Wednesday May 8th, 7:30 pm at Kaleideum North the Forsyth Astronomical Society will have its regularly scheduled monthly meeting. The program for this month’s meeting will be given by Dr. Brad Barlow, Assistant Professor of Astrophysics at High Point University, titled:
“Exploring the Impact of Substellar Objects on Late Stellar Evolution.”
A description of this presentation in Dr. Barlow’s own words:
“Planets and brown dwarfs in close orbits around main sequence stars will interact with their stellar hosts once they ascend the red giant branch. The details of these interactions and their outcomes are currently unclear. Recent discoveries of brown dwarfs orbiting post-red giant branch “hot subdwarf” stars imply that (i) the angular momentum resident in an orbiting substellar object is sufficient for ejecting the outer layers of a red giant’s atmosphere and (ii) the substellar object can survive this interaction. More than a hundred new eclipsing hot subdwarf binaries with cool, low-mass companions have recently been discovered by large photometric surveys like the Optical Gravitational Lensing Experiment (OGLE) and UNC’s Evryscope project, increasing the number known systems by nearly a factor of ten. Over the next several years, our research group at HPU will work with international collaborators to obtain follow-up spectroscopy and determine the stellar masses in these systems. The companion mass distribution resulting from this work will allow us to determine whether there is a lower mass limit for substellar objects to eject a red giant’s envelope and survive engulfment, as suggested by theory. Here I give a brief overview of this work and discuss progress towards our science goals.”
Dr. Brad Barlow joined the Department of Physics at High Point University as an Assistant Professor in 2013. Before moving to the NC Triad, he completed his Ph.D. in the Department of Physics & Astronomy at UNC-Chapel Hill in 2011 and spent two years as a Postdoctoral Research Scholar at Penn State University. His research primarily focuses on pulsating stars, late stellar evolution, and binary star systems. He has also collaborated on research projects involving pulsators in the Kepler field, X-ray binaries, white dwarfs, and exoplanets. While at Chapel Hill he helped develop software for the Goodman spectrograph on the 4.1-m SOAR telescope on Cerro Pachon in Chile. In September 2018, the National Science Foundation awarded his research group a three-year, $349,621 grant to study the effects small objects like planets and brown dwarfs might have on the evolution of stars like the sun. Originally from Biloxi, Mississippi, Brad did his undergraduate studies at Mississippi State University. His other interests include playing the piano, writing music, cycling, and public outreach.
Following the presentation portion, we will have a brief business/planning meeting and as always, there will be an informal social gathering 30 minutes or so before the meeting. Come early for the best choice of doughnuts. All meetings are open to the public, free of charge and all are welcome. Hope to see you there.
A reminder to club members: It’s that time again, our renewal of annual dues is upon us. You can pay them at any meeting, or by mail, address in the Contact Us tab above. Dues are $35/year for the basic membership, $40/year for a dual vote membership and our student rate is still $5/year. For any one else interested in joining our organization, now is the prime time to do it. More information on membership benefits and our dues structure can be found on our membership info page. Don’t forget to renew your Astronomical League membership as well if you participate in that group, $7.50 additional to your FAS membership. Don’t know about the Astronomical League, ask our FAS AL correspondent member Sean Wood.