We combine results from imaging searches for substellar objects in the σ Orionis cluster and follow-up photometric and spectroscopic observations to derive a census of the brown dwarf population in a region of 847 arcmin2. We identify 64 very low mass cluster member candidates in this region. We have available three-color (I, Z, and J) photometry

We present our recent spectrophotometric results of the infrared luminous Seyfert 2 galaxy NGC 7679. We find compelling evidence for the presence of a recent nuclear starburst, revealed by the observations of a) the spectral features of high order Balmer absorption lines, b) the weak equivalent widths for CaIIK lambda 3933, CN lambda 4200, G-band

We report new (1995) Very Large Array (VLA) observations and (1984-1999) Effelsberg 100 m monitoring observations of the 22 GHz H2O maser spectrum of the Seyfert 2 galaxy NGC 1068. The sensitive VLA observations provide a registration of the 22 GHz continuum emission and the location of the maser spots with an accuracy of ~5 mas. Within the

The term "Target of Opportunity" (ToO) is used in astronomy to identify unpredictable events whose study is of the highest scientific interest. For XMM-Newton a ToO is an astronomical event observable by its instruments, which cannot be predicted and scheduled on the time scale of one year, yet is scientifically significant enough to justify the

We have explored the effect of transition timescales in planetary nebulae (PNe) formation. We have performed hydrodynamical simulations of the evolution of the stellar winds predicted by theoretical stellar evolutionary models adopting two choices for the evolution during the transition time. The evolution of the star from the AGB to the PN stage

We have obtained high-resolution high signal-to-noise ratio spectra of the S I near-infrared doublet at 8694 Å in eight metal-poor stars with metallicities in the range -0.6