3 research outputs found
Oxygen abundance in local disk and bulge: chemical evolution with a strictly universal IMF
The empirical differential oxygen abundance distribution (EDOD) is deduced
from subsamples related to two different samples involving solar neighbourhood
(SN) thick disk, thin disk, halo, and bulge stars. The EDOD of the SN thick +
thin disk is determined by weighting the mass, for assumed SN thick to thin
disk mass ratio within the range, 0.1-0.9. Inhomogeneous models of chemical
evolution for the SN thick disk, the SN thin disk, the SN thick + thin disk,
the SN halo, and the bulge, are computed assuming the instantaneous recycling
approximation. The EDOD data are fitted, to an acceptable extent, by their TDOD
counterparts provided (i) still undetected, low-oxygen abundance thin disk
stars exist, and (ii) a single oxygen overabundant star is removed from a thin
disk subsample. In any case, the (assumed power-law) stellar initial mass
function (IMF) is universal but gas can be inhibited from, or enhanced in,
forming stars at different rates with respect to a selected reference case.
Models involving a strictly universal IMF (i.e. gas neither inhibited from, nor
enhanced in, forming stars with respect to a selected reference case) can also
reproduce the data. The existence of a strictly universal IMF makes similar
chemical enrichment within active (i.e. undergoing star formation) regions
placed in different environments, but increasing probability of a region being
active passing from SN halo to SN thick + thin disk, SN thin disk, SN thick
disk, and bulge. On the basis of the results, it is realized that the chemical
evolution of the SN thick + thin disk as a whole cannot be excluded.Comment: 26 pages, 10 tables, and 5 figures; tables out of page are splitted
in two parts in Appendix B; sects.4 and 5 rewritten for better understanding
of the results; further references added. Accepted for publication in
Astrophysics & Space Scienc