The Canada-France Imaging Survey: Reconstructing the Milky Way Star Formation History from its White Dwarf Population

Understand

As the remnants of stars with initial masses $\lesssim$ 8 M$_{\odot}$, white dwarfs contain valuable information on the formation histories of stellar populations.

• In this paper, we use deep, high-quality, u-band photometry from the Canada France Imaging Survey (CFIS), griz photometry from Pan-STARRS 1 (PS1), as well as proper motions from Gaia DR2, to select 25,156 white dwarf candidates over $\sim$4500 deg$^2$ using a reduced proper motion diagram.
• We develop a new white dwarf population synthesis code that returns mock observations of the Galactic field white dwarf population for a given star formation history, while simultaneously taking into account the geometry of the Milky Way, survey parameters, and selection effects.
• We use this model to derive the star formation histories of the thin disk, thick disk, and stellar halo.