Hoi Fung Chau – författare

This volume consists of 62 papers contributed by 120 authors/co-authors working in the field of stellar research. The conference was the fifth of the Pacific Rim Stellar Conference series and was the second time that Hong Kong hosted the series. These conferences started in 1985, concentrating on binary star research. Over the years, the series has grown wider in scope. During this conference, three topics were covered: binary stars, compact stars, and solar-type stars. Though a Pacific Rim conference, many of the 90 participants were from far regions of the world. The contributions to this proceeding are categorized according to the expertise of the participants into the following six groups: solar/stellar evolution and observational constraints, physics of compact stars and pulsars, observational constraints, physics of binary stars, binary stars with an accretion disk, and observations and theory of high-energy phenomena. The volume contains many updated reviews in these research areas and is a very useful reference for graduate students and researchers.

The Pacific Rim Conference originally started with one research concentration only - binary star research. The first Conference was held in Beijing, China, 1985, the second one in Seoul and Taejon, South Korea, 1990 and the third one in Chiang Mai, Thailand, 1995. In recent years, the conference series evolved into a much broader area of stellar astrophysics. The first such conference was held in Hong Kong in 1997. Kwong-Sang Cheng, a. k. a. one of the three Musketeers, documented the "accidental" development in writing in the Proceedings of the 1997 Pacific Rim Conference on Stellar Astrophysics (Volume 138 of the ASP Conference Series)! The meeting at Hong Kong University of Science and Technology covered three major topics: binary stars, compact stars and solar type stars. The conference was extremely successful. There was a general feeling among the participants that the conference on stellar astrophysics provided a good means to share ideas between such closely related disciplines. Unfortunately after the very successful meeting at HKST, Kwing L. Chan (another Musketeer) thought that he had already served and would not like to chair for another LOC for at least five years! After a few drinks at one of the watering holes in Wan Chai district of Hong Kong, Kwong-Sang Cheng was in very hiRh spirit and volunteered to taking on the responsibility of hosting the 51 Pacific Rim Conference at Hong Kong University in 1999.