An ongoing study is presented in which a photometric non-linear Scaling Relation of Early-Type Galaxies (ETGs) is proposed to carry out a consistency test on cosmic and galaxy evolution.

We have measured C II and O II recombination lines in several H II regions of low-metallicity dwarf galaxies. These objects show lower C/O ratios than H II regions in spiral galaxies, indicating different chemical evolution histories.

We report the discovery of a detached 20-min orbital period binary white dwarf (WD). WD 0931+444 (SDSS J093506.93+441106.9) was previously classified as a WD + M dwarf system based on its optical spectrum. Our time-resolved optical spectroscopy observations obtained at the 8 m Gemini and 6.5 m MMT reveal peak-to-peak radial velocity variations of

Most ultraluminous X-ray sources have a typical set of properties not seen in Galactic stellar-mass black holes. They have luminosities of more than 3 × 1039 ergs per second, unusually soft X-ray components (with a typical temperature of less than about 0.3 kiloelectronvolts) and a characteristic downturn in their spectra above about 5

We present a 3D map of extinction in the northern Galactic plane derived using photometry from the INT/WFC Photometric Hα Survey of the northern Galactic plane. The map has fine angular ( ˜ 10 arcmin) and distance (100 pc) sampling allied to a significant depth (≳5 kpc). We construct the map using a method based on a hierarchical Bayesian model

Over six years of operation, the Catalina Real-time Transient Survey (CRTS) has identified 1043 cataclysmic variable (CV) candidates - the largest sample of CVs from a single survey to date. Here, we provide spectroscopic identification of 85 systems fainter than g ≥ 19, including three AM Canum Venaticorum binaries, one helium-enriched CV, one