Context. Rotation plays a key role in the life cycles of stars with masses above ~8 M⊙. Hence, accurate knowledge of the rotation rates of such massive stars is critical for understanding their properties and for constraining models of their evolution. Aims: This paper investigates the reliability of current methods used to derive projected

We use recent high-resolution infrared (IR; 1-20 μm) photometry to examine the origin of the IR emission in low-luminosity active galactic nuclei (LLAGN). The data are compared with published model fits that describe the spectral energy distribution (SED) of LLAGN in terms of an advection-dominated accretion flow, truncated thin accretion disk, and

We present photometric and spectroscopic observations of the low-mass X-ray binary GR Mus (XB 1254-690), and find strong evidence for the presence of a negative superhump with a period that is 2.4 ± 0.3 per cent shorter than the orbital. This provides further support that GR Mus indeed harbours a precessing accretion disc (with a period of 6.74 ± 0

The Open Cluster Chemical Analysis and Mapping (OCCAM) survey aims to produce a comprehensive, uniform, infrared-based data set for hundreds of open clusters, and constrain key Galactic dynamical and chemical parameters from this sample. This first contribution from the OCCAM survey presents analysis of 141 members stars in 28 open clusters with

The use of integral field spectroscopy is since recently allowing to measure the emission line fluxes of an increasingly large number of star-forming galaxies, both locally and at high redshift. Many studies have used these fluxes to derive the gas-phase metallicity of the galaxies by applying the so-called strong-line methods. However, the

Context. There is still some debate about the presence and the morphological properties of the long bar in the inner Galaxy. Aims: We investigate the morphological properties of the long Galactic bar using the VVV survey extending star counts at least 3 mag deeper than 2MASS. Our study covers the relatively unexplored negative longitudes of the