Stellar rotation bifurcation caused by tidal locking in the open cluster NGC 2287?

We present a detailed analysis of the projected stellar rotational velocities of the well-separated double main sequence (MS) in the young, \(\sim200\)Myr-old Milky Way open cluster NGC 2287 and suggest that stellar rotation may drive the split MSs in NGC 2287. We find that the observed distribution...

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Bibliographic Details
Published inarXiv.org
Main Authors Sun, Weijia, Li, Chengyuan, Deng, Licai, de Grijs, Richard
Format Paper Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Ithaca Cornell University Library, arXiv.org 18.08.2019
Subjects
Bifurcations
Binary stars
Clusters
Galactic rotation
Locking
Physics - Astrophysics of Galaxies
Physics - Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
Stellar rotation
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Summary:We present a detailed analysis of the projected stellar rotational velocities of the well-separated double main sequence (MS) in the young, \(\sim200\)Myr-old Milky Way open cluster NGC 2287 and suggest that stellar rotation may drive the split MSs in NGC 2287. We find that the observed distribution of projected stellar rotation velocities could result from a dichotomous distribution of stellar rotation rates. We discuss whether our observations may reflect the effects of tidal locking affecting a fraction of the cluster's member stars in stellar binary systems. The slow rotators are likely stars that initially rotated rapidly but subsequently slowed down through tidal locking induced by low-mass-ratio binary systems. However, the cluster may have a much larger population of short-period binaries than is usually seen in the literature, with relatively low secondary masses.
ISSN:2331-8422
DOI:10.48550/arxiv.1908.06531