The old populations of galaxies are particularly vital for understanding the formation and chemical evolution of galaxies. As in any field, ideas come and go, and today’s discussion has given us a valuable assessment of current knowledge and thinking on many topics.

The problems of star formation and the IMF are basic to many aspects of work on old populations. The discussion included some interesting ideas on star formation, and a useful warning that there are probably different modes of star formation which may give different IMFs: for example the mode of star formation that is widely studied now (in spiral arms) is probably different to the mode of star formation that was active in forming the stars of the galactic bulge.