OB stars as laboratories for numerous astrophysical fields
OB stars are massive stars located in star-forming regions surrounded by interstellar gas and dust from which they have been formed. They shape the spiral arms of our Milky Way and can be observed at high resolution even in nearby galaxies
Normal and single OB stars are ideal laboratories to investigate massive star evolution and Galactic chemical evolution.
In the past decade, we have improved their spectral modeling and spectral analysis in a way that most systematic uncertainties could be minimized. Following our techniques, normal and single OB stars can be used as cosmic abundance references not only in the solar neighbourhood (they are already well-accepted values), but also along the Galactic disk (ongoing work). Moreover, used as background sources of the ISM, they contribute with physical and chemical input to cosmic ray propagation models within our Galaxy (ongoing work).
In order to analyze normal stars, we have to be able to identify "non-normal" stars to understand the limitations of our method when applied to them.
I will briefly summarize our improvements in their spectral models and analysis and I will address implications for stellar and Galactochemical evolution and interstellar dust models.
I will also briefly describe our contribution to the fields of the "non-normal" stars, like stars with magnetic fields, pulsations, chemical peculiarities, runaway stars, multiple systems, Be stars, pre-main-sequence stars and also to cosmic ray propagation models.