Despite years of effort, the impact of central star binarity on planetary nebula formation and shaping remains unclear. This is hampered by the fact that detecting central star binarity is inherently difficult, and requires very precise observations. The fraction of planetary nebulae with binary central stars therefore remains elusive. This work presents initial results of central star analysis using data from the VST Hα Survey of the Southern Galactic Plane and Bulge (VPHAS+). The true central star of PN Hf 38 has been revealed, and it exhibits a 0.465±0.334 i band magnitude excess, indicative of a M0V companion.

The Optical Gravitational Experiment (OGLE) was effectively used in discovering binary central stars of planetary nebulae (CSPNe). About 50 binary CSPNe have been hitherto identified in the Galaxy, almost half of them were detected in the OGLE database. We used the OGLE data to search for binary CSPNe in the Magellanic Clouds. We also searched for PNe mimics and removed them from the PNe sample. Here, we present results of the photometric analysis for Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) and our progress on search of binary central stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). So far, we have discovered one binary central star of the PN beyond the Milky Way, which is located in the Small Magellanic Cloud.

As part of a systematic effort to characterize the properties and progenitors of the most luminous planetary nebulae (PNe), we obtained a sample among the brightest PNe in two stellar systems of different metallicities: LMC (Z/Z⊙~0.5) and M31 (Z/Z⊙~1) by means of a combined effort with the VLT and the 10mGTC. Modelling of these data will allow us to infer the masses of the stellar progenitors, gaining insights into the controversial origin of the universal cutoff of the Planetary Nebulae Luminosity Function (PNLF).

We present LAMOST observations and radial velocity measurements of about 1500 planetary nebulae (PNe) in M31 and M33. Most of the PNe are previously known, but 36 of them are newly discovered in the outskirts of M31, and the furthest one has a projected distance larger than 50 kpc away from the galaxy center. Eighteen objects in the area of M33 are probably newly discovered PNe, and quite a few of them are associated with previously known clusters. For all the 1500 PNe, homogeneous radial velocities are measured from the LAMOST spectra, with a typical uncertainty of a few km s−1.

We present high resolution spectroscopy obtained with MIKE-Magellan and MES OAN-SPM of a number of planetary nebulae (PNe) and H ii regions, distributed along the dwarf irregular galaxy NGC 3109 and compare their kinematical behavior with the one of H i data. We aim to determine if there is a kinematical connection among these objects. We also perform a revision of the chemical composition of PNe and H ii regions in this galaxy and discuss it in comparison with stellar evolution models.

Star formation rate (SFR) is one of the most important diagnostics in understanding the evolution of galaxies across cosmic times. In order to explore the possibility of using the optical u-band luminosities to estimate SFRs of galaxies, we show the correlations between u band, Hα and infrared luminosities by combing the data from the South Galactic Cap u band Sky Survey (SCUSS) with the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) and the Wide-field Infrared Survey Explorer (WISE). We derive the u versus Hα relation and the u and 12 μm relations to calibrate the u-band luminosity as an SFR indicator.