Swift, UVOT and Hot Stars

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates the capabilities of the Swift/UVOT telescope in studying hot stars and young stellar populations, revealing recent star formation in the Small Magellanic Cloud and characterizing rare hot stars.

Contribution

It provides new UVOT photometry data for hot stars in clusters and the SMC, and discusses the potential to constrain star formation history through UV observations.

Findings

UVOT can characterize rare hot stars like Post-AGB and EHB stars.

SMC shows evidence of recent star formation episodes.

Constraining SMC's star formation history requires better reddening models.

Abstract

We present the results of our ongoing investigation into the properties of hot stars and young stellar populations using the Swift/UVOT telescope. We present UVOT photometry of open and globular clusters and show that UVOT is capable of characterizing a variety of rare hot stars, including Post-Asymptotic Giant Branch and Extreme Horizontal Branch Stars. We also present very early reults of our survey of stellar populations in the Small Magellanic Cloud. We find that the SMC has experienced recent bouts of star formation but constraining the exact star formation history will depend on finding an effective model of the reddening within the SMC.