"On 12 February 2006, the recurrent nova RS Ophiuchi erupted for the first time since 1985, its 6th (at least!) known eruption. This event triggered an intensive multi-wavelength observational campaign, from the radio to gamma-rays, and theoreticians have been presented with a wealth of high-quality data. A workshop was held at Keele University, UK, from 12-14 June 2007 to discuss the observations, their interpretation, and where RS Ophiuchi sits in the wider astrophysical picture. The workshop brought together observers, from gamma-ray to radio wavelengths, theoreticians, and workers in closely related areas. The workshop considered not only the 2006 eruption of RS Oph but also the implications that this has had for our understanding of other much broader areas of astrophysics. It was wide ranging, taking in the environments of red giants; supernova progenitors; accretion, thermonuclear processes and evolution of close binary systems; and shocks of jets, as well as recurrent novae and related objects. The proceedings contain 15 invited reviews, 38 contributed talks and posters, and 3 specially commissioned papers which we hope will enhance the value of the workshop for the wider astrophysical community."--Publisher's website

Fully updated and revised second edition reference on classical novae for researchers and graduate students.

Targeting advanced students of astronomy and physics, as well as astronomers and physicists contemplating research on supernovae or related fields, David Branch and J. Craig Wheeler offer a modern account of the nature, causes and consequences of supernovae, as well as of issues that remain to be resolved. Owing especially to (1) the appearance of supernova 1987A in the nearby Large Magellanic Cloud, (2) the spectacularly successful use of supernovae as distance indicators for cosmology, (3) the association of some supernovae with the enigmatic cosmic gamma-ray bursts, and (4) the discovery of a class of superluminous supernovae, the pace of supernova research has been increasing sharply. This monograph serves as a broad survey of modern supernova research and a guide to the current literature. The book’s emphasis is on the explosive phases of supernovae. Part 1 is devoted to a survey of the kinds of observations that inform us about supernovae, some basic interpretations of such data, and an overview of the evolution of stars that brings them to an explosive endpoint. Part 2 goes into more detail on core-collapse and superluminous events: which kinds of stars produce them, and how do they do it? Part 3 is concerned with the stellar progenitors and explosion mechanisms of thermonuclear (Type Ia) supernovae. Part 4 is about consequences of supernovae and some applications to astrophysics and cosmology. References are provided in sufficient number to help the reader enter the literature.

This book surveys our understanding of stars which change in brightness because they pulsate. Pulsating variable stars are keys to distance scales inside and beyond the Milky Way galaxy. They test our understanding not only of stellar pulsation theory but also of stellar structure and evolution theory. Moreover, pulsating stars are important probes of the formation and evolution of our own and neighboring galaxies. Our understanding of pulsating stars has greatly increased in recent years as large-scale surveys of pulsating stars in the Milky Way and other Local Group galaxies have provided a wealth of new observations and as space-based instruments have studied particular pulsating stars in unprecedented detail.

The proceedings of MG16 give a broad view of all aspects of gravitational physics and astrophysics, from mathematical issues to recent observations and experiments. The scientific program of the meeting included 46 plenary presentations, 3 public lectures, 5 round tables and 81 parallel sessions arranged during the intense six-day online meeting. All talks were recorded and are available on the ICRANet YouTube channel at the following link: www.icranet.org/video_mg16.These proceedings are a representative sample of the very many contributions made at the meeting. They contain 383 papers, among which 14 come from the plenary sessions.The material represented in these proceedings cover the following topics: accretion, active galactic nuclei, alternative theories of gravity, black holes (theory, observations and experiments), binaries, boson stars, cosmic microwave background, cosmic strings, dark energy and large scale structure, dark matter, education, exact solutions, early universe, fundamental interactions and stellar evolution, fast transients, gravitational waves, high energy physics, history of relativity, neutron stars, precision tests, quantum gravity, strong fields, and white dwarf; all of them represented by a large number of contributions.The online e-proceedings are published in an open access format.

Stars are the main factories of element production in the universe through a suite of complex and intertwined physical processes. Such stellar alchemy is driven by multiple nuclear interactions that through eons have transformed the pristine, metal-poor ashes leftover by the Big Bang into a cosmos with 100 distinct chemical species. The products of

This book, which is a reworked and updated version of Steven Bloemen’s original PhD thesis, reports on several high-precision studies of compact variable stars. Its strength lies in the large variety of observational, theoretical and instrumentation techniques that are presented and used and paves the way towards new and detailed asteroseismic applications of single and binary subdwarf stars. Close binary stars are studied using high cadence spectroscopic datasets collected with state of the art electron multiplying CCDs and analysed using Doppler tomography visualization techniques. The work touches upon instrumentation, presenting the calibration of a new fast, multi-colour camera installed at the Mercator Telescope on La Palma. The thesis also includes theoretical work on the computation of the temperature range in which stellar oscillations can be driven in subdwarf B-stars. Finally, the highlight of the thesis is the measurement of velocities of stars using only photometric data from NASA's Kepler satellite. Doppler beaming causes stars to appear slightly brighter when they move towards us in their orbits, and this subtle effect can be seen in Kepler's brightness measurements. The thesis presents the first validation of such velocity measurements using independent spectroscopic measurements. Since the detection and validation of this Doppler beaming effect, it has been used in tens of studies to detect and characterize binary star systems, which are key calibrators in stellar astronomy.