure interferometer within the PHIBSS program (Tacconi, Combes et al.) permit us to study the star formation efficiency at sub-galactic scales around z=1.2 and 1.5 for a limited sample of galaxies, and thus help characterize the star formation processes at this epoch. Our results lay in the continuation of the resolved low-redshift measurements, but further studies would be necessary to complement our sample and validate our conclusions.

Core-collapse supernovae (SNe) are the final act in the evolution of stars more massive than about 8–9 solar masses. Determining the progenitors of these explosive events and how massive stars are linked to the different SN types are topics of major significance for several fields of astrophysics. Recent progress in observational techniques now allow for rapid-response spectroscopic observations of SNe within a day of detection Gal-Yam et al. (2014). This allows the study of early phases when the SN shock front has not yet reached spatial scales of 1014 cm. Depending on the progenitor's wind density and SN shock front velocity, these early-time SN observations may probe epochs early enough that the dense parts of the progenitor wind and circumstellar medium (CSM) have not yet been overrun by the SN shock front.

We present coupled radiation hydrodynamical simulations of the epoch of reionization, aimed at probing self-feedback on galactic scales. Unlike previous works, which assume a (quasi) homogeneous UV background, we self-consistently evolve both the radiation field and the gas to model the impact of previously unresolved processes such as spectral hardening and self-shielding. We find that the characteristic halo mass with a gas fraction half the cosmic mean, Mc(z), a quantity frequently used in semi-analytical models of galaxy formation, is significantly larger than previously assumed. While this results in an increased suppression of star formation in the early Universe, our results are consistent with the extrapolated stellar abundance matching models from Moster et al. 2013.

The standard paradigm of structure formation in the universe, the cold dark matter cosmology, contains several crucial unsolved problems such as “cusp-core problem” and “too-big-to-fail problem”. To solve these problems, we study about the dynamical response of a virialized system with a central cusp to the energy feedback driven by periodic supernova feedback using collisionless N-body simulations with the Nested-Particle-Mesh code. The resonance between dark matter particles and the density wave excited by the oscillating potential plays a significant role in the cusp-core transition of dark matter halos. Furthermore, we show that the cusp-core transition with periodic supernova feedback can solve the too-big-to-fail problem.

The X-ray light curve of Sw~J1644+57 indicates this event would be due to a tidal disruption. The lightcurve shows large amplitude fluctuation. As proposed by Lyubarskii (1997), the aperiodic variability observed in the Galactic X-ray binaries and active galactic nuclei is likely from the fluctuation of the viscous parameter in their disks. We explain the significant fluctuation of the late X-ray lightcurve (t>106 seconds) of Sw J1644+57 with this model. We assume the stochastic variations in the viscous parameter featuring as α(R,t) = α0 [1+β(R,t)], where the time-scale for varying β(R,t) is set as ten times of the dynamic time-scale for disk at the radius R (Janiuk & Misra 2012). Based on the simulation results of Lodato et al. (2009), we describe the fallback behavior of the tidal disruption as Ṁfb ∝ {[(t - tb)/tfb]κ n + [(t - tb)/tfb]5n/3}−1/n for t > tb and Ṁfb=0 for other situations, where κ=10.0, n=0.5, tfb=103τ, and tb=102τ in which τ=2π(Rf3/GMBH)1/2 and Rf=5rg is the pericentre distance. Figure 1 compare the power-density spectra (PDS) derived from the observed and our simulated lightcurves. It is found the our simulations are well consistent with the observations.

Since 1970 surface brightness profiles of disc galaxies were classified as Type-I, single falling exponentials, or Type-II, broken exponentials with steeper decline in the outskirts. For the past decade Type-III profiles, (antitruncations), with a shallower fall-off in the outskirts, have been shown to occur in a significant fraction of galaxy discs. Here we give a brief overview, characterizing these profiles and their distribution with galaxy type, with a look at recent explanations of their causes, and how they fit into the picture of galaxy evolution.

The history of supermassive black holes’ activity can be partly constrained by monitoring the diffuse X-ray emission possibly created by the echoes of past events propagating through the molecular clouds of their respective environments. In particular, using this method we have demonstrated that our Galaxy’s supermassive black hole, Sgr A⋆, has experienced multiple periods of higher activity in the last centuries, likely due to several short but very energetic events, and we now investigate the possibility of studying the past activity of other supermassive black holes by applying the same method to M31⋆. We set strong constraints on putative phase transitions of this more distant galactic nucleus but the existence of short events such as the ones observed in the Galactic center cannot be assessed with the upper limits we derived.

The XXIX IAU General Assembly took place during the golden year of the exploration of small solar system bodies. With the Rosetta ESA mission around comet 67P, NASA Dawn and New Horizons missions nearby dwarf planets Ceres and Pluto, respectively, and the NASA/Cassini mission in Saturn neighborhood, year 2015 marked an important step towards further understanding of small solar system bodies. On August 11-13, Focus meeting 9 "Highlights in the exploration of small worlds" gathered scientists of all over the world to present and discuss the spectacular results obtained from these missions, as well as recent achievements obtained from past missions, comprehensive spectroscopic surveys from space (e.g., Herschel, NEOWISE, Gaia), ground-based observations, and geochemical analyses. This meeting was also the opportunity to discuss the state of our understanding of the nature of the various populations of small bodies in the Solar System, including icy satellites, in a cosmo-chemistry perspective.