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Description
We present F555W (V), F439W (B), and F336W (U) photometry of 9507 stars in the central 2' of the dense, post-core-collapse cluster M30 (NGC 7099) derived from Hubble Space Telescope Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 images. These data are used to study the mix of stellar populations in the central region of the cluster. Forty-eight blue straggler stars are identified; they are found to be strongly concentrated toward the cluster center. The specific frequency of blue stragglers, F_BSS_=N(BSS)/N(V<V_HB_+2), is 0.25+/-0.05 in the inner region of M30 (r<20"), significantly higher than the frequency found in other clusters: F_BSS_=0.05-0.15. The shape of M30's blue straggler luminosity function resembles the prediction of the collisional formation model, and is inconsistent with the binary merger model of Bailyn & Pinsonneault (1995ApJ...439..705B). An unusually blue star (B=18.6, B-V=-0.97), possibly a cataclysmic variable based on its color, is found about 1.2" from the crowded cluster center; the photometric uncertainty for this star is large, however, because of the presence of a very close neighbor. Bright red giant stars (B<16.6) appear to be depleted by a factor of 2-3 in the inner r<10" relative to fainter giants, subgiants, and main-sequence turnoff stars (95% significance). We confirm that there is a radial gradient in the color of the overall cluster light, going from B-V~0.82 at r~1' to B-V~0.45 in the central 10". The central depletion of the bright red giants is responsible for about half of the observed color gradient; the rest of the gradient is caused by the relative underabundance of faint red main-sequence stars near the cluster center (presumably a result of mass segregation). The luminosity function of M30's evolved stars does not match the luminosity function shape derived from standard stellar evolutionary models: the ratio of the number of bright giants to the number of turnoff stars in the cluster is 30% higher than predicted by the model (3.8{sigma} effect), roughly independent of red giant brightness over the range M_V_=-2 to +2.
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