---
OA_place: publisher
OA_type: gold
PlanS_conform: '1'
_id: '23051'
abstract:
- lang: eng
  text: 'Most massive stars (∼8–25M⊙) interact with a binary companion during their
    lifetimes. These interactions can remove the hydrogen-rich envelope, producing
    intermediate-mass (∼2–8M⊙) and helium-rich stars. These “stripped stars” are predicted
    to emit predominantly in the ultraviolet (UV) and can therefore be identified
    via a UV excess—provided they are not outshone by their companion. However, despite
    their importance to binary evolution, supernovae, and ionizing feedback, few stripped
    stars have been confirmed. This is likely due to the scarcity of wide-field, high
    angular-resolution, UV surveys of stellar populations with reliable distances
    and extinction estimates. To address this, we present the Stripped-Star Ultraviolet
    Magellanic Clouds Survey catalog. We use the Tractor forward modeling software
    to perform point-spread function photometry on 2420 Swift UVOT images of the LMC
    and SMC. The resulting catalog contains 734,862 sources in three UV filters to
    a depth of ∼20 Vega mag. We perform validation tests on the photometry pipeline
    and highlight the catalog’s broad applicability. We then identify sources with
    excess UV light compared to main-sequence stars and apply a series of quality
    cuts. From this, we identify 522 candidate stripped stars in the LMC and 298 in
    the SMC. We assess the potential contamination from other UV excess systems and
    argue the dominant uncertainty to be dust: early main-sequence stars can mimic
    the colors of stripped-star binaries when extinction is overcorrected. This survey
    lays the groundwork for the first systematic census of stripped stars and opens
    new windows into binary evolution and massive star populations.'
acknowledgement: "We thank Anna O’Grady, Christopher D. Matzner, Joshua S. Speagle,
  Carles Badenes, Marten van Kerkwijk, Selma de Mink, Hugues Sana, Kareem El-Badry,
  and Lisa Blomberg for helpful conversations. We would also like to thank the anonymous
  referee for their thoughtful and constructive comments, which helped to improve
  the clarity and depth of this work.\r\n\r\nB.L. has received financial support from
  the Flemish Government under the long-term structural Methusalem funding program
  by means of the project SOUL: Stellar evolution in full glory, grant METH/24/012
  at KU Leuven. M.R.D. acknowledges support from the NSERC through grant RGPIN-2019-06186,
  the Canada Research Chairs Program, and the Dunlap Institute at the University of
  Toronto. A.L. acknowledges support from the NSERC and is funded through a NSERC
  Canada Graduate Scholarship—Doctoral. A.L. is also supported by the Data Sciences
  Institute at the University of Toronto through grant number DSI- DSFY3R1P02.\r\n\r\nFacility:
  Swift (NASA Neil Gehrels Swift Observatory Mission) - .\r\n\r\nSoftware: astropy
  (Astropy Collaboration et al. 2013, 2018, 2022), astroquery (A. Ginsburg et al.
  2019), matplotlib (J. D. Hunter 2007), numpy (C. R. Harris et al. 2020), pandas
  (W. McKinney 2010; pandas development team 2020), Photutils (L. Bradley et al. 2022,
  2024), SciPy (P. Virtanen et al. 2020), the Tractor (D. Lang et al. 2016a), TOPCAT(M.
  B. Taylor 2005, 2006)."
article_number: '73'
article_processing_charge: Yes
article_type: original
arxiv: 1
author:
- first_name: B.
  full_name: Ludwig, B.
  last_name: Ludwig
- first_name: M. R.
  full_name: Drout, M. R.
  last_name: Drout
- first_name: Ylva Louise Linsdotter
  full_name: Götberg, Ylva Louise Linsdotter
  id: d0648d0c-0f64-11ee-a2e0-dd0faa2e4f7d
  last_name: Götberg
  orcid: 0000-0002-6960-6911
- first_name: D.
  full_name: Lang, D.
  last_name: Lang
- first_name: A.
  full_name: Laroche, A.
  last_name: Laroche
citation:
  ama: 'Ludwig B, Drout MR, Götberg YLL, Lang D, Laroche A. The Stripped-Star Ultraviolet
    Magellanic Cloud Survey (SUMS): The ultraviolet photometric catalog and stripped-star
    candidate selection. <i>The Astrophysical Journal</i>. 2026;999(1). doi:<a href="https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae2d13">10.3847/1538-4357/ae2d13</a>'
  apa: 'Ludwig, B., Drout, M. R., Götberg, Y. L. L., Lang, D., &#38; Laroche, A. (2026).
    The Stripped-Star Ultraviolet Magellanic Cloud Survey (SUMS): The ultraviolet
    photometric catalog and stripped-star candidate selection. <i>The Astrophysical
    Journal</i>. IOP Publishing. <a href="https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae2d13">https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae2d13</a>'
  chicago: 'Ludwig, B., M. R. Drout, Ylva Louise Linsdotter Götberg, D. Lang, and
    A. Laroche. “The Stripped-Star Ultraviolet Magellanic Cloud Survey (SUMS): The
    Ultraviolet Photometric Catalog and Stripped-Star Candidate Selection.” <i>The
    Astrophysical Journal</i>. IOP Publishing, 2026. <a href="https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae2d13">https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae2d13</a>.'
  ieee: 'B. Ludwig, M. R. Drout, Y. L. L. Götberg, D. Lang, and A. Laroche, “The Stripped-Star
    Ultraviolet Magellanic Cloud Survey (SUMS): The ultraviolet photometric catalog
    and stripped-star candidate selection,” <i>The Astrophysical Journal</i>, vol.
    999, no. 1. IOP Publishing, 2026.'
  ista: 'Ludwig B, Drout MR, Götberg YLL, Lang D, Laroche A. 2026. The Stripped-Star
    Ultraviolet Magellanic Cloud Survey (SUMS): The ultraviolet photometric catalog
    and stripped-star candidate selection. The Astrophysical Journal. 999(1), 73.'
  mla: 'Ludwig, B., et al. “The Stripped-Star Ultraviolet Magellanic Cloud Survey
    (SUMS): The Ultraviolet Photometric Catalog and Stripped-Star Candidate Selection.”
    <i>The Astrophysical Journal</i>, vol. 999, no. 1, 73, IOP Publishing, 2026, doi:<a
    href="https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae2d13">10.3847/1538-4357/ae2d13</a>.'
  short: B. Ludwig, M.R. Drout, Y.L.L. Götberg, D. Lang, A. Laroche, The Astrophysical
    Journal 999 (2026).
das_tickbox: '0'
date_created: 2026-10-04T22:01:55Z
date_published: 2026-03-01T00:00:00Z
date_updated: 2026-10-12T06:54:27Z
day: '01'
ddc:
- '520'
department:
- _id: YlGo
doi: 10.3847/1538-4357/ae2d13
external_id:
  arxiv:
  - '2505.18632'
file:
- access_level: open_access
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  creator: dernst
  date_created: 2026-10-12T06:31:40Z
  date_updated: 2026-10-12T06:31:40Z
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file_date_updated: 2026-10-12T06:31:40Z
fulldoi: https://doi.org/10.3847/1538-4357/ae2d13
has_accepted_license: '1'
intvolume: '       999'
issue: '1'
language:
- iso: eng
month: '03'
oa: 1
oa_version: Published Version
publication: The Astrophysical Journal
publication_identifier:
  eissn:
  - 1538-4357
  issn:
  - 0004-637X
publication_status: published
publisher: IOP Publishing
quality_controlled: '1'
researchdata_availability: no
scopus_import: '1'
status: public
supplementarymaterial: yes
title: 'The Stripped-Star Ultraviolet Magellanic Cloud Survey (SUMS): The ultraviolet
  photometric catalog and stripped-star candidate selection'
tmp:
  image: /images/cc_by.png
  legal_code_url: https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/legalcode
  name: Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International Public License (CC-BY 4.0)
  short: CC BY (4.0)
type: journal_article
user_id: 2DF688A6-F248-11E8-B48F-1D18A9856A87
volume: 999
year: '2026'
...