Tidal tails in the disintegrating open cluster NGC 752

We utilize the robust membership determination algorithm, ML-MOC, on the precise astrometric and deep photometric data from Gaia Early Data Release 3 within a region of radius 5\(^{\circ}\) around the center of the intermediate-age galactic open cluster NGC 752 to identify its member stars. We repor...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:arXiv.org 2021-05
Main Authors: Bhattacharya, Souradeep, Agarwal, Manan, Rao, Khushboo K, Vaidya, Kaushar
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Algorithms
Disintegration
Galactic clusters
Stellar age
Stellar evolution
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:We utilize the robust membership determination algorithm, ML-MOC, on the precise astrometric and deep photometric data from Gaia Early Data Release 3 within a region of radius 5\(^{\circ}\) around the center of the intermediate-age galactic open cluster NGC 752 to identify its member stars. We report the discovery of the tidal tails of NGC 752, extending out to \(\sim\)35 pc on either side of its denser central region and following the cluster orbit. From comparison with PARSEC stellar isochrones, we obtain the mass function of the cluster with a slope, \(\chi=-1.26\pm0.07\). The high negative value of \(\chi\) is indicative of a disintegrating cluster undergoing mass-segregation. \(\chi\) is more negative in the intra-tidal regions as compared to the outskirts of NGC 752. We estimate a present day mass of the cluster, M\(\rm_{C}=297\pm10\) M\(_{\odot}\). Through mass-loss due to stellar evolution and tidal interactions, we further estimate that NGC 752 has lost nearly 95.2-98.5 % of its initial mass, \(\rm M_{i}~=~0.64~-2~\times~10^{4}~M_{\odot}\).
ISSN:2331-8422
DOI:10.48550/arxiv.2105.06108