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Young stellar clusters are predominantly the hub of star formation and hence, ideal to perform comprehensive studies over the least explored substellar regime. Various unanswered questions like the mass distribution in brown dwarf regime and the effect of diverse cluster environment on brown dwarf formation efficiency still plague the scientific community. The nearby young cluster, IC 1396 with its feedback-driven environment, is ideal to conduct such study. In this paper, we adopt a multiwavelength approach, using deep Subaru HSC along with other data sets and machine learning techniques to identify the cluster members complete down to ∼ 0.03 M⊙ in the central 22 arcmin area of IC 1396. We identify 458 cluster members including 62 brown dwarfs which are used to determine mass distribution in the region. We obtain a star-to-brown dwarf ratio of ∼ 6 for a stellar mass range 0.03–1 M⊙ in the studied cluster. The brown dwarf fraction is observed to increase across the cluster as radial distance from the central OB-stars increases. This study also compiles 15 young stellar clusters to check the variation of star-to-brown dwarf ratio relative to stellar density and ultraviolet (UV) flux ranging within 4–2500 stars pc−2 and 0.7–7.3  G 0, respectively. The brown dwarf fraction is observed to increase with stellar density but the results about the influence of incident UV flux are inconclusive within this range. This is the deepest study of IC 1396 as of yet and it will pave the way to understand various aspects of brown dwarfs using spectroscopic observations in future. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Low-mass star formation inside massive clusters is crucial to understand the effect of cluster environment on processes like circumstellar disc evolution, planet, and brown dwarf formation. The young massive association of Cygnus OB2, with a strong feedback from massive stars, is an ideal target to study the effect of extreme environmental conditions on its extensive low-mass population. We aim to perform deep multiwavelength studies to understand the role of stellar feedback on the IMF, brown dwarf fraction and circumstellar disc properties in the region. We introduce here, the deepest and widest optical photometry of 1.5○ diameter region centred at Cygnus OB2 in r 2, i 2, z , and Y-filters, using Subaru Hyper Suprime-Cam (HSC). This work presents the data reduction, source catalogue generation, data quality checks, and preliminary results about the pre-main sequence sources. We obtain 713 529 sources in total, with detection down to ∼28, 27, 25.5, and 24.5 mag in r 2, i 2, z , and Y -band, respectively, which is ∼3 – 5 mag deeper than the existing Pan-STARRS and GTC/OSIRIS photometry. We confirm the presence of a distinct pre-main sequence branch by statistical field subtraction of the central 18 arcmin region. We find the median age of the region as ∼5 ± 2 Myr with an average disc fraction of ∼9 per cent. At this age, combined with A |$_V\, \sim$| 6 – 8 mag, we detect sources down to a mass range of ∼0.01–0.17 M⊙. The deep HSC catalogue will serve as the groundwork for further studies on this prominent active young cluster. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In the star-formation process, the vital impact of environmental factors such as feedback from massive stars and stellar density on the form of the initial mass function (IMF) at the low-mass end is yet to be understood. Hence a systematic highly sensitive observational analysis of a sample of regions under diverse environmental conditions is essential. We analyse the IMF of eight young clusters (<5 Myr), namely IC 1848-West, IC 1848-East, NGC 1893, NGC 2244, NGC 2362, NGC 6611, Stock 8, and Cygnus OB2, which are located at the Galactocentric distance (R g) range ∼6–12 kpc along with the nearby cluster IC 348 using deep near-IR photometry and Gaia DR2. These clusters are embedded in massive stellar environments of radiation strength |$\log(L_\mathrm{FUV}/\mathrm{L}_{\odot })\, \sim 2.6$| –6.8, |$\log(L_\mathrm{EUV})\, \sim$|  42.2–50.85 photon s−1, with stellar density in the range of ∼170–1220 star pc−2. After structural analysis and field decontamination we obtain an unbiased uniformly sensitive sample of pre-main-sequence members of the clusters down to the brown-dwarf regime. The lognormal fit to the IMF of nine clusters gives the mean characteristic mass (m c) and σ of 0.32 ± 0.02 M⊙ and 0.47 ± 0.02, respectively. We compare the IMF with that of low- and high-mass clusters across the Milky Way. We also check for any systematic variation with respect to the radiation field strength and the stellar density as well with R g. We conclude that there is no strong evidence for an environmental effect in the underlying form of the IMF of these clusters. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]