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Alison Sills Professor Department of Physics and Astronomy  McMaster University  1280 Main Street West  Hamilton, ON  L8S 4M1  Office:  ABB 353 Phone:  (905) 525-9140 x24189 FAX:    (905) 546-1252  E-mail:  asills@mcmaster.ca Research Area:  Astrophysics

Research Interests

In my research, I use knowledge of stars and stellar evolution to understand unusual stars in dense places, their interactions and their effect on their environment.

A selection of questions that my group is interested in:

• Blue Straggler Stars
  • What are the expected pulsation characteristics of collisional & mass transfer blue straggler stars? Are those in agreement with the observations?
  • What happens to the angular momentum in a stellar collision and during the subsequent evolution of the product? Is this the same or different for binary mass transfer products?
• Globular Cluster Formation and Dynamics:
  • How can we explain the multiple populations now seen in globular clusters? Are the current explainations viable? What other ingredients are required to fully understand this problem?
  • What are the connections between local clustered star formation and the formation & evolution of globular clusters?

I answer these questions using a variety of theoretical techniques and computer codes. Depending on the situation, I use stellar evolution codes, smoothed particle hydrodynamic codes or stellar dynamics codes, running on computers which range from laptops to supercomputers.

I am an active member of collaborations with researchers from Canada, the US and Europe, including the MODEST (MOdelling DEnse STellar Systems) collaboration and the MYStIX collaboration.

Publications from ADS Abstract Service