Old-Aged Primary Distance Indicators

Beaton, Rachael L.; Bono, Giuseppe; Braga, Vittorio Francesco; Dall'Ora, Massimo; Fiorentino, Giuliana; Jang, In Sung; Martínez-Vázquez, Clara E.; Matsunaga, Noriyuki; Monelli, Matteo; Neeley, Jillian R.; Salaris, Maurizio
Bibliographical reference

Space Science Reviews, Volume 214, Issue 8, article id. 113, 93 pp.

Advertised on:
12
2018
Number of authors
11
IAC number of authors
1
Citations
63
Refereed citations
55
Description
Old-aged stellar distance indicators are present in all Galactic structures (halo, bulge, disk) and in galaxies of all Hubble types and, thus, are immensely powerful tools for understanding our Universe. Here we present a comprehensive review for three primary standard candles from Population II: (i) RR Lyrae type variables (RRL), (ii) type II Cepheid variables (T2C), and (iii) the tip of the red giant branch (TRGB). The discovery and use of these distance indicators is placed in historical context before describing their theoretical foundations and demonstrating their observational applications across multiple wavelengths. The methods used to establish the absolute scale for each standard candle is described with a discussion of the observational systematics. We conclude by looking forward to the suite of new observational facilities anticipated over the next decade; these have both a broader wavelength coverage and larger apertures than current facilities. We anticipate future advancements in our theoretical understanding and observational application of these stellar populations as they apply to the Galactic and extragalactic distance scale.
Related projects
A view of our Milky Way galaxy with its close neighbors the Magellanic Clouds
Galaxy Evolution in the Local Group

Galaxy formation and evolution is a fundamental Astrophysical problem. Its study requires “travelling back in time”, for which there are two complementary approaches. One is to analyse galaxy properties as a function of red-shift. Our team focuses on the other approach, called “Galactic Archaeology”. It is based on the determination of galaxy

Matteo
Monelli