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Timothy C. Beers National Optical Astronomy Observatory

Carbon-Enhanced Metal-Poor (CEMP) stars: probes of nucleosynthesis from the first generation of stars in the Universe. Timothy C. Beers National Optical Astronomy Observatory. SDSS. First-generation objects of high mass presumably formed from metal-free gas Lived short lives (Myrs)

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Timothy C. Beers National Optical Astronomy Observatory

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  1. Carbon-Enhanced Metal-Poor (CEMP) stars: probes ofnucleosynthesis from the first generation of stars in the Universe Timothy C. Beers National Optical Astronomy Observatory SDSS

  2. First-generation objects of high mass presumably formed from metal-free gas • Lived short lives (Myrs) • Exploded • Distributed (pre or post explosion) their nucleosynthetic products • Next-generation objects formed from the gas polluted by first-generation objects • A wider range of masses allowed, perhaps including stars with main-sequence lifetimes > a Hubble time • Further star formation (Pop II) contributed additional material, and diluted the signatures of first/next-generation stars • We should look for a characteristic set of abundance signatures ONLY foundamong the lowest metallicity stars • Although alternatives have been suggested (e.g., “sawtooth pattern”), the odd-even effect associated with explosions of pair-instability SNe, I would like to advocate for CARBON and other light elements Expected Signatures

  3. HK Survey (Beers, Preston, & Shectman 1992) • Note that original selection criteria was carbon blind • Only based on perceived weaknessof CaII H and K lines on objective prism spectra The Discovery of Carbon-Enhanced Metal-Poor (CEMP) Stars

  4. Just How Common are These CEMP Stars ? • The HK Surveyof Beers and colleagues revealed that MANY low-[Fe/H] stars exhibit a large overabundance of carbon relative to iron (10s of CEMP stars) • This realization has inspired further searches for CEMP stars, both in the HK survey and the (then) newer Hamburg/ESO prism survey (100s of CEMP stars) • And by SDSS/SEGUE-1/SEGUE-2(1000s of CEMP stars)

  5. Carbon-Enhanced Metal-Poor (CEMP) stars have been recognized to be an important stellar component of the halo system • CEMP stars frequencies are: • 20% for [Fe/H] < —2.5 • 30% for [Fe/H] < —3.0 EMP • 40% for [Fe/H] < —3.5 • 75% for [Fe/H] < —4.0 UMP • But Why ? – Atmospheric/Progenitor or Population Driven ? • Carollo et al. (2012) suggest the latter Frequencies of CEMP Stars Based on Stellar Populations

  6. Exploration of Nature’s Laboratory for Neutron-Capture Processes Beers & Christlieb ARAA (2005)

  7. Aoki et al. (2007) • demonstrated that • the CEMP-no stars • occur preferentially • at lower [Fe/H] than • the CEMP-s stars • About 80% of CEMP • stars are CEMP-s • or CEMP-r/s, 20% are • CEMP-no • Global abundance • patterns of CEMP-no • stars incompatible • with AGB models • at low [Fe/H] The UMP/HMP Stars are (Almost) ALL CEMP-no Stars

  8. Carbon Enhancement Associated with s-process Patterns (Aoki et al. 2002) LP 625-44: [Fe/H] = -2.7; [C/Fe] = +2.0 LP 625-44 was the first s-process-rich MP star with Pb measured

  9. CS 22892-052: [Fe/H] = -3.1; [C/Fe] = +1.0 Carbon Enhancement Associated with r-process Patterns (CS 22892-052; McWilliam et al. 1995; Sneden et al. 2000) CS 22892-052 was the first highly r-process-rich MP star discovered

  10. CEMP-no Stars are Associated with UNIQUE Light-Element Abundance Patterns (Aoki et al. 2002) CS 29498-043: [Fe/H] = -3.8; [C/Fe] = +1.9 Harbingers of Things to Come!

  11. HE 0107-5240 [Fe/H] = -5.3 [C/Fe] = +3.9 Last but Definitely Least… (Christlieb et al. 2002; Frebel et al. 2005) It is the SAME pattern among the light elements !

  12. Ito et al. (2009) report on discovery that BD+44 is an [Fe/H] = —3.8, CEMP-no star • Light-element abundance patterns similar to those for other CEMP-no stars • Previous RV monitoring by Carney et al. indicate no variation at levels > 0.5 km/s over past 25 years • More detailed observations by Ito et al. (2013) BD+44:493 – A 9th Magnitude Messenger from the Early Universe

  13. Something You Don’t Often See An Object of COSMOLOGICAL Significance with Diffraction Spikes

  14. Abundance Pattern Compared to 25 Mo Mixing/Fallback Model Ito et al. (2013) : Note the low N, compared with some other CEMP-no stars with enhanced N

  15. Carney et al. (1986) + Ito et al. (2012) Radial Velocity Monitoring The rms variation over 25 years is 0.73 km/s !

  16. Follow-on of work from D. Carollo et al. (2007), demonstrating existence of inner/outer halo populations,based on 32,360 unique calibration stars from SDSS • Determination of velocity ellipsoids for thick disk, MWTD, inner, outer halos • Modeling of fractions of various components in local sample (d < 4 kpc) Inference of Inner/Outer Halo Structure (Carollo et al. 2010)

  17. Fractions of Components

  18. Velocity Ellipsoids

  19. Global CEMP Fraction and <[C/Fe]> vs [Fe/H](Carollo et al. 2012) analysis of SDSS/SEGUE Cal Stars Global variation shows smooth increase of f (CEMP) vs. [Fe/H] Clear increase of <[C/Fe]> vs. [Fe/H]

  20. Global CEMP Fraction vs. |Z| Clear increase of f (CEMP) with |Z| (not expected for single halo)

  21. Inner/Outer Halo CEMP Fractions f (CEMP)OH ~ 2 x f (CEMP) IH <[C/Fe]> roughly constant IH/OH (Carollo et al. 2012)

  22. The distribution of CEMP stars indicates that there is likely to be more than one source of C production at low metallicity, and that the difference can be associated with assignment to inner/outer halo • Modelers (e.g., Izzard, Pols, Stancliffe) have tried, without success, to reproduce the observed fractions of CEMP stars at low metallicity using AGB sources alone. Getting beyond 10% appears to be a real barrier • We speculate that the majority of CEMP stars associated with the inner halo will be CEMP-s, while those associated with the outer halo will be CEMP-no Interpretation

  23. CEMP stars in the Galaxy likely have had multiple sources of • carbon production • CEMP-s in AGB stars • CEMP-no in massive (50-100 Mo) rapidly rotating MMP stars • CEMP-no in intermediate (25-30 Mo) “faint” SNe • CEMP-no stars occur preferentially at the lowest metallicities, including the 3 of the 4 stars known with [Fe/H] < -4.5 • CEMP stars are found in great number in the ultra-faint SDSS dwarf galaxies, some of which have low n-capture abundances • High-z DLA systems exhibit similar abundance patterns as CEMP-no stars • We have observed (!) the nucleosynthesis products of first generation stars (Pop III) Bottom Line

  24. Fractions of CEMP-no and CEMP-s in the Inner/Outer halo • Carollo et al., in preparation • Sample of 183 stars with high-resolution spectroscopy obtained with Subaru and other sources (Aoki et al. 2013; Norris et al. 2013), including on the order of 50 CEMP stars • High resolution spectroscopy necessary to obtain the Barium signature of s-process

  25. IHP-OHP Memberships using Integrals of Motion Rapo > 15 kpc

  26. IHP-OHP Memberships using Integrals of Motion OHP IHP

  27. New CEMP + VMP Star Survey Summary • Placco, Beers, et al. have been using “bad weather” time on the Gemini N and S telescopes to search for NEW (formerly missed) • examples of CEMP and VMP stars chosen from the HK and HES candidates • Numerous examples of new CEMP stars found by targeting on the G-band strength of scanned HES stars • By taking advantage of the apparently strong correlation between large C over-abundances and declining [Fe/H], rather than on the weakness • of the CaII K line for metal weakness, and obtaining C information later • from medium-res spectroscopic follow-up • Numerous examples of new VMP stars found by targeting on previously unobserved HK and HES candidates • CEMP survey recently completed (~ 800 spectra / ~200 new CEMP stars) • VMP survey just getting underway • High-resolution work (AAT, Magellan, VLT/X-Shooter) – Just Starting

  28. [C/Fe] vs. [Fe/H] (Medium-Res Results)

  29. Expansion of numbers of identified CEMP stars, in particular with [F/eH] < —2.5, which include both CEMP-s and CEMP-no stars • High-resolution follow-up spectroscopy of a core sample of 100-200 CEMP stars, in order to assign classifications based on heavy elements, and to determine CNO and other light element abundances • Radial velocity monitoring of CEMP stars, in order to determine binary nature, as well as characterize correlations between chemical patterns and nature of the detected binary • An exciting time indeed ! The Path Forward

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