Automated search for star clusters in large multiband surveys: II. Discovery and investigation of open clusters in the Galactic plane

TL;DR

This paper presents an automated method to discover and analyze star clusters in large multiband surveys, resulting in the identification of 153 new clusters and detailed parameters for many of them, enhancing our understanding of galactic structure.

Contribution

The study introduces a new automated search technique applied to 2MASS data, discovering numerous new star clusters and providing their fundamental parameters for the first time.

Findings

Discovered 153 new star clusters in the Galactic plane.

Determined color excesses, distances, and ages for 144 clusters.

Published a comprehensive catalog and developed a web resource for data access.

Abstract

Automated search for star clusters in J,H,K_s data from 2MASS catalog has been performed using the method developed by Koposov et. al (2008). We have found and verified 153 new clusters in the interval of the galactic latitude -24 < b < 24 degrees. Color excesses E(B-V), distance moduli and ages were determined for 130 new and 14 yet-unstudied known clusters. In this paper, we publish a catalog of coordinates, diameters, and main parameters of all the clusters under study. A special web-site available at http://ocl.sai.msu.ru has been developed to facilitate dissemination and scientific usage of the results.