| Abstract : | Brown dwarfs bridge the gap between low-mass stars and planets. Identifying and exploring these cool objects aid in understanding the dominant mechanism through which they form and in tracing the very low-mass end of the initial mass function (IMF). We study these substellar objects in diverse environments such as the nearby young Sigma Orionis cluster, in the feedback dominated region IC1396 and in the distant W5 twin clusters - IC1848 east and west using multiwavelength data and various techniques. We primarily use the NIR photometric data from the CFHT-WIRCam (in J, W and H bands), Subaru-HSC (in r, i, and Y bands), UKIDSS-WFCAM (in J, H, and K bands) and Mayal telescope-Newfirm (in J, H and K bands). We also use the optical (CFHT-Megaprime and PanSTARRS) and MIR (Spitzer-IRAC, MIPS) data. With the multiwavelength data we photometrically identify the candidate low-mass objects and refine their membership in each cluster using Gaia data and confirm with follow-up spectroscopy using IRTF-Spex and GTC-EMIR. With the census of members in each cluster ranging from the massive stars in the region to the Jupiter mass sources, we probe the IMF down to the planetary mass regime and study its dependance on the environment and compare with other well-known star forming regions. Additionally, the protoplanetary disks being the birth sites for planets, provide raw materials for its formation. Therefore understanding the evolution and dissipation of the disks will constrain the planet formation theories and provide clues to the formation of brown dwarfs. We report the disk population in these regions and analyse its properties such as disk frequency and dependance on stellar mass and age. |
