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Quantitative chemical tagging, stellar ages and the chemo-dynamical evolution of the Galactic disc

Mitschang, A. W. ; De Silva, G. ; Zucker, D. B. ; Anguiano, B. ; Bensby, Thomas LU orcid and Feltzing, Sofia LU orcid (2014) In Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society 438(4). p.2753-2764
Abstract
The early science results from the new generation of high-resolution stellar spectroscopic surveys, such as Galactic Archaeology with HERMES (GALAH) and the Gaia European Southern Observatory survey (Gaia-ESO), will represent major milestones in the quest to chemically tag the Galaxy. Yet this technique to reconstruct dispersed coeval stellar groups has remained largely untested until recently. We build on previous work that developed an empirical chemical tagging probability function, which describes the likelihood that two field stars are conatal, that is, they were formed in the same cluster environment. In this work, we perform the first ever blind chemical tagging experiment, i.e. tagging stars with no known or otherwise discernible... (More)
The early science results from the new generation of high-resolution stellar spectroscopic surveys, such as Galactic Archaeology with HERMES (GALAH) and the Gaia European Southern Observatory survey (Gaia-ESO), will represent major milestones in the quest to chemically tag the Galaxy. Yet this technique to reconstruct dispersed coeval stellar groups has remained largely untested until recently. We build on previous work that developed an empirical chemical tagging probability function, which describes the likelihood that two field stars are conatal, that is, they were formed in the same cluster environment. In this work, we perform the first ever blind chemical tagging experiment, i.e. tagging stars with no known or otherwise discernible associations, on a sample of 714 disc field stars with a number of high-quality high-resolution homogeneous metal abundance measurements. We present evidence that chemical tagging of field stars does identify coeval groups of stars, yet these groups may not represent distinct formation sites, e.g. as in dissolved open clusters, as previously thought. Our results point to several important conclusions, among them that group finding will be limited strictly to chemical abundance space, e.g. stellar ages, kinematics, colours, temperature and surface gravity do not enhance the detectability of groups. We also demonstrate that in addition to its role in probing the chemical enrichment and kinematic history of the Galactic disc, chemical tagging represents a powerful new stellar age determination technique. (Less)
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author
; ; ; ; and
organization
publishing date
type
Contribution to journal
publication status
published
subject
keywords
techniques: miscellaneous, stars: abundances, Galaxy: disc, Galaxy:, evolution, open clusters and associations: general
in
Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
volume
438
issue
4
pages
2753 - 2764
publisher
Oxford University Press
external identifiers
  • wos:000332038000003
  • scopus:84894362042
ISSN
1365-2966
DOI
10.1093/mnras/stt2320
language
English
LU publication?
yes
id
d991fd29-c5e2-403d-9d98-cfd32f17edb2 (old id 4417721)
date added to LUP
2016-04-01 09:57:22
date last changed
2024-01-06 04:15:32
@article{d991fd29-c5e2-403d-9d98-cfd32f17edb2,
  abstract     = {{The early science results from the new generation of high-resolution stellar spectroscopic surveys, such as Galactic Archaeology with HERMES (GALAH) and the Gaia European Southern Observatory survey (Gaia-ESO), will represent major milestones in the quest to chemically tag the Galaxy. Yet this technique to reconstruct dispersed coeval stellar groups has remained largely untested until recently. We build on previous work that developed an empirical chemical tagging probability function, which describes the likelihood that two field stars are conatal, that is, they were formed in the same cluster environment. In this work, we perform the first ever blind chemical tagging experiment, i.e. tagging stars with no known or otherwise discernible associations, on a sample of 714 disc field stars with a number of high-quality high-resolution homogeneous metal abundance measurements. We present evidence that chemical tagging of field stars does identify coeval groups of stars, yet these groups may not represent distinct formation sites, e.g. as in dissolved open clusters, as previously thought. Our results point to several important conclusions, among them that group finding will be limited strictly to chemical abundance space, e.g. stellar ages, kinematics, colours, temperature and surface gravity do not enhance the detectability of groups. We also demonstrate that in addition to its role in probing the chemical enrichment and kinematic history of the Galactic disc, chemical tagging represents a powerful new stellar age determination technique.}},
  author       = {{Mitschang, A. W. and De Silva, G. and Zucker, D. B. and Anguiano, B. and Bensby, Thomas and Feltzing, Sofia}},
  issn         = {{1365-2966}},
  keywords     = {{techniques: miscellaneous; stars: abundances; Galaxy: disc; Galaxy:; evolution; open clusters and associations: general}},
  language     = {{eng}},
  number       = {{4}},
  pages        = {{2753--2764}},
  publisher    = {{Oxford University Press}},
  series       = {{Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society}},
  title        = {{Quantitative chemical tagging, stellar ages and the chemo-dynamical evolution of the Galactic disc}},
  url          = {{http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/mnras/stt2320}},
  doi          = {{10.1093/mnras/stt2320}},
  volume       = {{438}},
  year         = {{2014}},
}