Unraveling the Origins of Nearby Young Stars

Abstract

A systematic search for close conjunctions and clusterings in the past of nearby stars younger than the Pleiades is undertaken, which may reveal the time, location, and mechanism of formation of these often isolated, disconnected from clusters and star-forming regions, objects. The sample under investigation includes 101 T Tauri, post-TT, and main-sequence stars and stellar systems with signs of youth, culled from the literature. Their Galactic orbits are traced back in time and near approaches are evaluated in time, distance, and relative velocity. Numerous clustering events are detected, providing clues to the origin of very young, isolated stars. Each star's orbit is also matched with those of nearby young open clusters, OB and TT associations and star-forming molecular clouds, including the Ophiuchus, Lupus, Corona Australis, and Chamaeleon regions. Ejection of young stars from open clusters is ruled out for nearly all investigated objects, but the nearest OB associations in Scorpius-Centaurus, and especially, the dense clouds in Ophiuchus and Corona Australis have likely played a major role in the generation of the local streams (TWA, Beta Pic, and Tucana-Horologium) that happen to be close to the Sun today. The core of the Tucana-Horologium association probably originated from the vicinity of the Upper Scorpius association 28 Myr ago. A few proposed members of the AB Dor moving group were in conjunction with the coeval Cepheus OB6 association 38 Myr ago.

Files

Additional details