arXiv subjects

Gail Zasowski

Publications and source records attributed to Gail Zasowski.

At least 73 records · Page 4Linked to original sources

arXiv2017

IN-SYNC. V. Stellar kinematics and dynamics in the Orion A Molecular Cloud

The kinematics and dynamics of young stellar populations enable us to test theories of star formation. With this aim, we continue our analysis of the SDSS-III/APOGEE IN-SYNC survey, a high resolution near infrared spectroscopic survey of young clusters. We focus on the Orion A star-forming region, for which IN-SYNC obtained spectra of $\sim2700$ stars. In Paper IV we used these data to study the young stellar population. Here we study the kinematic properties through radial velocities ($v_r$). The young stellar population remains kinematically associated with the molecular gas, following a $\sim10\:{\rm{km\:s}}^{-1}$ gradient along filament. However, near the center of the region, the $v_r$ distribution is slightly blueshifted and asymmetric; we suggest that this population, which is older, is slightly in foreground. We find evidence for kinematic subclustering, detecting statistically significant groupings of co-located stars with coherent motions. These are mostly in the lower-density regions of the cloud, while the ONC radial velocities are smoothly distributed, consistent with it being an older, more dynamically evolved cluster. The velocity dispersion $σ_v$ varies along the filament. The ONC appears virialized, or just slightly supervirial, consistent with an old dynamical age. Here there is also some evidence for on-going expansion, from a $v_r$--extinction correlation. In the southern filament, $σ_v$ is $\sim2$--$3$ times larger than virial in the L1641N region, where we infer a superposition along the line of sight of stellar sub-populations, detached from the gas. On the contrary, $σ_v$ decreases towards L1641S, where the population is again in agreement with a virial state.

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arXiv2017

IN-SYNC VI. Identification and Radial Velocity Extraction for 100+ Double-Lined Spectroscopic Binaries in the APOGEE/IN-SYNC Fields

We present radial velocity measurements for 70 high confidence, and 34 potential binary systems in fields containing the Perseus Molecular Cloud, Pleiades, NGC 2264, and the Orion A star forming region. 18 of these systems have been previously identified as binaries in the literature. Candidate double-lined spectroscopic binaries (SB2s) are identified by analyzing the cross-correlation functions (CCFs) computed during the reduction of each APOGEE spectrum. We identify sources whose CCFs are well fit as the sum of two Lorentzians as likely binaries, and provide an initial characterization of the system based on the radial velocities indicated by that dual fit. For systems observed over several epochs, we present mass ratios and systemic velocities; for two systems with observations on eight or more epochs, and which meet our criteria for robust orbital coverage, we derive initial orbital parameters. The distribution of mass ratios for multi-epoch sources in our sample peaks at q=1, but with a significant tail toward lower q values. Tables reporting radial velocities, systemic velocities, and mass ratios are provided online. We discuss future improvements to the radial velocity extraction method we employ, as well as limitations imposed by the number of epochs currently available in the APOGEE database. The Appendix contains brief notes from the literature on each system in the sample, and more extensive notes for select sources of interest.

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arXiv2017

The age-metallicity structure of the Milky Way disk

The measurement of the structure of stellar populations in the Milky Way disk places fundamental constraints on models of galaxy formation and evolution. Previously, the disk's structure has been studied in terms of populations defined geometrically and/or chemically, but a decomposition based on stellar ages provides a more direct connection to the history of the disk, and stronger constraint on theory. Here, we use positions, abundances and ages for 31,244 red giant branch stars from the SDSS-APOGEE survey, spanning $3 < R_{\mathrm{gc}} < 15$ kpc, to dissect the disk into mono-age and mono-[Fe/H] populations at low and high [$α$/Fe]. For each population, with $Δ\mathrm{age} < 2$ Gyr and $Δ\mathrm{[Fe/H]} < 0.1$ dex, we measure the structure and surface-mass density contribution. We find that low [$α$/Fe] mono-age populations are fit well by a broken exponential, which increases to a peak radius and decreases thereafter. We show that this profile becomes broader with age, interpreted here as a new signal of disk heating and radial migration. High [$α$/Fe] populations are well fit as single exponentials within the radial range considered, with an average scale length of $1.9\pm 0.1$ kpc. We find that the relative contribution of high to low [$α$/Fe] populations at $R_0$ is $f_Σ= 18\% \pm 5\%$; high [$α$/Fe] contributes most of the mass at old ages, and low [$α$/Fe] at young ages. The low and high [$α$/Fe] populations overlap in age at intermediate [Fe/H], although both contribute mass at $R_{0}$ across the full range of [Fe/H]. The mass weighted scale height $h_Z$ distribution is a smoothly declining exponential function. High [$α$/Fe] populations are thicker than low [$α$/Fe], and the average $h_Z$ increases steadily with age, between 200 and 600 pc.

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arXiv2017

Timing the Evolution of the Galactic Disk with NGC 6791: An Open Cluster with Peculiar High-$α$ Chemistry as seen by APOGEE

We utilize elemental-abundance information for Galactic red giant stars in five open clusters (NGC 7789, NGC 6819, M67, NGC 188, and NGC 6791) from the Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment (APOGEE) DR13 dataset to age-date the chemical evolution of the high- and low-$α$ element sequences of the Milky Way. Key to this time-stamping is the cluster NGC 6791, whose stellar members have mean abundances that place it in the high-$α$, high-[Fe/H] region of the [$α$/Fe]-[Fe/H] plane. Based on the cluster's age ($\sim 8$ Gyr), Galactocentric radius, and height above the Galactic plane, as well as comparable chemistry reported for APOGEE stars in Baade's Window, we suggest that the two most likely origins for NGC 6791 are as an original part of the thick-disk, or as a former member of the Galactic bulge. Moreover, because NGC 6791 lies at the \textit{high metallicity end} ([Fe/H] $\sim 0.4$) of the high-$α$ sequence, the age of NGC 6791 places a limit on the \textit{youngest age} of stars in the high-metallicity, high-$α$ sequence for the cluster's parent population (i.e., either the bulge or the disk). In a similar way, we can also use the age and chemistry of NGC 188 to set a limit of $\sim 7$ Gyr on the \textit{oldest age} of the low-$α$ sequence of the Milky Way. Therefore, NGC 6791 and NGC 188 are potentially a pair of star clusters that bracket both the timing and the duration of an important transition point in the chemical history of the Milky Way.

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arXiv2017

The Correlation Between Mixing Length and Metallicity on the Giant Branch: Implications for Ages in the Gaia Era

In the updated APOGEE-Kepler catalog, we have asteroseismic and spectroscopic data for over 3000 first ascent red giants. Given the size and accuracy of this sample, these data offer an unprecedented test of the accuracy of stellar models on the post-main-sequence. When we compare these data to theoretical predictions, we find a metallicity dependent temperature offset with a slope of around 100 K per dex in metallicity. We find that this effect is present in all model grids tested and that theoretical uncertainties in the models, correlated spectroscopic errors, and shifts in the asteroseismic mass scale are insufficient to explain this effect. Stellar models can be brought into agreement with the data if a metallicity dependent convective mixing length is used, with $ Δα_{\rm ML, YREC} \sim 0.2$ per dex in metallicity, a trend inconsistent with the predictions of three dimensional stellar convection simulations. If this effect is not taken into account, isochrone ages for red giants from the Gaia data will be off by as much as a factor of 2 even at modest deviations from solar metallicity ([Fe/H]=$-$0.5).

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arXiv2016

APOGEE Chemical Abundances of Globular Cluster Giants in the Inner Galaxy

We report chemical abundances obtained by SDSS-III/APOGEE for giant stars in five globular clusters located within 2.2 kpc of the Galactic centre. We detect the presence of multiple stellar populations in four of those clusters (NGC 6553, NGC 6528, Terzan 5, and Palomar 6) and find strong evidence for their presence in NGC 6522. All clusters present a significant spread in the abundances of N, C, Na, and Al, with the usual correlations and anti-correlations between various abundances seen in other globular clusters. Our results provide important quantitative constraints on theoretical models for self-enrichment of globular clusters, by testing their predictions for the dependence of yields of elements such as Na, N, C, and Al on metallicity. They also confirm that, under the assumption that field N-rich stars originate from globular cluster destruction, they can be used as tracers of their parental systems in the high- metallicity regime.

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arXiv2016

Chemical tagging with APOGEE: Discovery of a large population of N-rich stars in the inner Galaxy

Formation of globular clusters (GCs), the Galactic bulge, or galaxy bulges in general, are important unsolved problems in Galactic astronomy. Homogeneous infrared observations of large samples of stars belonging to GCs and the Galactic bulge field are one of the best ways to study these problems. We report the discovery by APOGEE of a population of field stars in the inner Galaxy with abundances of N, C, and Al that are typically found in GC stars. The newly discovered stars have high [N/Fe], which is correlated with [Al/Fe] and anti-correlated with [C/Fe]. They are homogeneously distributed across, and kinematically indistinguishable from, other field stars in the same volume. Their metallicity distribution is seemingly unimodal, peaking at [Fe/H]~-1, thus being in disagreement with that of the Galactic GC system. Our results can be understood in terms of different scenarios. N-rich stars could be former members of dissolved GCs, in which case the mass in destroyed GCs exceeds that of the surviving GC system by a factor of ~8. In that scenario, the total mass contained in so-called "first-generation" stars cannot be larger than that in "second-generation" stars by more than a factor of ~9 and was certainly smaller. Conversely, our results may imply the absence of a mandatory genetic link between "second generation" stars and GCs. Last, but not least, N-rich stars could be the oldest stars in the Galaxy, the by-products of chemical enrichment by the first stellar generations formed in the heart of the Galaxy.

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arXiv2016

Chemical abundance gradients from open clusters in the Milky Way disk: results from the APOGEE survey

Metallicity gradients provide strong constraints for understanding the chemical evolution of the Galaxy. We report on radial abundance gradients of Fe, Ni, Ca, Si, and Mg obtained from a sample of 304 red-giant members of 29 disk open clusters, mostly concentrated at galactocentric distances between ~8 - 15 kpc, but including two open clusters in the outer disk. The observations are from the APOGEE survey. The chemical abundances were derived automatically by the ASPCAP pipeline and these are part of the SDSS III Data Release 12. The gradients, obtained from least squares fits to the data, are relatively flat, with slopes ranging from -0.026 to -0.033 dex/kpc for the alpha-elements [O/H], [Ca/H], [Si/H] and [Mg/H] and -0.035 dex/kpc and -0.040 dex/kpc for [Fe/H] and [Ni/H], respectively. Our results are not at odds with the possibility that metallicity ([Fe/H]) gradients are steeper in the inner disk (R_GC ~7 - 12 kpc) and flatter towards the outer disk. The open cluster sample studied spans a significant range in age. When breaking the sample into age bins, there is some indication that the younger open cluster population in our sample (log age < 8.7) has a flatter metallicity gradient when compared with the gradients obtained from older open clusters.

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arXiv2015

Interstellar Extinction Curve Variations Toward the Inner Milky Way: A Challenge to Observational Cosmology

We investigate interstellar extinction curve variations toward $\sim$4 deg$^{2}$ of the inner Milky Way in $VIJK_{s}$ photometry from the OGLE-III and $VVV$ surveys, with supporting evidence from diffuse interstellar bands and $F435W,F625W$ photometry. We obtain independent measurements toward $\sim$2,000 sightlines of $A_{I}$, $E(V-I)$, $E(I-J)$, and $E(J-K_{s})$, with median precision and accuracy of 2%. We find that the variations in the extinction ratios $A_{I}/E(V-I)$, $E(I-J)/E(V-I)$ and $E(J-K_{s})/E(V-I)$ are large (exceeding 20%), significant, and positively correlated, as expected. However, both the mean values and the trends in these extinction ratios are drastically shifted from the predictions of Cardelli and Fitzpatrick, regardless of how $R_{V}$ is varied. Furthermore, we demonstrate that variations in the shape of the extinction curve has at least two degrees of freedom, and not one (e.g. $R_{V}$), which we conform with a principal component analysis. We derive a median value of $ =13.44$, which is $\sim$60% higher than the "standard" value. We show that the Wesenheit magnitude $W_{I}=I-1.61(I-J)$ is relatively impervious to extinction curve variations. Given that these extinction curves are linchpins of observational cosmology, and that it is generally assumed that $R_{V}$ variations correctly capture variations in the extinction curve, we argue that systematic errors in the distance ladder from studies of type Ia supernovae and Cepheids may have been underestimated. Moreover, the reddening maps from the Planck experiment are shown to systematically overestimate dust extinction by $\sim$100%, and lack sensitivity to extinction curve variations.

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arXiv2015

IN-SYNC IV - The Young Stellar Population in the Orion A Molecular Cloud

We present the results of the SDSS APOGEE INfrared Spectroscopy of Young Nebulous Clusters program (IN-SYNC) survey of the Orion A molecular cloud. This survey obtained high resolution near infrared (NIR) spectroscopy of about 2700 young pre-main sequence stars throughout the region, acquired across five distinct fields spanning 6deg field of view (FOV). With these spectra, we have measured accurate stellar parameters (T_eff, log g, v sin i) and extinctions, and placed the sources in the Hertzsprung-Russel Diagram (HRD). We have also extracted radial velocities for the kinematic characterization of the population. We compare our measurements with literature results for a sub-sample of targets in order to assess the performances and accuracy of the survey. Source extinction shows evidence for dust grains that are larger than those in the diffuse interstellar medium (ISM): we estimate an average R_V=5.5 in the region. Importantly, we find a clear correlation between HRD inferred ages and spectroscopic surface-gravity inferred ages. This clearly indicates a real spread of stellar radii at fixed temperature, and together with additional correlations with extinction and with disk presence, strongly suggests a real spread of ages large than a few Myr. Focussing on the young population around NGC1980 iota Ori, which has previously been suggested to be a separate, foreground, older cluster, we confirm its older (5Myr) age and low A_V, but considering that its radial velocity distribution is indistinguishable from the Orion A's population, we suggest that NGC1980 is part of Orion A's star formation activity. Based on their stellar parameters and kinematic properties, we identify 383 new candidate members of Orion A, most of which are diskless sources in areas of the region poorly studied by previous works.

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arXiv2015

The SDSS-III APOGEE Spectral Line List for H-band Spectroscopy

We present the $H$-band spectral line lists adopted by the Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment (APOGEE). The APOGEE line lists comprise astrophysical, theoretical, and laboratory sources from the literature, as well as newly evaluated astrophysical oscillator strengths and damping parameters. We discuss the construction of the APOGEE line list, which is one of the critical inputs for the APOGEE Stellar Parameters and Chemical Abundances Pipeline, and present three different versions that have been used at various stages of the project. The methodology for the newly calculated astrophysical line lists is reviewed. The largest of these three line lists contains 134,457 molecular and atomic transitions. In addition to the format adopted to store the data, the line lists are available in MOOG, Synspec and Turbospectrum formats. We also present a list of $H$-band spectral features that are either poorly represented or completely missing in our line list. This list is based on the average of a large number of spectral fit residuals for APOGEE observations spanning a wide range of stellar parameters.

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arXiv2015

ASPCAP: The Apogee Stellar Parameter and Chemical Abundances Pipeline

The Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment (APOGEE) has built the largest moderately high-resolution (R=22, 500) spectroscopic map of the stars across the Milky Way, and including dust-obscured areas. The APOGEE Stellar Parameter and Chemical Abundances Pipeline (ASPCAP) is the software developed for the automated analysis of these spectra. ASPCAP determines atmospheric parameters and chemical abundances from observed spectra by comparing observed spectra to libraries of theoretical spectra, using chi-2 minimization in a multidimensional parameter space. The package consists of a fortran90 code that does the actual minimization, and a wrapper IDL code for book-keeping and data handling. This paper explains in detail the ASPCAP components and functionality, and presents results from a number of tests designed to check its performance. ASPCAP provides stellar effective temperatures, surface gravities, and metallicities precise to 2%, 0.1 dex, and 0.05 dex, respectively, for most APOGEE stars, which are predominantly giants. It also provides abundances for up to 15 chemical elements with various levels of precision, typically under 0.1 dex. The final data release (DR12) of the Sloan Digital Sky Survey III contains an APOGEE database of more than 150,000 stars. ASPCAP development continues in the SDSS-IV APOGEE-2 survey.

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arXiv2015

Spectro-photometric distances to stars: a general-purpose Bayesian approach

We developed a code that estimates distances to stars using measured spectroscopic and photometric quantities. We employ a Bayesian approach to build the probability distribution function over stellar evolutionary models given these data, delivering estimates of model parameters for each star individually. The code was first tested on simulations, successfully recovering input distances to mock stars with <1% bias.The method-intrinsic random distance uncertainties for typical spectroscopic survey measurements amount to around 10% for dwarf stars and 20\% for giants, and are most sensitive to the quality of $\log g$ measurements. The code was validated by comparing our distance estimates to parallax measurements from the Hipparcos mission for nearby stars (< 300 pc), to asteroseismic distances of CoRoT red giant stars, and to known distances of well-studied open and globular clusters. The external comparisons confirm that our distances are subject to very small systematic biases with respect to the fundamental Hipparcos scale (+0.4 % for dwarfs, and +1.6% for giants). The typical random distance scatter is 18% for dwarfs, and 26% for giants. For the CoRoT-APOGEE sample, the typical random distance scatter is ~15%, both for the nearby and farther data. Our distances are systematically larger than the CoRoT ones by about +9%, which can mostly be attributed to the different choice of priors. The comparison to known distances of star clusters from SEGUE and APOGEE has led to significant systematic differences for many cluster stars, but with opposite signs, and with substantial scatter. Finally, we tested our distances against those previously determined for a high-quality sample of giant stars from the RAVE survey, again finding a small systematic trend of +5% and an rms scatter of 30%.

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arXiv2015

The Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment (APOGEE)

The Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment (APOGEE), one of the programs in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey III (SDSS-III), has now completed its systematic, homogeneous spectroscopic survey sampling all major populations of the Milky Way. After a three year observing campaign on the Sloan 2.5-m Telescope, APOGEE has collected a half million high resolution (R~22,500), high S/N (>100), infrared (1.51-1.70 microns) spectra for 146,000 stars, with time series information via repeat visits to most of these stars. This paper describes the motivations for the survey and its overall design---hardware, field placement, target selection, operations---and gives an overview of these aspects as well as the data reduction, analysis and products. An index is also given to the complement of technical papers that describe various critical survey components in detail. Finally, we discuss the achieved survey performance and illustrate the variety of potential uses of the data products by way of a number of science demonstrations, which span from time series analysis of stellar spectral variations and radial velocity variations from stellar companions, to spatial maps of kinematics, metallicity and abundance patterns across the Galaxy and as a function of age, to new views of the interstellar medium, the chemistry of star clusters, and the discovery of rare stellar species. As part of SDSS-III Data Release 12, all of the APOGEE data products are now publicly available.

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arXiv2015

The Cannon: A data-driven approach to stellar label determination

New spectroscopic surveys offer the promise of consistent stellar parameters and abundances ('stellar labels') for hundreds of thousands of stars in the Milky Way: this poses a formidable spectral modeling challenge. In many cases, there is a sub-set of reference objects for which the stellar labels are known with high(er) fidelity. We take advantage of this with The Cannon, a new data-driven approach for determining stellar labels from spectroscopic data. The Cannon learns from the 'known' labels of reference stars how the continuum-normalized spectra depend on these labels by fitting a flexible model at each wavelength; then, The Cannon uses this model to derive labels for the remaining survey stars. We illustrate The Cannon by training the model on only 542 stars in 19 clusters as reference objects, with Teff, log g and [Fe/H] as the labels, and then applying it to the spectra of 56,000 stars from APOGEE DR10. The Cannon is very accurate. Its stellar labels compare well to the stars for which APOGEE pipeline (ASPCAP) labels are provided in DR10, with rms differences that are basically identical to the stated ASPCAP uncertainties. Beyond the reference labels, The Cannon makes no use of stellar models nor any line-list, but needs a set of reference objects that span label-space. The Cannon performs well at lower signal-to-noise, as it delivers comparably good labels even at one ninth the APOGEE observing time. We discuss the limitations of The Cannon and its future potential, particularly, to bring different spectroscopic surveys onto a consistent scale of stellar labels.

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arXiv2015

IN-SYNC III: The dynamical state of IC 348 - A super-virial velocity dispersion and a puzzling sign of convergence

Most field stars will have encountered the highest stellar density and hence the largest number of interactions in their birth environment. Yet the stellar dynamics during this crucial phase are poorly understood. Here we analyze the radial velocities measured for 152 out of 380 observed stars in the 2-6 Myr old star cluster IC 348 as part of the SDSS-III APOGEE. The radial velocity distribution of these stars is fitted with one or two Gaussians, convolved with the measurement uncertainties including binary orbital motions. Including a second Gaussian improves the fit; the high-velocity outliers that are best fit by this second component may either (1) be contaminants from the nearby Perseus OB2 association, (2) be a halo of ejected or dispersing stars from IC 348, or (3) reflect that IC 348 has not relaxed to a Gaussian velocity distribution. We measure a velocity dispersion for IC 348 of $0.72 \pm 0.07$ km s$^{-1}$ (or $0.64 \pm 0.08$ km s$^{-1}$ if two Gaussians are fitted), which implies a supervirial state, unless the gas contributes more to the gravitational potential than expected. No evidence is found for a dependence of this velocity dispersion on distance from the cluster center or stellar mass. We also find that stars with lower extinction (in the front of the cloud) tend to be redshifted compared with stars with somewhat higher extinction (towards the back of the cloud). This data suggests that the stars in IC 348 are converging along the line of sight. We show that this correlation between radial velocity and extinction is unlikely to be spuriously caused by the small cluster rotation of $0.024 \pm 0.013$ km s$^{-1}$ arcmin$^{-1}$ or by correlations between the radial velocities of neighboring stars. This signature, if confirmed, will be the first detection of line-of-sight convergence in a star cluster(...)

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arXiv2015

The SDSS-IV in 2014: A Demographic Snapshot

Many astronomers now participate in large international collaborations, and it is important to examine whether these structures foster a scientific climate that is inclusive and diverse. The Committee on the Participation of Women in the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (CPWS) was formed to evaluate the demographics and gender climate within SDSS-IV, one of the largest and most geographically distributed astronomical collaborations. In April 2014, the CPWS administered a demographic survey to establish a baseline for the incipient SDSS-IV. We received responses from 250 participants (46% of the active membership). Half of the survey respondents were located in the US or Canada and 30% were based in Europe. Eleven percent of survey respondents considered themselves to be an ethnic minority at their current institution. Twenty-five percent of the SDSS-IV collaboration members are women, a fraction that is consistent with the US astronomical community, but substantially higher than the fraction of women in the IAU (16%). Approximately equal fractions of men and women report holding positions of leadership. When binned by academic age and career level, men and women also assume leadership roles at approximately equal rates, in a way that increases steadily for both genders with increasing seniority. In this sense, SDSS-IV has been successful in recruiting leaders that are representative of the collaboration. Yet, more progress needs to be made towards achieving gender balance and increasing diversity in the field of astronomy, and there is still room for improvement in the membership and leadership of SDSS-IV. For example, at the highest level of SDSS-IV leadership, women disproportionately assume roles related to education and public outreach. The CPWS plans to use these initial data to establish a baseline for tracking demographics over time as we work to assess and improve the climate of SDSS-IV.

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arXiv2015

Exploring Anticorrelations and Light Element Variations in Northern Globular Clusters Observed by the APOGEE Survey

We investigate the light-element behavior of red giant stars in Northern globular clusters (GCs) observed by the SDSS-III Apache Point Observatory Galactic Evolution Experiment (APOGEE). We derive abundances of nine elements (Fe, C, N, O, Mg, Al, Si, Ca, and Ti) for 428 red giant stars in 10 globular clusters. The intrinsic abundance range relative to measurement errors is examined, and the well-known C-N and Mg-Al anticorrelations are explored using an extreme-deconvolution code for the first time in a consistent way. We find that Mg and Al drive the population membership in most clusters, except in M107 and M71, the two most metal-rich clusters in our study, where the grouping is most sensitive to N. We also find a diversity in the abundance distributions, with some clusters exhibiting clear abundance bimodalities (for example M3 and M53) while others show extended distributions. The spread of Al abundances increases significantly as cluster average metallicity decreases as previously found by other works, which we take as evidence that low metallicity, intermediate mass AGB polluters were more common in the more metal poor clusters. The statistically significant correlation of [Al/Fe] with [Si/Fe] in M15 suggests that $^{28}$Si leakage has occurred in this cluster. We also present C, N and O abundances for stars cooler than 4500 K and examine the behavior of A(C+N+O) in each cluster as a function of temperature and [Al/Fe]. The scatter of A(C+N+O) is close to its estimated uncertainty in all clusters and independent on stellar temperature. A(C+N+O) exhibits small correlations and anticorrelations with [Al/Fe] in M3 and M13, but we cannot be certain about these relations given the size of our abundance uncertainties. Star-to-star variations of $α-$elements (Si, Ca, Ti) abundances are comparable to our estimated errors in all clusters.

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