The Paα Luminosity Function of H II Regions in Nearby Galaxies from HST/NICMOS

The H II region luminosity function (LF) is an important tool for deriving the birthrates and mass distribution of OB associations and is an excellent tracer of the newly formed massive stars and associations. To date, extensive work (predominantly in Hα) has been done from the ground, which is hindered by dust extinction and the severe blending of adjacent (spatially or in projection) H II regions. Reliably measuring the properties of H II regions requires a linear resolution