Binary Stars in the Space Era
Astrophysics Conference at Keele Hall, Keele University, UK
Monday 30th June to Friday 4th July, 2025
Rationale
The study of binary stars is one of the oldest areas of astrophysics. Results from binary stars are fundamental to our understanding of how stars form and evolve, galactic stellar populations, chemical evolution, and the cosmological distance scale. Wide binaries allow us to probe the properties of normal stars, including direct measurements of their masses. Eclipsing binaries are the only stars whose masses and radii can be measured to high precision. Close binaries can be used to study the physics of mass transfer, mass loss, accretion discs and how stars evolve. Binary star evolution is critical to the formation of cataclysmic variables, novae, supernovae, X-ray binaries, millisecond pulsars, gamma-ray bursts and gravitational wave events. Planets are found in binary star systems in both S-type and P-type orbits.
We are now firmly in the space-photometry era, with observations of binary stars available from the WIRE, MOST, BRITE, CoRoT, Kepler, TESS and CHEOPS satellites. In the near future PLATO will offer another leap forward in the quality of photometric data, and binary stars will in turn provide crucial information for the interpretation of the many planetary systems it will find. What legacy of achievements can we attribute to the study of binary systems? What is the current state of this area of astrophysics? What problems are still to be solved? How can we further improve our understanding of normal stars? What new analyses are now possible with Kepler, TESS and CHEOPS data? What more will PLATO allow us to do? How should we prepare? The aim of this conference is to bring together observational and theoretical astrophysicists to critique the past, understand the present, and organise the future of binary star research.
Announcements
Code of Conduct
We value the participation of everyone at this meeting and want all attendees to have an enjoyable and fulfilling experience. Accordingly, all attendees are expected to show respect and courtesy to other attendees and staff.
As such, Keele University will be a harassment-free environment for everyone, regardless of gender, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, nationality, religion. We do not tolerate harassment of attendees in any form.
- Speakers give their time freely, many have travelled a considerable distance, some are very distinguished, some are early career scientists perhaps giving a presentation at this level for the first time, and all deserve a fair and encouraging hearing. Please try to be on time for the start of a session, or otherwise slip quietly into the lecture hall, refrain from loud conversations outside the doors, switch off mobile phones, and if you must use a laptop computer do so inconspicuously.
- Harassment includes offensive verbal comments related to gender, sexual orientation, disability, physical appearance, body size, race, religion, sexual images in public spaces, deliberate intimidation, stalking, following, harassing photography or recording, sustained disruption of talks or other events, inappropriate physical contact, and unwelcome sexual attention.
- All communication given by speakers, organisers and attendees should be appropriate for a professional audience including people of many different backgrounds. Sexual language, jokes and imagery is not appropriate for any event.
- Be kind to others. Do not insult or put down other attendees.
- Respect Keele University staff.
- Behave professionally. Remember that harassment and sexist, racist, or exclusionary jokes are not appropriate.
Participants asked to stop any harassing behaviour are expected to comply immediately. Attendees violating these rules may be asked to leave the event, without a refund of any charge that may have been levied.
Thank you for helping make this a welcoming, respectful space for all.
This is a modified version of the code of conduct from the Royal Astronomical Society and we are grateful to them for making it available.
Location
The conference will be held in room DH 0.51 of the Dorothy Hodgkin building on the campus of Keele University. The registration desk will in the foyer at the main entrance, posters will be in room DH 0.63, and lunches and drinks in room DH 0.08. Evening meals, the welcome barbecue and the conference dinner will be in the Salvin Room and Old Library at Keele Hall. A little information on Keele Hall can be found in its wikipedia entry.
Information on how to get to the campus of Keele University can be found on the university travel page and on the Keele Conferences travel page. The closest large airports are Manchester and Birmingham, both of which have rail links to the train stations at Crewe and Stoke-on-Trent.
Warning: the UK has just implemented an Electronic Travel Authorisation (ETA) scheme. Most conference attendees from outside the UK will need to obtain one of these (cost £10) or may be refused entry to the UK. Please check carefully whether this applies to you, and get your ETA if needed.
More photos of the venue will be available shortly.
Please note that Keele Hall has become a cashless venue. Any payments (e.g. for alcoholic drinks) must be done by card.
A printable map of Keele campus can be found here. Keele Hall is building 12 (towards the top left of the map) and Dorothy Hodgkin is building 18 just right of centre.
Accommodation
Standard accommodation will be en-suite rooms in one of the student accommodation blocks on campus. It will provisionally be in Barnes Halls, and final confirmation will be provided once the number of rooms required for the conference is known. Check-in will be from 16:00 and check-out by 09:30. Please declare on the registration form if you need a disabled room. Our supplier needs this information in advance to ensure a suitable room can be provided.
Attendees can instead opt for the Courtyard Hotel By Marriott on campus (building 53 on the campus map). To take this option, please register for the conference attendance package (not the full package) and arrange your stay with the Marriott Hotel yourself.
A third alternative for accommodation is to stay in Newcastle-under-Lyme, which is a 15-minute bus ride away. We do not recommend this option as it is much less convenient, but make it available in case it is useful. The Travelodge hotel is close to the bus route (First Bus route 25).
People wishing to stay extra night(s) before or after the conference can book into the Marriott hotel. This is because the standard accommodation has been allocated only for the duration of the conference.
Sessions
The intended sessions are:
- Space photometry + modelling binary systems
- Spectroscopic binaries
- Astrometric binaries / Gaia (1)
- Astrometric binaries / Gaia (2)
- Binary formation
- Binary evolution
- Binary populations
- Interacting binaries and mergers
- Pulsations in binaries (1)
- Pulsations in binaries (2)
- Comparison to theoretical models
- Looking forward to PLATO
- Benchmark binaries
- Binaries and planets
Full programme
The full conference programme will be placed here. It will be available once registration has closed and the schedule of invited and contributed talks has been defined.
The following evening activities will occur: welcome reception on Monday night, (provisional) visit to Keele Observatory (building 42 on the campus map) on Tuesday or Wednesday, and the conference dinner on Thursday.
Here is the intended schedule for each day:
| Time | Activity | Venue |
| 08:00 to 09:00 | Breakfast | Probably Chancellor's Building |
| 09:00 to 10:35 | Session 1 | Dorothy Hodgkin: DH 0.51 |
| 10:35 to 11:15 | Refreshments | Dorothy Hodgkin: DH 0.08 |
| 11:15 to 12:50 | Session 2 | Dorothy Hodgkin: DH 0.51 |
| 12:50 to 14:00 | Lunch | Dorothy Hodgkin: DH 0.08 |
| 14:00 to 15:35 | Session 3 | Dorothy Hodgkin: DH 0.51 |
| 15:35 to 16:15 | Refreshments | Dorothy Hodgkin: DH 0.08 |
| 16:15 to 17:50 | Session 3 | Dorothy Hodgkin: DH 0.51 |
| 19:00 to 20:30 | Dinner | Keele Hall: Salvin Room and Old Library |
Here is the provisional schedule for the talks:
| Day | Time | Type | Speaker | Title |
| Tuesday | 09:00 | Welcome | Anna Meredith | Formal welcome from the Executive Dean of Natural Sciences at Keele University |
| 09:05 | Invited | John Southworth | Introduction | |
| 09:40 | Invited | Andrej Prsa | Modelling binary systems | |
| 10:15 | Contributed | Marcin Wrona | PHOEBAI: Solving Hundreds of Thousands of Eclipsing Binary Light Curves with Deep Neural Networks | |
| 11:15 | Invited | Nikki Miller | Benchmark eclipsing binary stars | |
| 11:50 | Contributed | Yasmin Davis | Understanding M Dwarf Radius Inflation - Insights from Low Mass Eclipsing Binaries | |
| 12:10 | Contributed | Adam Stevenson | Single to double-lined: absolute dynamical SB1 masses with HRCCS | |
| 12:30 | Contributed | JJ Hermes | High-precision masses and ages of white dwarfs in wide binaries | |
| 14:00 | Invited | Pierre Kervella | Perspectives on astrometry of binary stars with Gaia DR4 (and a little bit of interferometry) | |
| 14:35 | Contributed | Kareem El-Badry | Population modeling with Gaia astrometric binaries | |
| 14:55 | Contributed | Johanna Müller-Horn | In Search of the Invisible: Hunting for Dormant Black Holes with Gaia DR3 | |
| 15:15 | Contributed | Pranav Nagarajan | Realistic predictions for Gaia black hole discoveries: comparison of isolated binary and dynamical formation models | |
| 16:15 | Contributed | Henri Boffin | Revisiting symbiotic stars with interferometry and Gaia | |
| 16:35 | Contributed | Natsuko Yamaguchi | A forward model of Gaia's astrometric WD + MS binaries | |
| 16:55 | Contributed | Yi Lu | Calibrating asteroseismology scaling relation by interferometric observation on Gaia binaries | |
| 17:15 | Contributed | Ingrid Pelisoli | Characterising the population of binary white dwarf stars with astrometry, photometry and spectroscopy | |
| 17:35 | Contributed | Na'ama Hallakoun | Intermediate-Separation White-Dwarf Binaries in the Gaia Era | |
| Wednesday | 09:00 | Invited | Paul Clark | The formation of multiple stellar systems |
| 09:35 | Contributed | Alex Kemp | Binary birth distributions through evolution back-tracing | |
| 09:55 | Contributed | Matthias Fabry | The evolution of W UMa contact binaries | |
| 10:15 | Contributed | Cheyanne Shariat | A Census of Massive Eclipsing Binaries in a Milky Way-like Galaxy | |
| 11:15 | Invited | Maxwell Moe | Populations and Formation Processes of Binary Stars | |
| 11:50 | Contributed | Tomer Shenar | Binarity at LOw Metallicity (BLOeM): An ESO/FLAMES monitoring of ~1000 Massive Stars in the SMC | |
| 12:10 | Contributed | Jen Winters | Multiple Star Results for Nearby Mid-to-Late M Dwarfs from an All-Sky, High-Res Spectroscopic Program | |
| 12:30 | Contributed | Jenni French | Dwarfs of Fire and Ice: Studying irradiated white dwarf-brown dwarf binaries | |
| 14:00 | Invited | Elizabeth Stanway | The Uncertainties in Binary Star Evolution | |
| 14:35 | Contributed | Luca Sciarini | Chemical evolution of close binaries - tidally-enhanced or tidally-suppressed mixing? | |
| 14:55 | Contributed | Anna Francesca Pala | Population studies of accreting white dwarfs | |
| 15:15 | Contributed | Sophie Rosu | Apsidal Motion in (O-Star) Binaries: GENEC rotating binary models put to the k2-test | |
| 16:15 | Invited | Koushik Sen | Interacting binaries and mergers | |
| 16:50 | Contributed | Ana Escorza | Stellar interactions, nucleosynthesis and pulsations as seen by binary-polluted stars | |
| 17:10 | Contributed | Tom Wagg | Assessing the impact of binary interactions on the timing and location of supernovae with cogsworth | |
| 17:30 | Contributed | Jaroslav Merc | Short-term variability of symbiotic binaries observed with TESS | |
| Thursday | 09:00 | Invited | Dominic Bowman | Asteroseismology of multiple systems: how binarity and pulsations go hand-in-hand for constraining stellar structure theory |
| 09:35 | Contributed | Rahul Jayaraman | Tidally tilted and triaxial pulsators: what we think we know and what we would like to know | |
| 09:55 | Contributed | Ayush Moharana | Push, pull and pulse: Tidally perturbed Beta Cephei stars in eclipsing binaries | |
| 10:15 | Contributed | Federica Nardini | Tracing binary evolution with asteroseismology and spectroscopy of B stars in four Galactic open clusters | |
| 11:15 | Invited | Kelly Hambleton Prsa | Unlocking Stellar Secrets: The Advantages of Combining Asteroseismology and Binary Star Physics | |
| 11:50 | Contributed | Simon Murphy | Pulsation timing binaries in all-sky space photometry | |
| 12:10 | Contributed | Paul Beck | Sounding the treasure trove – Asteroseismology of solar-like oscillators and binaries systems | |
| 12:30 | Contributed | Jeppe Thomsen | KIC10001167: The prototype eclipsing binary for red giant seismology in the old in-situ Milky Way population | |
| 14:00 | Invited | Poojan Agrawal | Binary Population Synthesis: Past, Present, and Future | |
| 14:35 | Contributed | Bethany Ludwig | Unveiling the hidden population of massive stars stripped in binaries with new UV photometry | |
| 14:55 | Contributed | Lisa Blomberg | Stripped stars in the Magellanic clouds: beyond the tip of the iceberg | |
| 15:15 | Contributed | Selma de Mink | Critical tests of Binary Physics with Space Mission Data of Post Interaction Binaries | |
| 16:15 | Invited | Andrew Tkachenko | From Telemetry to Discovery: PLATO Simulations for Binary Star Science | |
| 16:50 | Contributed | Hans Deeg | Expanding the Census and the Diversity of Circumbinary Planets with PLATO | |
| 17:10 | Contributed | Mohammad Farhat | Death and Dearth of Circumbinary Planets | |
| 17:30 | Contributed | Ganesh Pawar | Stability of light curve solutions for benchmark candidates in PLATO's LOPS2 field | |
| Friday | 09:00 | Invited | Darek Graczyk | Local distance scale with eclipsing binary stars |
| 09:35 | Contributed | Thibault Merle | Exploring Spectroscopic Binaries: From SB9 to the 4MOST Large Survey | |
| 09:55 | Contributed | Michael Abdul-Masih | Improving the treatment of stellar distortions in spectroscopic and photometric studies | |
| 10:15 | Contributed | Alexios Liakos | Demographics and properties of delta Scuti stars in binary systems | |
| 11:15 | Invited | Krzysztof Hełminiak | Detached eclipsing binaries and benchmark stars | |
| 11:50 | Contributed | Matthew Swayne | The Radius Inflation Problem in M-dwarfs - Insights from CHEOPS and TESS and a look to the future | |
| 12:10 | Contributed | Dominic Oddo | A catalog of low-mass TESS M&M eclipsing binary orbital and physical properties | |
| 12:30 | Contributed | Emily Pass | Wide Binaries Elucidate Mid-to-Late M-Dwarf Spindown |
Invited speakers
The current list of invited speakers is:
- Poojan Agrawal (Leuven, Belgium)
- Dominic Bowman (Newcastle, UK)
- Paul Clark (Cardiff, UK)
- Dariusz Graczyk (CAMK, Toruń, Poland)
- Kelly Hambleton Prša (Villanova, US)
- Koushik Sen (Arizona, US)
- Krzysztof Hełminiak (NCAC, Toruń, Poland)
- Pierre Kervella (Paris, France)
- Nikki Miller (Uppsala, Sweden)
- Maxwell Moe (Wyoming, US)
- Andrej Prša (Villanova, US)
- John Southworth (Keele, UK)
- Elizabeth Stanway (Warwick, UK)
- Andrew Tkachenko (Leuven, Belgium)
Registration
The conference will last from Monday evening to Friday lunchtime, to allow many attendees to fit the conference and travel within one working week. Accommodation and food will be provided within the cost of the registration fee.
Full package: £750. This includes conference registration, accommodation (four nights, Monday to Friday), opening reception buffet (Monday night), breakfast (Tuesday to Friday), lunch (Tuesday to Friday), dinner (Tuesday and Wednesday), the conference dinner (Thursday), and morning and afternoon refreshments.
Attendance package: £450. This is like the full package but without accommodation and breakfast.
Registration has now closed. Here are the links to the registration form and the payment page for anyone who needs them. Please do not register or make a payment unless you have agreed this with the conference organisers.
SOC and LOC
Scientific Organising Committee (SOC)
- John Southworth (Keele University, UK)
- Conny Aerts (KU Leuven, Belgium)
- Jan Eldridge (University of Auckland, NZ)
- Kareem El-Badry (California Institute of Technology, US)
- Pierre Maxted (Keele University, UK)
- Nikki Miller (University of Uppsala, Sweden)
Local Organising Committee (LOC)
- Pierre Maxted (Keele University, UK)
- John Southworth (Keele University, UK)
- Barry Smalley (Keele University, UK)
- Ayush Moharana (Keele University, UK)
- Steve Overall (Keele University, UK)
- Lex Griffiths (Keele University, UK)
Contact us
Conference email address: spacebinary2025@gmail.com
Conference Slack channel: https://binarystarswi-omr4237.slack.com/
| Dr John Taylor (Southworth) |
Dr Pierre Maxted Astrophysics Group Room LJ 2.06 Lennard Jones Building Keele University Newcastle-under-Lyme Staffordshire ST5 5BG, UK |