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The Magellanic Stream has long been known to contain multiple HI strands and corresponding stellar populations are beginning to be discovered. Combining an H3-selected sample with stars drawn from the Gaia catalog, we trace stars along a sub-dominant strand of the Magellanic Stream, as defined by gas content, across 30$^\circ$ on the sky. We find that the dominant strand is devoid of stars with Galactocentric distance $\lesssim 55$ kpc while the subdominant strand shows a close correspondence to such stars. We conclude that (1) the two Stream strands have different origins, (2) they are likely only close in projection, (3) the subdominant strand is tidal in origin, and (4) the subdominant strand is composed of disk material, likely drawn from the disk of the Small Magellanic Cloud., Comment: 8 pages, 8 figures

The Milky Way hosts at least two modes in its present day distribution of Fe and alpha-elements. The exact cause of this bimodality is disputed, but one class of explanations involves the merger between the Milky Way and a relatively massive satellite (Gaia-Sausage-Enceladus) at z~2. However, reproducing this bimodality in simulations is not straightforward, with conflicting results on the prevalance, morphology, and mechanism behind multimodality. We present a case study of a galaxy in the Illustris TNG50 simulation which undergoes sequential phases of starburst, brief quiescence, and then rejuvenation. This scenario results in a pronounced abundance bimodality after a post-processing adjustment of the [alpha/Fe] of old stars designed to mimic a higher star formation efficiency in dense gas. The high- and low-alpha sequences are separated in time by the brief quiescent period, which is not associated with a merger but by the formation of a bar followed by AGN activity. This galaxy indicates a novel scenario in which the alpha-bimodality in the Milky Way is caused by the formation of the bar via AGN-induced quenching. In addition to a stellar age gap in the Milky Way, we predict that abundance bimodalities should be more common in barred as opposed to unbarred galaxies., Comment: 13+10 pages, 5+18 figures, to be submitted to ApJ; comments welcome

The Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) is a Milky Way (MW) satellite that is massive enough to gravitationally attract the MW disc and inner halo, causing significant motion of the inner MW with respect to the outer halo. In this work, we probe this interaction by constructing a sample of 9,866 blue horizontal branch (BHB) stars with radial velocities from the DESI spectroscopic survey out to 120 kpc from the Galactic centre. This is the largest spectroscopic set of BHB stars in the literature to date, and it contains four times more stars with Galactocentric distances beyond 50 kpc than previous BHB catalogues. Using the DESI BHB sample combined with SDSS BHBs, we measure the bulk radial velocity of stars in the outer halo and observe that the velocity in the Southern Galactic hemisphere is different by 3.7$\sigma$ from the North. Modelling the projected velocity field shows that its dipole component is directed at a point 22 degrees away from the LMC along its orbit, which we interpret as the travel direction of the inner MW. The velocity field includes a monopole term that is -24 km/s, which we refer to as compression velocity. This velocity is significantly larger than predicted by the current models of the MW and LMC interaction. This work uses DESI data from its first two years of observations, but we expect that with upcoming DESI data releases, the sample of BHB stars will increase and our ability to measure the MW-LMC interaction will improve significantly., Comment: 22 pages, 19 figures. Submitted to MNRAS

Dwarf galaxies hold the key to crucial frontiers of astrophysics, however, their faintness renders spectroscopy challenging. Here we present the JWST Cycle 2 survey, All the Little Things (ALT, PID 3516), which is designed to seek late-forming Pop III stars and the drivers of reionization at $z\sim6-7$. ALT has acquired the deepest NIRCam grism spectroscopy yet (7-27 hr), at JWST's most sensitive wavelengths (3-4 $\mu$m), covering the powerful lensing cluster Abell 2744. Over the same 30 arcmin$^2$, ALT's ultra-deep F070W+F090W imaging ($\sim$30 mag) enables selection of very faint sources at $z>6$. We demonstrate the success of ALT's novel ``butterfly" mosaic to solve spectral confusion and contamination, and introduce the ``Allegro" method for emission line identification. By collecting spectra for every source in the field of view, ALT has measured precise ($R\sim1600$) redshifts for 1630 sources at $z=0.2-8.5$. This includes one of the largest samples of distant dwarf galaxies: [1015, 475, 50] sources less massive than the SMC, Fornax, and Sculptor with $\log(M_{*}/M_{\odot})<$[8.5, 7.5, 6.5]. We showcase ALT's discovery space with: (i) spatially resolved spectra of lensed clumps in galaxies as faint as $M_{\rm{UV}}\sim-15$; (ii) large-scale clustering -- overdensities at $z$=[2.50, 2.58, 3.97, 4.30, 5.66, 5.77, 6.33] hosting massive galaxies with striking Balmer breaks; (iii) small-scale clustering -- a system of satellites around a Milky Way analog at $z\sim6$; (iv) spectroscopically confirmed multiple images that help constrain the lensing model underlying all science in this legacy field; (v) sensitive star-formation maps based on dust-insensitive tracers such as Pa$\alpha$; (vi) direct spectroscopic discovery of rare sources such as AGN with ionized outflows. These results provide a powerful proof of concept for how grism surveys maximize the potential of strong lensing fields., Comment: Submitted to the Open Journal of Astrophysics. Figs. 6 and 10 illustrate the quality of the spectra and imaging, while Fig. 12 summarizes the yield of the survey. Comments warmly welcomed and greatly appreciated. The ALT DR1 catalog is available at https://zenodo.org/records/13871850

Our understanding of the assembly timeline of the Milky Way has been transforming along with the dramatic increase in astrometric and spectroscopic data available over the past several years. Many substructures in chemo-dynamical space have been discovered and identified as the remnants of various galactic mergers. To investigate the timeline of these mergers we select main sequence turn off & subgiant stars (MSTOs) from the H3 survey, finding members in seven metal poor components of the halo: GSE, the Helmi Streams, Thamnos, Sequoia, Wukong/LMS-1, Arjuna, and I'itoi. We also select out the metal poor in situ disk to facilitate comparison to the evolution of the Milky Way itself at these early epochs. We fit individual isochrone ages to the MSTOs in each of these substructures and use the resulting age distributions to infer simple star formation histories. For GSE we resolve an extended star formation history that truncates $\approx10$ Gyr ago, as well as a clear age -- metallicity relation. From this age distribution and measured star formation history we infer that GSE merged with the Milky Way at a time $9.5-10.2$ Gyr ago, in agreement with previous estimates. We infer that the other mergers occurred at various times ranging from $9-13$ Gyr ago, and that the metal poor component of the disk built up within only a few billion years. These results reinforce the emerging picture that both the disk and halo of the Milky Way experienced a rapid assembly., Comment: 27 pages, 17 figures

The kinematics of the stellar halo hold important clues to the assembly history and mass distribution of the Galaxy. In this study, we map the kinematics of stars across the Galactic halo with the H3 Survey. We find a complex distribution that breaks both azimuthal symmetry about the $Z$-axis and mirror symmetry about the Galactic plane. This asymmetry manifests as large variations in the radial velocity dispersion $\sigma_r$ from as ``cold'' as 70 $\text{km}\text{ s}^{-1}$ to as ``hot'' as 160 $\text{km}\text{ s}^{-1}$. We use stellar chemistry to distinguish accreted stars from in-situ stars in the halo, and find that the accreted population has higher $\sigma_r$ and radially biased orbits, while the in-situ population has lower $\sigma_r$ and isotropic orbits. As a result, the Galactic halo kinematics are highly heterogeneous and poorly approximated as being spherical or axisymmetric. We measure radial profiles of $\sigma_r$ and the anisotropy parameter $\beta$ over Galactocentric radii $10-80\text{ kpc}$, and find that discrepancies in the literature are due to the nonspherical geometry and heterogeneous nature of the halo. Investigating the effect of strongly asymmetric $\sigma_r$ and $\beta$ on equilibrium models is a path forward to accurately constraining the Galactic gravitational field, including its total mass., Comment: submitted to ApJ; comments welcome

We show with Gaia XP spectroscopy that extremely metal-rich stars in the Milky Way (EMR; $[M/H]_{XP} > 0.5$) - but only those - are largely confined to a tight "knot" at the center of the Galaxy. This EMR knot is round in projection, has a fairly abrupt edge near $\sim 1.5$kpc, and is a dynamically hot system. This central knot also contains very metal-rich (VMR; $+0.2\le [M/H]_{XP} \le +0.4$) stars. However, in contrast to EMR stars, the bulk of VMR stars form an extended, highly flattened distribution in the inner Galaxy ($R_{\mathrm{GC}}\lesssim 5$ kpc). We draw on TNG50 simulations of Milky Way analogs for context and find that compact, metal-rich knots confined to $<1.5$kpc are a universal feature. In typical simulated analogs, the top 5-10% most metal-rich stars are confined to a central knot; however, in our Milky Way data this fraction is only 0.1%. Dust-penetrating wide-area near-infrared spectroscopy, such as SDSS-V, will be needed for a rigorous estimate of the fraction of stars in the Galactic EMR knot. Why in our Milky Way only EMR giants are confined to such a central knot remains to be explained. Remarkably, the central few kiloparsecs of the Milky Way harbor both the highest concentration of metal-poor stars (the `poor old heart') and almost all EMR stars. This highlights the stellar population diversity at the bottom of galactic potential wells., Comment: 11 pages, 7 figures, submitted to ApJ

The infall of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) is predicted to displace the inner Milky Way (MW), imprinting an apparent 'reflex motion' on the observed velocities of distant halo stars. We construct the largest all-sky spectroscopic dataset of luminous red giant stars from $50-160$ kpc, including a new survey of the southern celestial hemisphere. We fit the full 6D kinematics of our data to measure the amplitude and direction of the inner MW's motion towards the outer halo. The observed velocity grows with distance such that, relative to halo stars at $100$ kpc, the inner MW is lurching at $\approx 40$ km s$^{-1}$ towards a recent location along the LMC's past orbit. Our measurements align with N-body simulations of the halo's response to a $1.8 \times 10^{11} M_\odot$ LMC on first infall, suggesting that the LMC is at least 15% as massive as the MW. Our findings highlight the dramatic disequilibrium of the MW outskirts, and will enable more accurate measurements of the total mass of our Galaxy., Comment: 25 pages, 15 figures. Submitted to ApJ

We offer a new way to look at the Large Magellanic Cloud through stellar mono-abundance and mono-age-mono-abundance maps. These maps are based on $\gtrsim 500\,000$ member stars with photo-spectroscopic [M/H] and age estimates from Gaia DR3 data, and they are the first area-complete, metallicity- and age-differentiated stellar maps of any disk galaxy. Azimuthally averaged, these maps reveal a surprisingly simple picture of the Milky Way's largest satellite galaxy. For any [M/H] below -0.1 dex, the LMC's radial profile is well described by a simple exponential, but with a scale length that steadily shrinks towards higher metallicities, from nearly 2.3~kpc at [M/H]$=-1.8$ to only 0.75~kpc at [M/H]$=-0.25$. The prominence of the bar decreases dramatically with [M/H], making it barely discernible at [M/H]$\lesssim -1.5$. Yet, even for metal-rich populations, the bar has little impact on the azimuthally averaged profile of the mono-abundance components. Including ages, we find that the scale length is a greater function of age than of metallicity, with younger populations far more centrally concentrated. At old ages, the scale length decreases with increasing metallicity; at young ages, the scale-length is independent of metallicity. These findings provide quantitative support for a scenario where the LMC built its stellar structure effectively outside in., Comment: Submitted to ApJ; constructive comments would be appreciated

Data-driven models, which apply machine learning to infer physical properties from large quantities of data, have become increasingly important for extracting stellar properties from spectra. In general, these methods have been applied to data in one wavelength regime or another. For example, APOGEE Net has been applied to near-IR spectra from the SDSS-V APOGEE survey to predict stellar parameters (Teff, log g, and [Fe/H]) for all stars with Teff from 3,000 to 50,000 K, including pre-main sequence stars, OB stars, main sequence dwarfs, and red giants. The increasing number of large surveys across multiple wavelength regimes provides the opportunity to improve data-driven models through learning from multiple datasets at once. In SDSS-V, a number of spectra of stars will be observed not just with APOGEE in near-IR, but also with BOSS in optical regime. Here we aim to develop a complementary model, BOSS Net, that will replicate the performance of APOGEE Net in these optical data through label transfer. We further improve the model by extending it to brown dwarfs, as well as white dwarfs, resulting in a comprehensive coverage between 1700

Stars formed with initial mass over 50 Msun are very rare today, but they are thought to be more common in the early universe. The fates of those early, metal-poor, massive stars are highly uncertain. Most are expected to directly collapse to black holes, while some may explode as a result of rotationally powered engines or the pair-creation instability. We present the chemical abundances of J0931+0038, a nearby low-mass star identified in early followup of SDSS-V Milky Way Mapper, which preserves the signature of unusual nucleosynthesis from a massive star in the early universe. J0931+0038 has relatively high metallicity ([Fe/H] = -1.76 +/- 0.13) but an extreme odd-even abundance pattern, with some of the lowest known abundance ratios of [N/Fe], [Na/Fe], [K/Fe], [Sc/Fe], and [Ba/Fe]. The implication is that a majority of its metals originated in a single extremely metal-poor nucleosynthetic source. An extensive search through nucleosynthesis predictions finds a clear preference for progenitors with initial mass > 50 Msun, making J0931+0038 one of the first observational constraints on nucleosynthesis in this mass range. However the full abundance pattern is not matched by any models in the literature. J0931+0038 thus presents a challenge for the next generation of nucleosynthesis models and motivates study of high-mass progenitor stars impacted by convection, rotation, jets, and/or binary companions. Though rare, more examples of unusual early nucleosynthesis in metal-poor stars should be found in upcoming large spectroscopic surveys., Comment: 11 pages + 22 page appendix, accepted to ApJL

Measuring the mass-radius relation of individual white dwarfs is an empirically challenging task that has been performed for only a few dozen stars. We measure the white dwarf mass-radius relation using gravitational redshifts and radii of 137 white dwarfs in wide binaries with main sequence companions. We obtain the space velocities to these systems using the main sequence companion, and subtract these Doppler redshifts from the white dwarfs' apparent motions, isolating their gravitational redshifts. We use Gaia data to calculate the surface temperatures and radii of these white dwarfs, thereby deriving an empirical gravitational redshift-radius relation. This work demonstrates the utility of low-resolution Galactic surveys to measure the white dwarf equation of state. Our results are consistent with theoretical models, and represent the largest sample of individual white dwarf gravitational redshift measurements to date., Comment: 12 pages, 9 figures

We report the discovery of SDSS~J022932.28+713002.7, a nascent extremely low-mass (ELM) white dwarf (WD) orbiting a massive ($> 1\,M_\odot$ at 2$\sigma$ confidence) companion with a period of 36 hours. We use a combination of spectroscopy, including data from the ongoing SDSS-V survey, and photometry to measure the stellar parameters for the primary pre-ELM white dwarf. The lightcurve of the primary WD exhibits ellipsoidal variation, which we combine with radial velocity data and $\tt{PHOEBE}$ binary simulations to estimate the mass of the invisible companion. We find that the primary WD has mass $M_1$ = $0.18^{+0.02}_{-0.02}$ M$_\odot$ and the unseen secondary has mass $M_2$ = $1.19^{+0.21}_{-0.14}$ M$_\odot$. The mass of the companion suggests that it is most likely a near-Chandrasekhar mass white dwarf or a neutron star. It is likely that the system recently went through a Roche lobe overflow from the visible primary onto the invisible secondary. The dynamical configuration of the binary is consistent with the theoretical evolutionary tracks for such objects, and the primary is currently in its contraction phase. The measured orbital period puts this system on a stable evolutionary path which, within a few Gyrs, will lead to a contracted ELM white dwarf orbiting a massive compact companion., Comment: 21 Pages, 8 Figures

We illustrate the formation and evolution of the Milky Way over cosmic time, utilizing a sample of 10 million red giant stars with full chemodynamical information, including metallicities and $\alpha$-abundances from low-resolution Gaia XP spectra. The evolution of angular momentum as a function of metallicity - a rough proxy for stellar age, particularly for high-[$\alpha$/Fe] stars - displays three distinct phases: the disordered and chaotic protogalaxy, the kinematically-hot old disk, and the kinematically-cold young disk. The old high-$\alpha$ disk starts at [Fe/H] $\approx -1.0$, 'spinning up' from the nascent protogalaxy, and then exhibits a smooth 'cooldown' toward more ordered and circular orbits at higher metallicities. The young low-$\alpha$ disk is kinematically cold throughout its metallicity range, with its observed properties modulated by a strong radial gradient. We interpret these trends using Milky Way analogs from the TNG50 cosmological simulation, identifying one that closely matches the kinematic evolution of our Galaxy. This halo's protogalaxy spins up into a relatively thin and misaligned high-$\alpha$ disk at early times, which is subsequently heated and torqued by a major gas-rich merger. The merger contributes a large amount of low-metallicity gas and angular momentum, from which the kinematically cold low-$\alpha$ stellar disk is subsequently born. This simulated history parallels several observed features of the Milky Way, particularly the decisive 'GSE' merger that likely occurred at $z \approx 2$. Our results provide an all-sky perspective on the emerging picture of our Galaxy's three-phase formation, impelled by the three physical mechanisms of spinup, merger, and cooldown., Comment: 21 pages, 12 figures, submitted to ApJ

We present AspGap, a new approach to infer stellar labels from low-resolution Gaia XP spectra, including precise [$\alpha$/M] estimates for the first time. AspGap is a neural-network based regression model trained on APOGEE spectra. In the training step, AspGap learns to use XP spectra not only to predict stellar labels but also the high-resolution APOGEE spectra that lead to the same stellar labels. The inclusion of this last model component -- dubbed the hallucinator -- creates a more physically motivated mapping and significantly improves the prediction of stellar labels in the validation, particularly of [$\alpha$/M]. For giant stars, we find cross-validated rms accuracies for Teff, log g, [M/H], [$\alpha$/M] of ~1%, 0.12 dex, 0.07 dex, 0.03 dex, respectively. We also validate our labels through comparison with external datasets and through a range of astrophysical tests that demonstrate that we are indeed determining [$\alpha$/M] from the XP spectra, rather than just inferring it indirectly from correlations with other labels. We publicly release the AspGap codebase, along with our stellar parameter catalog for all giants observed by Gaia XP. AspGap enables new insights into the formation and chemo-dynamics of our Galaxy by providing precise [$\alpha$/M] estimates for 23 million giant stars, including 12 million with radial velocities from Gaia., Comment: 29 pages, 19 figures, submitted to ApJS

We present the first detailed chemical-abundance analysis of stars from the dwarf-galaxy stellar stream Wukong/LMS-1 covering a wide metallicity range ($-3.5 < \rm[Fe/H] \lesssim -1.3$). We find abundance patterns that are effectively indistinguishable from the bulk of Indus and Jhelum, a pair of smaller stellar streams proposed to be dynamically associated with Wukong/LMS-1. We confirmed a carbon-enhanced metal-poor star ($\rm[C/Fe] > +0.7$ and $\rm[Fe/H] \sim -2.9$) in Wukong/LMS-1 with strong enhancements in Sr, Y, and Zr, which is peculiar given its solar-level [Ba/Fe]. Wukong/LMS-1 stars have high abundances of $\alpha$ elements up to $\rm[Fe/H] \gtrsim -2$, which is expected for relatively massive dwarfs. Towards the high-metallicity end, Wukong/LMS-1 becomes $\alpha$-poor, revealing that it probably experienced fairly standard chemical evolution. We identified a pair of N- and Na-rich stars in Wukong/LMS-1, reminiscent of multiple populations in globular clusters. This indicates that this dwarf galaxy contained at least one globular cluster that was completely disrupted in addition to two intact ones previously known to be associated with Wukong/LMS-1, which is possibly connected to similar evidence found in Indus. From these $\geq$3 globular clusters, we estimate the total mass of Wukong/LMS-1 to be ${\approx}10^{10} M_\odot$, representing ${\sim}1$% of the present-day Milky Way. Finally, the [Eu/Mg] ratio in Wukong/LMS-1 continuously increases with metallicity, making this the first example of a dwarf galaxy where the production of $r$-process elements is clearly dominated by delayed sources, presumably neutron-star mergers., Comment: Accepted to MNRAS. New version fixes abundance uncertainties, which significantly affects elements like Al and N. Use new version of abundance files for correct error bars

The Magellanic Stream (MS) - an enormous ribbon of gas spanning $140^\circ$ of the southern sky trailing the Magellanic Clouds - has been exquisitely mapped in the five decades since its discovery. However, despite concerted efforts, no stellar counterpart to the MS has been conclusively identified. This stellar stream would reveal the distance and 6D kinematics of the MS, constraining its formation and the past orbital history of the Clouds. We have been conducting a spectroscopic survey of the most distant and luminous red giant stars in the Galactic outskirts. From this dataset, we have discovered a prominent population of 13 stars matching the extreme angular momentum of the Clouds, spanning up to $100^\circ$ along the MS at distances of $60-120$ kpc. Furthermore, these kinemetically-selected stars lie along a [$\alpha$/Fe]-deficient track in chemical space from $-2.5 < \mathrm{[Fe/H]} < -0.5$, consistent with their formation in the Clouds themselves. We identify these stars as high-confidence members of the Magellanic Stellar Stream. Half of these stars are metal-rich and closely follow the gaseous MS, whereas the other half are more scattered and metal-poor. We argue that the metal-rich stream is the recently-formed tidal counterpart to the MS, and speculate that the metal-poor population was thrown out of the SMC outskirts during an earlier interaction between the Clouds. The Magellanic Stellar Stream provides a strong set of constraints - distances, 6D kinematics, and birth locations - that will guide future simulations towards unveiling the detailed history of the Clouds., Comment: 21 pages, 12 figures. Submitted to ApJ

Using a representative sample of Milky Way (MW)-like galaxies from the TNG50 cosmological simulation, we investigate physical processes driving the formation of galactic disks. A disk forms as a result of the interplay between inflow and outflow carrying angular momentum in and out of the galaxy. Interestingly, the inflow and outflow have remarkably similar distributions of angular momentum, suggesting an exchange of angular momentum and/or outflow recycling, leading to continuous feeding of prealigned material from the corotating circumgalactic medium. We show that the disk formation in TNG50 is correlated with stellar bulge formation, in qualitative agreement with a recent theoretical model of disk formation facilitated by steep gravitational potentials. Disk formation is also correlated with the formation of a hot circumgalactic halo with around half of the inflow occurring at subsonic and transonic velocities corresponding to Mach numbers of $\lesssim2$. In the context of recent theoretical works connecting disk settling and hot halo formation, our results imply that the subsonic part of the inflow may settle into a disk while the remaining supersonic inflow will perturb this disk via the chaotic cold accretion. We find that disks tend to form when the host halos become more massive than $\sim (1-2) \times 10^{11} M_\odot$, consistent with previous theoretical findings and observational estimates of the predisk protogalaxy remnant in the MW. Our results do not prove that either corotating outflow recycling, gravitational potential steepening, or hot halo formation cause disk formation, but they show that all these processes occur concurrently and may play an important role in disk growth., Comment: 24 pages, 15 figures; accepted for publication in ApJ

As our nearest large neighbor, the Andromeda Galaxy provides a unique laboratory for investigating galaxy formation and the distribution and substructure properties of dark matter in a Milky Way-like galaxy. Here, we propose an initial 2-epoch ($\Delta t\approx 5$yr), 2-band Roman survey of the entire halo of Andromeda, covering 500 square degrees, which will detect nearly every red giant star in the halo (10$\sigma$ detection in F146, F062 of 26.5, 26.1AB mag respectively) and yield proper motions to $\sim$25 microarcsec/year (i.e., $\sim$90 km/s) for all stars brighter than F146 $\approx 23.6$ AB mag (i.e., reaching the red clump stars in the Andromeda halo). This survey will yield (through averaging) high-fidelity proper motions for all satellites and compact substructures in the Andromeda halo and will enable statistical searches for clusters in chemo-dynamical space. Adding a third epoch during the extended mission will improve these proper motions by $\sim t^{-1.5}$, to $\approx 11$ km/s, but this requires obtaining the first epoch in Year 1 of Roman operations. In combination with ongoing and imminent spectroscopic campaigns with ground-based telescopes, this Roman survey has the potential to yield full 3-d space motions of $>$100,000 stars in the Andromeda halo, including (by combining individual measurements) robust space motions of its entire globular cluster and most of its dwarf galaxy satellite populations. It will also identify high-velocity stars in Andromeda, providing unique information on the processes that create this population. These data offer a unique opportunity to study the immigration history, halo formation, and underlying dark matter scaffolding of a galaxy other than our own., Comment: Submitted in response to the call for Roman Space Telescope Core Community Survey white papers

The Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope is capable of delivering an unprecedented all-sky, high-spatial resolution, multi-epoch infrared map to the astronomical community. This opportunity arises in the midst of numerous ground- and space-based surveys that will provide extensive spectroscopy and imaging together covering the entire sky (such as Rubin/LSST, Euclid, UNIONS, SPHEREx, DESI, SDSS-V, GALAH, 4MOST, WEAVE, MOONS, PFS, UVEX, NEO Surveyor, etc.). Roman can uniquely provide uniform high-spatial-resolution (~0.1 arcsec) imaging over the entire sky, vastly expanding the science reach and precision of all of these near-term and future surveys. This imaging will not only enhance other surveys, but also facilitate completely new science. By imaging the full sky over two epochs, Roman can measure the proper motions for stars across the entire Milky Way, probing 100 times fainter than Gaia out to the very edge of the Galaxy. Here, we propose NANCY: a completely public, all-sky survey that will create a high-value legacy dataset benefiting innumerable ongoing and forthcoming studies of the universe. NANCY is a pure expression of Roman's potential: it images the entire sky, at high spatial resolution, in a broad infrared bandpass that collects as many photons as possible. The majority of all ongoing astronomical surveys would benefit from incorporating observations of NANCY into their analyses, whether these surveys focus on nearby stars, the Milky Way, near-field cosmology, or the broader universe., Comment: Submitted to the call for white papers for the Roman Core Community Survey (June 16th, 2023), and to the Bulletin of the AAS

Recent results from spectroscopic and astrometric surveys of nearby stars suggest that the stellar disk of our Milky Way (MW) was formed quite early, within the first few billion years of its evolution. Chemokinematic signatures of disk formation in cosmological zoom-in simulations appear to be in tension with these data, implying that MW-like disk formation is delayed in simulations. We investigate the formation of galactic disks using a representative sample of MW-like galaxies from the cosmological-volume simulation TNG50. We find that on average MW-mass disks indeed form later than the local data suggest. However, their formation time and metallicity exhibit a substantial scatter, such that $\sim$10% of MW-mass galaxies form disks early, similar to the MW. Thus, although the MW is unusual, it is consistent with the overall population of MW-mass disk galaxies. The direct MW analogs assemble most of their mass early, $\gtrsim 10$ Gyr ago, and are not affected by destructive mergers after that. In addition, these galaxies form their disks during the early enrichment stage when the interstellar medium metallicity increases rapidly, with only $\sim$25% of early-forming disks being as metal-poor as the MW was at the onset of disk formation, [Fe/H] $\approx -1.0$. In contrast, most MW-mass galaxies either form disks from already enriched material or experience late destructive mergers that reset the signatures of galactic disk formation to later times and higher metallicities. Finally, we also show that earlier disk formation leads to more dominant rotationally supported stellar disks at redshift zero., Comment: 19 pages, 13 figures + appendix; accepted for publication in ApJ

We report a spectroscopic search for hypervelocity white dwarfs (WDs) that are runaways from Type Ia supernovae (SNe Ia) and related thermonuclear explosions. Candidates are selected from Gaia data with high tangential velocities and blue colors. We find six new runaways, including four stars with radial velocities (RVs) $>1000\,\rm km\,s^{-1}$ and total space velocities $\gtrsim 1300\,\rm km\,s^{-1}$. These are most likely the surviving donors from double-degenerate binaries in which the other WD exploded. The other two objects have lower minimum velocities, $\gtrsim 600\,\rm km\,s^{-1}$, and may have formed through a different mechanism, such as pure deflagration of a WD in a Type Iax supernova. The four fastest stars are hotter and smaller than the previously known "D$^6$ stars," with effective temperatures ranging from $\sim$20,000 to $\sim$130,000 K and radii of $\sim 0.02-0.10\,R_{\odot}$. Three of these have carbon-dominated atmospheres, and one has a helium-dominated atmosphere. Two stars have RVs of $-1694$ and $-2285\rm \,km\,s^{-1}$ -- the fastest systemic stellar RVs ever measured. Their inferred birth velocities, $\sim 2200-2500\,\rm km\,s^{-1}$, imply that both WDs in the progenitor binary had masses $>1.0\,M_{\odot}$. The high observed velocities suggest that a dominant fraction of the observed hypervelocity WD population comes from double-degenerate binaries whose total mass significantly exceeds the Chandrasekhar limit. However, the two nearest and faintest D$^6$ stars have the lowest velocities and masses, suggesting that observational selection effects favor rarer, higher-mass stars. A significant population of fainter low-mass runaways may still await discovery. We infer a birth rate of D$^6$ stars that is consistent with the SN Ia rate. The birth rate is poorly constrained, however, because the luminosities and lifetimes of $\rm D^6$ stars are uncertain., Comment: 26 pages, 17 figures. Accepted to OJA

We derive and publish data-driven estimates of stellar metallicities [M/H] for 175 million stars with low-resolution XP spectra published in Gaia DR3. The [M/H] values, along with Teff and logg, are derived using the XGBoost algorithm, trained on stellar parameters from APOGEE, augmented by a set of very metal-poor stars. XGBoost draws on a number of data features: the full set of XP spectral coefficients, narrowband fluxes derived from XP spectra, and broadband magnitudes. In particular, we include CatWISE magnitudes, as they reduce the degeneracy of Teff and dust reddening. We also include the parallax as a data feature, which helps constrain logg and [M/H]. The resulting mean stellar parameter precision is 0.1 dex in [M/H], 50 K in Teff, and 0.08 dex in logg. This all-sky [M/H] sample is substantially larger than published samples of comparable fidelity across -3<[M/H]<+0.5. Additionally, we provide a catalog of over 17 million bright (G<16) red giants whose [M/H] are vetted to be precise and pure. We present all-sky maps of the Milky Way in different [M/H] regimes that illustrate the purity of the dataset, and demonstrate the power of this unprecedented sample to reveal the Milky Way's structure from its heart to its disk., Comment: 19 pages, 18 figures, accepted by ApJS

The eighteenth data release of the Sloan Digital Sky Surveys (SDSS) is the first one for SDSS-V, the fifth generation of the survey. SDSS-V comprises three primary scientific programs, or "Mappers": Milky Way Mapper (MWM), Black Hole Mapper (BHM), and Local Volume Mapper (LVM). This data release contains extensive targeting information for the two multi-object spectroscopy programs (MWM and BHM), including input catalogs and selection functions for their numerous scientific objectives. We describe the production of the targeting databases and their calibration- and scientifically-focused components. DR18 also includes ~25,000 new SDSS spectra and supplemental information for X-ray sources identified by eROSITA in its eFEDS field. We present updates to some of the SDSS software pipelines and preview changes anticipated for DR19. We also describe three value-added catalogs (VACs) based on SDSS-IV data that have been published since DR17, and one VAC based on the SDSS-V data in the eFEDS field., Comment: Accepted to ApJS

The majority of the Milky Way's stellar halo consists of debris from our Galaxy's last major merger, the Gaia-Sausage-Enceladus (GSE). In the past few years, stars from GSE have been kinematically and chemically studied in the inner $30$ kpc of our Galaxy. However, simulations predict that accreted debris could lie at greater distances, forming substructures in the outer halo. Here we derive metallicities and distances using Gaia DR3 XP spectra for an all-sky sample of luminous red giant stars, and map the outer halo with kinematics and metallicities out to $100$ kpc. We obtain follow-up spectra of stars in two strong overdensities - including the previously identified Outer Virgo Overdensity - and find them to be relatively metal-rich and on predominantly retrograde orbits, matching predictions from simulations of the GSE merger. We argue that these are apocentric shells of GSE debris, forming $60-90$ kpc counterparts to the $15-20$ kpc shells that are known to dominate the inner stellar halo. Extending our search across the sky with literature radial velocities, we find evidence for a coherent stream of retrograde stars encircling the Milky Way from $50-100$ kpc, in the same plane as the Sagittarius stream but moving in the opposite direction. These are the first discoveries of distant and structured imprints from the GSE merger, cementing the picture of an inclined and retrograde collision that built up our Galaxy's stellar halo., Comment: 22 pages, 10 figures. Accepted to ApJ

Massive disk galaxies like our Milky Way should host an ancient, metal-poor, and centrally concentrated stellar population. This population reflects the star formation and enrichment in the few most massive progenitor components that coalesced at high redshift to form the proto-Galaxy. While metal-poor stars are known to reside in the inner few kiloparsecs of our Galaxy, current data do not yet provide a comprehensive picture of such a metal-poor "heart" of the Milky Way. We use information from Gaia DR3, especially the XP spectra, to construct a sample of 2 million bright (BP $<15.5$ mag) giant stars within $30^\circ$ of the Galactic Center with robust [M/H] estimates, $\delta$ [M/H] $\lesssim 0.1$. For most sample members we can calculate orbits based on Gaia RVS velocities and astrometry. This sample reveals an extensive, ancient, and metal-poor population that includes $\sim 18,000$ stars with $-2.7<$ [M/H] $<-1.5$, representing a stellar mass of $\gtrsim 5\times 10^7$ M$_\odot$. The spatial distribution of these [M/H] $<-1.5$ stars has a Gaussian extent of only $\sigma_{\mathrm{R_{GC}}} \sim 2.7$ kpc around the Galactic center, with most of these orbits being confined to the inner Galaxy. At high orbital eccentricities, there is clear evidence for accreted halo stars in their pericentral orbit phase. Stars with [M/H] $< -2$ show no net rotation, whereas those with [M/H] $\sim -1$ are rotation dominated. Most of the tightly bound stars show $[\alpha/\text{Fe}]$-enhancement and [Al/Fe]-[Mn/Fe] abundance patterns expected for an origin in the more massive portions of the proto-Galaxy. These central, metal-poor stars most likely predate the oldest part of the disk ($\tau_{\text{age}}\approx 12.5$ Gyrs), which implies that they formed at $z\gtrsim 5$, forging the proto-Milky Way., Comment: 21 pages, 9 figures, submitted to ApJ

Modern Galactic surveys have revealed an ancient merger that dominates the stellar halo of our Galaxy (\textit{Gaia}-Sausage-Enceladus, GSE). Using chemical abundances and kinematics from the H3 Survey, we identify 5559 halo stars from this merger in the radial range $r_{\text{Gal}}=6-60\text{ kpc}$. We forward model the full selection function of H3 to infer the density profile of this accreted component of the stellar halo. We consider a general ellipsoid with principal axes allowed to rotate with respect to the Galactocentric axes, coupled with a multiply-broken power law. The best-fit model is a triaxial ellipsoid (axes ratios 10:8:7) tilted $25^\circ$ above the Galactic plane towards the Sun and a doubly-broken power law with breaking radii at 12 kpc and 28 kpc. This result resolves the long-standing dichotomy in literature values of the halo breaking radius, being at either $\sim15\text{ kpc}$ or $\sim30\text{ kpc}$ assuming a singly-broken power law. N-body simulations suggest that the breaking radii are connected to apocenter pile-ups of stellar orbits, and so the observed double-break provides new insight into the initial conditions and evolution of the GSE merger. Furthermore, the tilt and triaxiality of the stellar halo could imply that a fraction of the underlying dark matter halo is also tilted and triaxial. This has important implications for dynamical mass modeling of the Galaxy as well as direct dark matter detection experiments., Comment: Submitted to ApJ; comments warmly welcome

We report the discovery of Specter, a disrupted ultrafaint dwarf galaxy revealed by the H3 Spectroscopic Survey. We detected this structure via a pair of comoving metal-poor stars at a distance of 12.5 kpc, and further characterized it with Gaia astrometry and follow-up spectroscopy. Specter is a $25^\circ \times 1^\circ$ stream of stars that is entirely invisible until strict kinematic cuts are applied to remove the Galactic foreground. The spectroscopic members suggest a stellar age $\tau \gtrsim 12$ Gyr and a mean metallicity $\langle\text{[Fe/H]}\rangle = -1.84_{-0.18}^{+0.16}$, with a significant intrinsic metallicity dispersion $\sigma_{ \text{[Fe/H]}} = 0.37_{-0.13}^{+0.21}$. We therefore argue that Specter is the disrupted remnant of an ancient dwarf galaxy. With an integrated luminosity $M_{\text{V}} \approx -2.6$, Specter is by far the least-luminous dwarf galaxy stream known. We estimate that dozens of similar streams are lurking below the detection threshold of current search techniques, and conclude that spectroscopic surveys offer a novel means to identify extremely low surface brightness structures., Comment: 17 pages, 10 figures. Accepted to ApJ

The Milky Way's satellite galaxies ("surviving dwarfs") have been studied for decades as unique probes of chemical evolution in the low-mass regime. Here we extend such studies to the "disrupted dwarfs", whose debris constitutes the stellar halo. We present abundances ([Fe/H], [$\alpha$/Fe]) and stellar masses for nine disrupted dwarfs with $M_{\star}\approx10^{6}-10^{9}M_{\odot}$ from the H3 Survey (Sagittarius, $Gaia$-Sausage-Enceladus, Helmi Streams, Sequoia, Wukong/LMS-1, Cetus, Thamnos, I'itoi, Orphan/Chenab). The surviving and disrupted dwarfs are chemically distinct: at fixed mass, the disrupted dwarfs are systematically metal-poor and $\alpha$-enhanced. The disrupted dwarfs define a mass-metallicity relation (MZR) with a similar slope as the $z=0$ MZR followed by the surviving dwarfs, but offset to lower metallicities by $\Delta$[Fe/H]$\approx0.3-0.4$ dex. Dwarfs with larger offsets from the $z=0$ MZR are more $\alpha$-enhanced. In simulations as well as observations, galaxies with higher $\Delta$[Fe/H] formed at higher redshifts -- exploiting this, we infer the disrupted dwarfs have typical star-formation truncation redshifts of $z_{\rm{trunc}}{\sim}1-2$. We compare the chemically inferred $z_{\rm{trunc}}$ with dynamically inferred accretion redshifts and find almost all dwarfs are quenched only after accretion. The differences between disrupted and surviving dwarfs are likely because the disrupted dwarfs assembled their mass rapidly, at higher redshifts, and within denser dark matter halos that formed closer to the Galaxy. Our results place novel archaeological constraints on low-mass galaxies inaccessible to direct high-$z$ studies: (i) the redshift evolution of the MZR along parallel tracks but offset to lower metallicities extends to $M_{\star}\approx10^{6}-10^{9}M_{\odot}$; (ii) galaxies at $z\approx2-3$ are $\alpha$-enhanced with [$\alpha$/Fe]$\approx0.4$., Comment: Submitted to ApJ. Tables 1 & 2 summarize properties of disrupted & surviving dwarfs. Fig. 2 plots the mass-metallicity and mass-$\alpha$ relations, Fig. 3 shows the correlation between $\Delta$[Fe/H] and [$\alpha$/Fe], and Fig. 4 might delight dwarf-quenching enthusiasts. Comments warmly welcomed and greatly appreciated!

We use chemistry ([alpha/Fe] and [Fe/H]), main sequence turnoff ages, and kinematics determined from H3 Survey spectroscopy and Gaia astrometry to identify the birth of the Galactic disk. We separate in-situ and accreted stars on the basis of angular momenta and eccentricities. The sequence of high-alpha in-situ stars persists down to at least [Fe/H]=-2.5 and shows unexpected non-monotonic behavior: with increasing metallicity the population first declines in [alpha/Fe], then increases over the range -1.3<[Fe/H]<-0.7, and then declines again at higher metallicities. The number of stars in the in-situ population rapidly increases above [Fe/H]=-1. The average kinematics of these stars are hot and independent of metallicity at [Fe/H]<-1 and then become increasingly cold and disk-like at higher metallicities. The ages of the in-situ, high-alpha stars are uniformly very old (13 Gyr) at [Fe/H]<-1.3, and span a wider range (8-12 Gyr) at higher metallicities. Interpreting the chemistry with a simple chemical evolution model suggests that the non-monotonic behavior is due to a significant increase in star formation efficiency, which began 13 Gyr ago. These results support a picture in which the first 1 Gyr of the Galaxy was characterized by a "simmering phase" in which the star formation efficiency was low and the kinematics had substantial disorder with some net rotation. The disk then underwent a dramatic transformation to a "boiling phase", in which the star formation efficiency increased substantially, the kinematics became disk-like, and the number of stars formed increased tenfold. We interpret this transformation as the birth of the Galactic disk at z~4. The physical origin of this transformation is unclear and does not seem to be reproduced in current galaxy formation models., Comment: 14 pages, 11 figures, submitted to OJAp

Recent observations of the stellar halo have uncovered the debris of an ancient merger, Gaia-Sausage-Enceladus, estimated to have occurred ~8 Gyr ago. Follow-up studies have associated GSE with a large-scale tilt in the stellar halo that links two well-known stellar over-densities in diagonally opposing octants of the Galaxy (the Hercules-Aquila Cloud and Virgo Overdensity; HAC and VOD). In this paper, we study the plausibility of such unmixed merger debris persisting over several Gyr in the Galactic halo. We employ the simulated stellar halo from Naidu et al. (2021), which reproduces several key properties of the merger remnant, including the large-scale tilt. By integrating the orbits of these simulated stellar halo particles, we show that adoption of a spherical halo potential results in rapid phase mixing of the asymmetry. However, adopting a tilted halo potential preserves the initial asymmetry in the stellar halo for many Gyr. The asymmetry is preserved even when a realistic growing disk is added to the potential. These results suggest that HAC and VOD are long-lived structures that are associated with GSE and that the dark matter halo of the Galaxy is tilted with respect to the disk and aligned in the direction of HAC-VOD. Such halo-disk misalignment is common in modern cosmological simulations. Lastly, we study the relationship between the local and global stellar halo in light of a tilted global halo comprised of highly radial orbits. We find that the local halo offers a dynamically biased view of the global halo due to its displacement from the Galactic Center., Comment: 10 pages, 7 figures, submitted to ApJ

The recently proposed "dynamically driven double-degenerate double-detonation" (D6) scenario posits that Type Ia supernovae (SNe) may occur during dynamically unstable mass transfer between two white dwarfs (WDs) in a binary. This scenario predicts that the donor WD may then survive the explosion and be released as a hypervelocity runaway, opening up the exciting possibility of identifying remnant stars from D6 SNe and using them to study the physics of detonations that produce Type Ia SNe. Three candidate D6 runaway objects have been identified in Gaia data. The observable runaway velocity of these remnant objects represents their orbital speed at the time of SN detonation. The orbital dynamics and Roche lobe geometry required in the D6 scenario place specific constraints on the radius and mass of the donor WD that becomes the hypervelocity runaway. In this letter, we calculate the radii required for D6 donor WDs as a function of the runaway velocity. Using mass-radius relations for WDs, we then constrain the masses of the donor stars as well. With measured velocities for each of the three D6 candidate objects based on Gaia EDR3, this work provides a new probe of the masses and mass ratios in WD binary systems that produce SN detonations and hypervelocity runaways., Comment: 8 pages, 4 figures, accepted for publication in ApJL

Due to the different environments in the Milky Way's disk and halo, comparing wide binaries in the disk and halo is key to understanding wide binary formation and evolution. By using Gaia Early Data Release 3, we search for resolved wide binary companions in the H3 survey, a spectroscopic survey that has compiled $\sim$150,000 spectra for thick-disk and halo stars to date. We identify 800 high-confidence (a contamination rate of 4%) wide binaries and two resolved triples, with binary separations mostly between $10^3$-$10^5$ AU and a lowest [Fe/H] of $-2.7$. Based on their Galactic kinematics, 33 of them are halo wide binaries, and most of those are associated with the accreted Gaia-Sausage-Enceladus galaxy. The wide binary fraction in the thick disk decreases toward the low metallicity end, consistent with the previous findings for the thin disk. Our key finding is that the halo wide binary fraction is consistent with the thick-disk stars at a fixed [Fe/H]. There is no significant dependence of the wide binary fraction on the $\alpha$-captured abundance. Therefore, the wide binary fraction is mainly determined by the iron abundance, not their disk or halo origin nor the $\alpha$-captured abundance. Our results suggest that the formation environments play a major role for the wide binary fraction, instead of other processes like radial migration that only apply to disk stars., Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS. Fig. 7 is the key plot. Online data are available at: https://drive.google.com/file/d/1TXKEwKBHcP4j9tMeJpa2hWDFHsEc1Qd3/view?usp=sharing. Comments are welcome!

The astrophysical origins of $r$-process elements remain elusive. Neutron star mergers (NSMs) and special classes of core-collapse supernovae (rCCSNe) are leading candidates. Due to these channels' distinct characteristic timescales (rCCSNe: prompt, NSMs: delayed), measuring $r$-process enrichment in galaxies of similar mass, but differing star-formation durations might prove informative. Two recently discovered disrupted dwarfs in the Milky Way's stellar halo, Kraken and \textit{Gaia}-Sausage Enceladus (GSE), afford precisely this opportunity: both have $M_{\star}\approx10^{8}M_{\rm{\odot}}$, but differing star-formation durations of ${\approx}2$ Gyrs and ${\approx}3.6$ Gyrs. Here we present $R\approx50,000$ Magellan/MIKE spectroscopy for 31 stars from these systems, detecting the $r$-process element Eu in all stars. Stars from both systems have similar [Mg/H]$\approx-1$, but Kraken has a median [Eu/Mg]$\approx-0.1$ while GSE has an elevated [Eu/Mg]$\approx0.2$. With simple models we argue NSM enrichment must be delayed by $500-1000$ Myrs to produce this difference. rCCSNe must also contribute, especially at early epochs, otherwise stars formed during the delay period would be Eu-free. In this picture, rCCSNe account for $\approx50\%$ of the Eu in Kraken, $\approx25\%$ in GSE, and $\approx15\%$ in dwarfs with extended star-formation durations like Sagittarius. The inferred delay time for NSM enrichment is $10-100\times$ longer than merger delay times from stellar population synthesis -- this is not necessarily surprising because the enrichment delay includes time taken for NSM ejecta to be incorporated into subsequent generations of stars. For example, this may be due to natal kicks that result in $r$-enriched material deposited far from star-forming gas, which then takes $\approx10^{8}-10^{9}$ years to cool in these galaxies., Comment: Submitted to ApJL. Figure 3 shows the key empirical result, and Figure 5 summarizes the proposed scenario. Comments very welcome!

A promising progenitor scenario for Type Ia supernovae (SNeIa) is the thermonuclear detonation of a white dwarf in a close binary system with another white dwarf. After the primary star explodes, the surviving donor can be spontaneously released as a hypervelocity runaway. One such runaway donor candidate is LP 398-9, whose orbital trajectory traces back $\approx 10^5$ years to a known supernova remnant. Here we report the discovery of carbon-rich circumstellar material around LP 398-9, revealed by a strong infrared excess and analyzed with follow-up spectroscopy. The circumstellar material is most plausibly composed of inflated layers from the star itself, mechanically and radioactively heated by the past companion's supernova. We also detect a 15.4 hr periodic signal in the UV and optical light curves of LP 398-9, which we interpret as surface rotation. The rotation rate is consistent with theoretical predictions from this supernova mechanism, and the brightness variations could originate from surface inhomogeneity deposited by the supernova itself. Our observations strengthen the case for this double-degenerate SNIa progenitor channel, and motivate the search for more runaway SNIa donors., Comment: Accepted to MNRAS

We report the discovery of SDSS J133725.26+395237.7 (hereafter SDSS J1337+3952), a double-lined white dwarf (WD+WD) binary identified in early data from the fifth generation Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS-V). The double-lined nature of the system enables us to fully determine its orbital and stellar parameters with follow-up Gemini spectroscopy and Swift UVOT ultraviolet fluxes. The system is nearby ($d = 113$ pc), and consists of a $0.51\, M_\odot$ primary and a $0.32\, M_\odot$ secondary. SDSS J1337+3952 is a powerful source of gravitational waves in the millihertz regime, and will be detectable by future space-based interferometers. Due to this gravitational wave emission, the binary orbit will shrink down to the point of interaction in $\approx 220$ Myr. The inferred stellar masses indicate that SDSS J1337+3952 will likely not explode as a Type Ia supernova (SN Ia). Instead, the system will probably merge and evolve into a rapidly rotating helium star, and could produce an under-luminous thermonuclear supernova along the way. The continuing search for similar systems in SDSS-V will grow the statistical sample of double-degenerate binaries across parameter space, constraining models of binary evolution and SNe Ia., Comment: Accepted to ApJ

It is uncertain whether or not low-mass Population III stars ever existed. While limits on the number density of Population III stars with $M_{\ast} \approx 0.8~M_{\odot}$ have been derived using Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) data, little is known about the occurrence of Population III stars at lower masses. In the absence of reliable parallaxes, the spectra of metal-poor main sequence (MPMS) stars with $M_{\ast} \lesssim 0.8~M_{\odot}$ can easily be confused with cool white dwarfs. To resolve this ambiguity, we present a classifier that differentiates between MPMS stars and white dwarfs based on photometry and/or spectroscopy without the use of parallax information. We build and train our classifier using state-of-the-art theoretical spectra and evaluate it on existing SDSS-based classifications for objects with reliable Gaia DR2 parallaxes. We then apply our classifier to a large catalog of objects with SDSS photometry and spectroscopy to search for MPMS candidates. We discover several previously unknown candidate extremely metal-poor (EMP) stars and recover numerous confirmed EMP stars already in the literature. We conclude that archival SDSS spectroscopy has already been exhaustively searched for EMP stars. We predict that the lowest-mass primordial-composition stars will have redder optical-to-infrared colors than cool white dwarfs at constant effective temperature due to surface gravity-dependent collision-induced absorption from molecular hydrogen. We suggest that the application of our classifier to data produced by next-generation spectroscopic surveys will set stronger constraints on the number density of low-mass Population III stars in the Milky Way., Comment: 16 pages, 5 figures, and 1 table in aastex63 format; accepted for publication in AJ

The time-series component of WISE is a valuable resource for the study of variable objects. We present an analysis of an all-sky sample of ~450,000 AllWISE+NEOWISE infrared light curves of likely variables identified in AllWISE. By computing periodograms of all these sources, we identify ~56,000 periodic variables. Of these, ~42,000 are short-period (P<1 day), near-contact or contact eclipsing binaries, many of which are on the main sequence. We use the periodic and aperiodic variables to test computationally inexpensive methods of periodic variable classification and identification, utilizing various measures of the probability distribution function of fluxes and of timescales of variability. The combination of variability measures from our periodogram and non-parametric analyses with infrared colors from WISE and absolute magnitudes, colors and variability amplitude from Gaia is useful for the identification and classification of periodic variables. Furthermore, we show that the effectiveness of non-parametric methods for the identification of periodic variables is comparable to that of the periodogram but at a much lower computational cost. Future surveys can utilize these methods to accelerate more traditional time-series analyses and to identify evolving sources missed by periodogram-based selections., Comment: 23 pages, 15 figures. Accepted for Publication in MNRAS. The full catalog of WISE variables, periodic variables, and binaries is available at https://zakamska.johnshopkins.edu/data.htm

The mass-radius relation of white dwarfs is largely determined by the equation of state of degenerate electrons, which causes the stellar radius to decrease as mass increases. Here we observationally measure this relation using the gravitational redshift effect, a prediction of general relativity that depends on the ratio between stellar mass and radius. Using observations of over three thousand white dwarfs from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey and the Gaia space observatory, we derive apparent radial velocities from absorption lines, stellar radii from photometry and parallaxes, and surface gravities by fitting atmospheric models to spectra. By averaging the apparent radial velocities of white dwarfs with similar radii and, independently, surface gravities, we cancel out random Doppler shifts and measure the underlying gravitational redshift. Using these results, we empirically measure the white dwarf mass-radius relation across a wide range of stellar masses. Our results are consistent with leading theoretical models, and our methods could be used with future observations to empirically constrain white dwarf core composition and evolution., Comment: 11 pages, 5 figures. Accepted to ApJ; corrected typos, added a reference and DOI

The spectroscopic features of white dwarfs are formed in the thin upper layer of their stellar photosphere. These features carry information about the white dwarf's surface temperature, surface gravity, and chemical composition (hereafter 'labels'). Existing methods to determine these labels rely on complex ab-initio theoretical models which are not always publicly available. Here we present two techniques to determine atmospheric labels from white dwarf spectra: a generative fitting pipeline that interpolates theoretical spectra with artificial neural networks, and a random forest regression model using parameters derived from absorption line features. We test and compare our methods using a large catalog of white dwarfs from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS), achieving the same accuracy and negligible bias compared to previous studies. We package our techniques into an open-source Python module 'wdtools' that provides a computationally inexpensive way to determine stellar labels from white dwarf spectra observed from any facility. We will actively develop and update our tool as more theoretical models become publicly available. We discuss applications of our tool in its present form to identify interesting outlier white dwarf systems including those with magnetic fields, helium-rich atmospheres, and double-degenerate binaries., Comment: 11 pages, 7 figures. Accepted for publication in MNRAS; updated references