An Innovative Technique for Membership Identification in Open Star Clusters, Integrating pyUPMASK with the King Model | Research Square window.SnipcartSettings = { analytics: { enabled: false } }; (function() { var accessVector = localStorage.getItem('access_vector') || ''; window.dataLayer = window.dataLayer || []; if (accessVector) { window.dataLayer.push({ user: { profile: { profileInfo: { snid: accessVector } } } }); } })(); (function(w,d,s,l,i){w[l]=w[l]||[];w[l].push({'gtm.start':new Date().getTime(),event:'gtm.js'});var f=d.getElementsByTagName(s)[0],j=d.createElement(s),dl=l!='dataLayer'?'&l='+l:'';j.async=true;j.src='https://www.googletagmanager.com/gtm.js?id='+i+dl;f.parentNode.insertBefore(j,f);})(window,document,'script','dataLayer','GTM-K279D39R'); Browse Preprints In Review Journals COVID-19 Preprints AJE Video Bytes Research Tools Research Promotion AJE Professional Editing AJE Rubriq About Preprint Platform In Review Editorial Policies Our Team Advisory Board Help Center Sign In Submit a Preprint Cite Share Download PDF Research Article An Innovative Technique for Membership Identification in Open Star Clusters, Integrating pyUPMASK with the King Model Nasser M. Ahmed This is a preprint; it has not been peer reviewed by a journal. https://doi.org/ 10.21203/rs.3.rs-7818305/v1 This work is licensed under a CC BY 4.0 License Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Abstract The probability cut-off threshold value represents one of the most substantial challenges in the study of open star clusters, notwithstanding its vital significance. There is ongoing debate on this matter, with some authors using a 50% value and others using a 70% value. Moreover, the probability cut-off threshold is altered even when only the field of view is modified, even when the same technique is used for the same cluster. So, we introduce a straightforward method that combines the probability with the King model. For every radial shell or ring, we assess the probability of yielding a number of stars that matches the number of stars estimated by the King model. This signifies that there is a probability threshold at each radius, rather than a single threshold that is applicable to the entire cluster. In this research, we utilized the pyUPMASK Python package alongside six distinct clustering algorithms. Each of these algorithms has been integrated with the King model, as previously mentioned. We employed our previous Gaia DR3 study of NGC 2158 as a case analysis to evaluate our methodology. Our key conclusion reveals that, initially, the Voronoi and HDBSCAN clustering algorithms exhibit significantly faster performance relative to other algorithms, requiring only minimal execution time. In contrast, the K-means and Gaussian Mixture Models are considerably slower, necessitating a longer execution time. Secondly, each method, when combined with the King model as mentioned earlier, yields identical values for the parameters of the NGC 2158 cluster, such as proper motion, distance, parallax, age, and others. Astronomy star cluster Gaia DR3 2Mass CMD Parallax proper motion distance membership Full Text Additional Declarations The authors declare no competing interests. Cite Share Download PDF Status: Posted Version 1 posted You are reading this latest preprint version Research Square lets you share your work early, gain feedback from the community, and start making changes to your manuscript prior to peer review in a journal. As a division of Research Square Company, we’re committed to making research communication faster, fairer, and more useful. We do this by developing innovative software and high quality services for the global research community. Our growing team is made up of researchers and industry professionals working together to solve the most critical problems facing scientific publishing. Also discoverable on Platform About Our Team In Review Editorial Policies Advisory Board Help Center Resources Author Services Accessibility API Access RSS feed Manage Cookie Preferences © Research Square 2026 | ISSN 2693-5015 (online) Privacy Policy Terms of Service Do Not Sell My Personal Information {"props":{"pageProps":{"initialData":{"identity":"rs-7818305","acceptedTermsAndConditions":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"archivedVersions":[],"articleType":"Research Article","associatedPublications":[],"authors":[{"id":527171187,"identity":"27951915-1d50-4595-945e-a0bc74f3787e","order_by":0,"name":"Nasser M. Ahmed","email":"data:image/png;base64,iVBORw0KGgoAAAANSUhEUgAAAZAAAAAyAQMAAABI0h/eAAAABlBMVEX///8AAABVwtN+AAAACXBIWXMAAA7EAAAOxAGVKw4bAAAA5klEQVRIiWNgGAWjYDADAxDBUwFlkKDlDMlaeNuI0GLOfvzxh497GOTNpbsTH7ydd1jenL35AMOPim04tVj25JhJznjGYLhzztnNhnO3HTbc2XMsgbHnzG3c7jmQw8bMc4CBccON3G3SvNsOAxk5BsyMbXi0nH/++POfAwz2QC3bf/POOWxPWMuNBANphgMMiSBbmHkbDicSoeWNmWTPAYZkoJbNknOOpSdvOHMs4SBev5xPf/zhxwEGW6CWjR/e1FjbbjjefPDBjwrcWqDgP4zRDCYPEFKPDOpIUTwKRsEoGAUjBAAAB1piFrw7LQcAAAAASUVORK5CYII=","orcid":"https://orcid.org/0000-0002-7701-3032","institution":"NRIAG","correspondingAuthor":true,"prefix":"","firstName":"Nasser","middleName":"M.","lastName":"Ahmed","suffix":""}],"badges":[],"createdAt":"2025-10-09 14:21:38","currentVersionCode":1,"declarations":{"humanSubjects":false,"vertebrateSubjects":false,"conflictsOfInterestStatement":false,"humanSubjectEthicalGuidelines":false,"humanSubjectConsent":false,"humanSubjectClinicalTrial":false,"humanSubjectCaseReport":false,"vertebrateSubjectEthicalGuidelines":false},"doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-7818305/v1","doiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-7818305/v1","draftVersion":[],"editorialEvents":[],"editorialNote":"","failedWorkflow":false,"files":[{"id":93486676,"identity":"b7711777-a607-4fdf-a2fa-b3dabfc0feae","added_by":"auto","created_at":"2025-10-14 11:12:04","extension":"pdf","order_by":1,"title":"","display":"","copyAsset":false,"role":"manuscript-pdf","size":3265174,"visible":true,"origin":"","legend":"","description":"","filename":"Thecutoff.pdf","url":"https://assets-eu.researchsquare.com/files/rs-7818305/v1_covered_a27ff737-1b68-4ee2-9fe5-3cb44338ab67.pdf"}],"financialInterests":"The authors declare no competing interests.","formattedTitle":"\u003cp\u003eAn Innovative Technique for Membership Identification in Open Star Clusters, Integrating pyUPMASK with the King Model\u003c/p\u003e","fulltext":[],"fulltextSource":"","fullText":"","funders":[],"hasAdminPriorityOnWorkflow":false,"hasManuscriptDocX":false,"hasOptedInToPreprint":true,"hasPassedJournalQc":"","hasAnyPriority":true,"hideJournal":true,"highlight":"","institution":"nriag","isAcceptedByJournal":false,"isAuthorSuppliedPdf":true,"isDeskRejected":"","isHiddenFromSearch":false,"isInQc":false,"isInWorkflow":false,"isPdf":true,"isPdfUpToDate":true,"isWithdrawnOrRetracted":false,"journal":{"display":true,"email":"
[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true},"keywords":"star cluster, Gaia DR3, 2Mass, CMD , Parallax, proper motion, distance, membership","lastPublishedDoi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-7818305/v1","lastPublishedDoiUrl":"https://doi.org/10.21203/rs.3.rs-7818305/v1","license":{"name":"CC BY 4.0","url":"https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/"},"manuscriptAbstract":"\u003cp\u003eThe probability cut-off threshold value represents one of the most substantial challenges in the study of open star clusters, notwithstanding its vital significance. There is ongoing debate on this matter, with some authors using a 50% value and others using a 70% value. Moreover, the probability cut-off threshold is altered even when only the field of view is modified, even when the same technique is used for the same cluster. So, we introduce a straightforward method that combines the probability with the King model. For every radial shell or ring, we assess the probability of yielding a number of stars that matches the number of stars estimated by the King model. This signifies that there is a probability threshold at each radius, rather than a single threshold that is applicable to the entire cluster. In this research, we utilized the pyUPMASK Python package alongside six distinct clustering algorithms. Each of these algorithms has been integrated with the King model, as previously mentioned. We employed our previous Gaia DR3 study of NGC 2158 as a case analysis to evaluate our methodology. Our key conclusion reveals that, initially, the Voronoi and HDBSCAN clustering algorithms exhibit significantly faster performance relative to other algorithms, requiring only minimal execution time. In contrast, the K-means and Gaussian Mixture Models are considerably slower, necessitating a longer execution time. Secondly, each method, when combined with the King model as mentioned earlier, yields identical values for the parameters of the NGC 2158 cluster, such as proper motion, distance, parallax, age, and others.\u003c/p\u003e","manuscriptTitle":"An Innovative Technique for Membership Identification in Open Star Clusters, Integrating pyUPMASK with the King Model","msid":"","msnumber":"","nonDraftVersions":[{"code":1,"date":"2025-10-14 11:03:53","doi":"10.21203/rs.3.rs-7818305/v1","editorialEvents":[{"type":"communityComments","content":0}],"status":"published","journal":{"display":true,"email":"
[email protected]","identity":"researchsquare","isNatureJournal":false,"hasQc":true,"allowDirectSubmit":true,"externalIdentity":"","sideBox":"","snPcode":"","submissionUrl":"/submission","title":"Research Square","twitterHandle":"researchsquare","acdcEnabled":true,"dfaEnabled":false,"editorialSystem":"","reportingPortfolio":"","inReviewEnabled":false,"inReviewRevisionsEnabled":true}}],"origin":"","ownerIdentity":"f2cc83d2-54f9-4418-bbfd-17568cab9a35","owner":[],"postedDate":"October 14th, 2025","published":true,"recentEditorialEvents":[],"rejectedJournal":[],"revision":"","amendment":"","status":"posted","subjectAreas":[{"id":56120160,"name":"Astronomy"}],"tags":[],"updatedAt":"2026-03-19T13:25:23+00:00","versionOfRecord":[],"versionCreatedAt":"2025-10-14 11:03:53","video":"","vorDoi":"","vorDoiUrl":"","workflowStages":[]},"version":"v1","identity":"rs-7818305","journalConfig":"researchsquare"},"__N_SSP":true},"page":"/article/[identity]/[[...version]]","query":{"redirect":"/article/rs-7818305","identity":"rs-7818305","version":["v1"]},"buildId":"8U1c8b4HqxoKbykW_rLl7","isFallback":false,"isExperimentalCompile":false,"dynamicIds":[84888],"gssp":true,"scriptLoader":[]}
Text is read by the "Ask this paper" AI Q&A widget below.
Extraction quality varies by source — PMC NXML preserves structure
cleanly, OA-HTML may include some navigation residue, and OA-PDF can
have broken hyphenation. The publisher copy
(via DOI)
is the canonical version.