Manash Samal

Near-infrared image of a star forming region taken with the TANSPEC camera mounted on the 3.6-m Devasthal optical telescope, revealing newly borned stars that are deeply embedded in the dusty cloud shown by contours. The spatial resolution of the image ~ 0.6 arsec, while the point source sensitvity at K-band is ~18.5 mag, four magnitude deeper than 2MASS data.

With proper motion and distance information of individual stars, now GAIA has opened a new avenue to understand the properties and evolution of open star clusters in a much better way than before. Currently, we are analyzing a set of open clusters using GAIA data to constrain their distance, age, mass, evolutionary status, and orbit.

The theoretical model says propagating ionization fronts from HII regions can induce the next-generation star formation in molecular clouds and this mode of star-formation can be the dominant mode in HII regions environment, however, proving it is a difficult task in the observational point of view. Presently, we are working on an HII region environment where we found clear evidence of a sequential wave of induced star formation as we progress from the older generation OB stars to younger generation protostars located on the outskirts of the HII region.

Jets and outflows are the first signposts of stellar birth. They are believed to be responsible for the removal of angular momentum from the star–disc system, allowing accretion to proceed and the star to grow. Thus, identifying and examining such phenomena in stars at their youngest phase is key to a number of astrophysical problems related to protostellar evolution. Presently, we are investing two molecular complexes with shock tracer 2.12-micron line observations for identifying jet bearing protostars, understanding their episodic accretion time scales, and the correlation between the accretion and ejection processes of such stars.