The Blue Straggler and Main-sequence Binary Population of the Low-Mass Globular Cluster Palomar 13

Abstract

We present high-precision VI photometry of stars from the middle of the giant branch to about 5 magnitudes below the main-sequence turnoff in the globular cluster Palomar 13 based on images obtained with the Keck II 10m telescope. We tabulate a complete sample of blue stragglers in the cluster out to about 18 core radii. The blue straggler population is significantly more centrally concentrated than the giant star sample, which is in turn significantly more centrally concentrated than the main-sequence star sample. Palomar 13 has one of the highest specific frequencies of blue stragglers of any known globular cluster, but the specific frequency of blue stragglers in the outskirts of the cluster does not increase as has been seen in denser clusters. We also identify a group of faint blue stragglers (bluer than the turnoff, but having about the same magnitude) that outnumbers the brighter stragglers by more than a factor of 2. The cluster's color-magnitude diagram shows a large excess of stars to the red of the main sequence, indicating that the cluster's binary fraction is at least 30% +/- 4%, which appears to be similar to that of the low-mass cluster E3 but significantly higher than that of the more massive clusters Pal 5 and NGC 288.

36 pages, 13 figures, 1 electronic table, accepted to AJ

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• Astrophysics in 2005