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arXiv · astro-ph/9711074

UV Spectral Dating of Stars and Galaxies

Abstract

An echelle spectrogram (R = 30,000) of the 2300-3100 A region in the ultraviolet spectrum of the F8V star 9 Comae is presented. The observation is used to calibrate features in the mid-ultraviolet spectra of similar stars according to age and metal content. In particular, the spectral break at 2640 A is interpreted using the spectral synthesis code SYNSPEC. We use this feature to estimate the time since the last major star formation episode in the z=1.55 early-type galaxy LBDS 53W091, whose rest frame mid-ultraviolet spectrum, observed with the Keck Telescope, is dominated by the flux from similar stars that are at or near the main-sequence turnoff in that system (Spinrad et al. 1997). Our result, 1 Gyr if the flux-dominating stellar population has a metallicity twice solar, or 2 Gyr for a more plausible solar metallicity, is significantly lower than the previous estimate and thereby relaxes constraints on cosmological parameters that were implied by the earlier work.

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S. R. Heap, T. M. Brown, I. Hubeny, W. Landsman, S. Yi, M. Fanelli, J. P. Gardner, T. Lanz, S. P. Maran, A. Sweigart, M. E. Kaiser, J. Linsky, J. G. Timothy, D. Lindler, T. Beck, R. C. Bohlin, M. Clampin, J. Grady, J. Loiacono, C. Krebs. 1997-11-07. UV Spectral Dating of Stars and Galaxies. https://doi.org/10.1023/a%3A1002199725466

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