Blue Straggler Stars in Open Clusters using Gaia: Dependence on Cluster Parameters and Possible Formation Pathways

TL;DR

This study catalogs blue straggler stars in open clusters using Gaia data, revealing their dependence on cluster parameters and suggesting multiple formation pathways including binary mass transfer and mergers.

Contribution

It provides the first large-scale Gaia-based catalog of BSSs in open clusters and analyzes their dependence on cluster age, mass, and dynamical state, offering observational constraints on formation mechanisms.

Findings

BSSs are present in clusters older than 1 Gyr and more massive than 1000 Msun.

The number of BSSs correlates with cluster age and mass following a power-law.

Most BSSs show signs of formation via binary mass transfer or mergers.

Abstract

Blue straggler stars (BSSs) are the most massive stars in a cluster formed via binary or higher-order stellar interactions. Though the exact nature of such formation scenarios is difficult to pin down, we provide observational constraints on the different possible mechanism. In this quest, we first produce a catalogue of BSSs using Gaia DR2 data. Among the 670 clusters older than 300 Myr, we identified 868 BSSs in 228 clusters and 500 BSS candidates in 208 clusters. In general, all clusters older than 1 Gyr and massive than 1000 Msun have BSSs. The average number of BSSs increases with cluster age and mass, and there is a power-law relation between the cluster mass and the maximum number of BSSs in the cluster. We introduce the term fractional mass excess (Me) for BSSs. We find that at least 54\% of BSSs have Me $<$ 0.5 (likely to have gained mass through a binary mass transfer (MT)), 30\% in the $1.0 <$ Me $< 0.5$ range (likely to have gained mass through a merger) and up to 16\% with Me $>$ 1.0 (likely from multiple mergers/MT). We also find that the percentage of low Me BSSs increases with age, beyond 1--2 Gyr, suggesting an increase in formation through MT in older clusters. The BSSs are radially segregated, and the extent of segregation depends on the dynamical relaxation of the cluster. The statistics and trends presented here are expected to constrain the BSS formation models in open clusters.