AGB stars in the Local Group, and beyond

M. Groenewegen
Instituut voor Sterrenkunde, Leuven, Belgium


I will discuss methods to identify AGB stars using infrared colours, variability properties and narrow-band filter techniques and their respective ad- and disadvantages. I will present an inventory of Carbon and Oxygen-rich AGB stars in LG galaxies and will present luminosity functions. There has been a wealth of new data but a quantitative interpretation is lacking.