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Gang Zhao

Publications and source records attributed to Gang Zhao.

At least 181 records · Page 10Linked to original sources

Local Group Analogs in $Λ$CDM cosmological simulations

We use semi-analytic galaxy catalogs based on two high-resolution cosmological $N$-body simulations, Millennium-WMAP7 and Millennium-II, to investigate the formation of the Local Group (LG) analogs. Unlike previous studies, we use the observed stellar masses to select the LG member (Milky Way (MW) and M31) analogs, and then impose constrains using the observed separation, isolation, and kinematics of the two main member galaxies. By comparing radial and low-ellipticity orbits between the MW and M31, we find higher tangential velocity results in higher total mass, which are 4.4$^{+2.4}_{-1.5}\times$10$^{12}\rm M_{\odot}$ and 6.6$^{+2.7}_{-1.5}\times$10$^{12}\rm M_{\odot}$ for radial and low-ellipticity orbits. The orbits also influence the individual mass distribution of MW and M31 analogs. For radial orbits, the typical host halo masses of the MW and M31 are 1.5$^{+1.4}_{-0.7}\times$10$^{12}\rm M_{\odot}$ and 2.5$^{+1.3}_{-1.1}\times$10$^{12}\rm M_{\odot}$; for low-ellipticity orbits, the masses are 2.5$^{+2.2}_{-1.4}\times$10$^{12}\rm M_{\odot}$ and 3.8$^{+2.8}_{-1.8}\times$10$^{12} \rm M_{\odot}$. The LG is located primarily in filaments with tails extending toward higher densities up to $δ\sim4.5$. The dark matter velocity anisotropy parameters $β$ of both the MW and M31 analogs are close to zero in the center, increasing to 0.2--0.3 at 50--80 kpc and decreasing slowly outward. The slope is much flatter than computed from the MW satellites, and the amplitude is smaller than traced by halo stars. Values of $β$ from different tracers agree at $\sim$120 kpc where $β\sim$ 0.2. We also find that model predictions agree broadly with observations in the radial distribution and luminosity function of satellites around the MW and M31.

astro-ph.GA↗

A high repetition rate picosecond LiNbO3 THz parametric amplifier and the parametric gain study

A high repetition rate, picosecond THz parametric amplifier (TPA) with a LiNbO3 (LN) crystal has been demonstrated in this work. At 10 kHz repetition rate, a peak power of 200 W and an average power of 12 μW have been obtained over a wide range around 2 THz; at 100 kHz repetition rate, a maximum peak power of 18 W and average power of 10.8 μW have been obtained. The parametric gain of the LN crystal was also investigated and a modified Schwarz-Maier model was introduced to interpret the experimental results.

physics.optics↗

Hot subdwarf stars identified in Gaia DR2 with spectra of LAMOST DR6 and DR7 I. Single-lined spectra

182 single-lined hot subdwarf stars are identified by using spectra from the sixth and seventh data release (DR6 and DR7) of the Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fibre Spectroscopic Telescope (LAMOST) survey. We classified all the hot subdwarf stars using a canonical classification scheme, and got 89 sdB, 37 sdOB, 26 sdO, 24 He-sdOB, 3 He-sdO and 3 He-sdB stars, respectively. Among these stars, 108 hot subdwarfs are newly discovered, while 74 stars were reported by previous catalogs. The atmospheric parameters of these stars were obtained by fitting the hydrogen (H) and helium (He) lines with non-local thermodynamic equilibrium (non-LTE) model atmospheres. The atmospheric parameters confirm the two He sequences and the two subgroups of He-sdOB stars in our samples, which were found by previous studies in the T eff -log(nHe/nH) diagram. Our results demonstrate different origins of field hot subdwarf stars and extreme horizontal branch (EHB) stars in globular clusters (GCs), and provide strict observational limits on the formation and evolution models of the different sub-types of these evolved objects. Based on the results, we evaluated the completeness of the Geier et al. (2019) catalog. We found the fraction of hot subdwarf stars is between 10% and 60%, depending on the brightness of the sample. A more accurate estimation for the hot subdwarf fraction can be obtained when similar results from composite spectra will become available.

astro-ph.SR↗

Lithium-rich Giants in LAMOST Survey. I. The Catalog

Standard stellar evolution model predicts a severe depletion of lithium (Li) abundance during the first dredge up process (FDU). Yet a small fraction of giant stars are still found to preserve a considerable amount of Li in their atmospheres after the FDU. Those giants are usually identified as Li-rich by a widely used criterion, A(Li) > 1.5 dex. A large number of works dedicated to searching for investigating this minority of the giant family, and the amount of Li-rich giants, has been largely expanded on, especially in the era of big data. In this paper, we present a catalog of Li-rich giants found from the Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fiber Spectroscopic Telescope (LAMOST) survey with Li abundances derived from a template-matching method developed for LAMOST low-resolution spectra.

astro-ph.SR↗

A wide star-black-hole binary system from radial-velocity measurements

All stellar mass black holes have hitherto been identified by X-rays emitted by gas that is accreting onto the black hole from a companion star. These systems are all binaries with black holes below 30 M$_{\odot}$$^{1-4}$. Theory predicts, however, that X-ray emitting systems form a minority of the total population of star-black hole binaries$^{5,6}$. When the black hole is not accreting gas, it can be found through radial velocity measurements of the motion of the companion star. Here we report radial velocity measurements of a Galactic star, LB-1, which is a B-type star, taken over two years. We find that the motion of the B-star and an accompanying H$α$ emission line require the presence of a dark companion with a mass of $68^{+11}_{-13}$ M$_{\odot}$, which can only be a black hole. The long orbital period of 78.9 days shows that this is a wide binary system. The gravitational wave experiments have detected similarly massive black holes$^{7,8}$, but forming such massive ones in a high-metallicity environment would be extremely challenging to current stellar evolution theories$^{9-11}$.

astro-ph.SR↗

SDSS-IV MaStar -- A Large and Comprehensive Empirical Stellar Spectral Library: First Release

We present the first release of the MaNGA Stellar Library (MaStar), which is a large, well-calibrated, high-quality empirical library covering the wavelength range of 3,622-10,354A at a resolving power of R~1800. The spectra were obtained using the same instrument as used by the Mapping Nearby Galaxies at Apache Point Observatory (MaNGA) project, by piggybacking on the SDSS-IV/APOGEE-2N observations. Compared to previous empirical libraries, the MaStar library will have a higher number of stars and a more comprehensive stellar-parameter coverage, especially of cool dwarfs, low-metallicity stars, and stars with different [alpha/Fe], achieved by a sophisticated target selection strategy that takes advantage of stellar-parameter catalogs from the literature. This empirical library will provide a new basis for stellar population synthesis, and is particularly well-suited for stellar-population analysis of MaNGA galaxies. The first version of the library contains 8646 high-quality per-visit spectra for 3321 unique stars. Compared to photometry, the relative flux calibration of the library is accurate to 3.9% in g-r, 2.7% in r-i, and 2.2% in i-z. The data are released as part of Sloan Digital Sky Survey Data Release 15. We expect the final release of the library to contain more than 10,000 stars.

astro-ph.IM↗

Elemental abundances distributions in (R, $V_ϕ$) plane with LAMOST DR5 and Gaia DR2

Since Gaia DR2 was released, many velocity structures in the disk have been revealed such as large scale ridge-like patterns in the phase space. Both kinematic information and stellar elemental abundances are needed to reveal their evolution history. We have used labels from the APOGEE survey to predict elemental abundances for a huge amount of low resolution spectra from the LAMOST survey. Deep learning with artificial neural networks can automatically draw on physically sensible features in the spectrum for their predictions. Abundances of 12 individual elements: [C/Fe], [N/Fe], [O/Fe], [Mg/Fe], [Al/Fe], [Si/Fe], [S/Fe], [Cl/Fe], [Ca/Fe], [Ti/Fe], [Mn/Fe] and [Ni/Fe] along with basic stellar labels $T_{\textrm{eff}}$, log $g$, metallicity ([M/H] and [Fe/H]) and [$α$/M] for 1 063 386 stars have been estimated. Then those stars were cross matched with Gaia DR2 data to obtain kinematic parameters. We presented distributions of chemical abundances in the $V_ϕ$ versus \textit{R} coordinate. Our results extend the chemical characterization of the ridges in the (R, $V_ϕ$) plane to about $R = $13 kpc toward the anticenter direction. In addition, radial elemental abundance gradients for disk stars with abs(\textit{z})$ < 0.5$ kpc are investigated and we fitted a line for median abundance values of bins of stars with galactocentric distance between $R > 7.84$ kpc and $R < 15.84$ kpc. The radial metallicity gradients for disk stars are respectively -0.0475 $\pm $0.0015 for $R < 13.09$ kpc and -0.0173 $\pm $0.0028 for $R < 13.09$ kpc. Gradients for other elemental abundances are also obtained, for example, [$α$/M] gradients for disk stars is 0.0030 $\pm $0.0002.

astro-ph.GA↗

Dynamical Relics of the Ancient Galactic Halo

We search for dynamical substructures in the LAMOST DR3 very metal-poor (VMP) star catalog. After cross-matching with Gaia DR2, there are 3300 VMP stars with available high-quality astrometric information that have halo-like kinematics. We apply a method based on self-organizing maps to find groups clustered in the 4D space of orbital energy and angular momentum. We identify 57 dynamically tagged groups, which we label DTG-1 to DTG-57. Most of them belong to existing substructures in the nearby halo, such as the $Gaia$ Sausage or Sequoia. The stream identified by Helmi et al. is recovered, but the two disjoint portions of the substructure have distinct dynamical properties. The very retrograde substructure Rg5 found previously by Myeong et al. is also retrieved. We report 6 new DTGs with highly retrograde orbits, 2 with very prograde orbits, and 12 with polar orbits. By mapping other datasets (APOGEE halo stars, and catalogs of r-process-enhanced and CEMP stars) onto the trained neuron map, we can associate stars with detailed chemical abundances to the DTGs, and look for associations with chemically peculiar stars. The highly eccentric $Gaia$ Sausage groups contain representatives both of debris from the satellite itself (which is $α$-poor) and the Splashed Disk, sent up into eccentric halo orbits from the encounter (and is $α$-rich). The new prograde substructures also appear to be associated with the Splashed Disk. The DTGs belonging to the $Gaia$ Sausage host two relatively metal-rich $r$-II stars and six CEMP stars in different sub-classes, consistent with the idea that the $Gaia$ Sausage progenitor is a massive dwarf galaxy. Rg5 is dynamically associated with two highly $r$-process-enhanced stars with [Fe/H] $\sim -$3. This finding indicates that its progenitor might be an ultra-faint dwarf galaxy that has experienced $r$-process enrichment from neutron star mergers.

astro-ph.GA↗

Stellar chromospheric activity and age relation from open clusters in the LAMOST Survey

We identify member stars of more than 90 open clusters in the LAMOST survey. With the method of Fang et al.(2018), the chromospheric activity (CA) indices logR'CaK for 1091 member stars in 82 open clusters and logR'Hα for 1118 member stars in 83 open clusters are calculated. The relations between the average logR'CaK, logR'Hα in each open cluster and its age are investigated in different Teff and [Fe/H] ranges. We find that CA starts to decrease slowly from logt = 6.70 to logt = 8.50, and then decreases rapidly until logt = 9.53. The trend becomes clearer for cooler stars. The quadratic functions between logR' and logt with 4000K < Teff < 5500K are constructed, which can be used to roughly estimate ages of field stars with accuracy about 40% for logR'CaK and 60% for logR'Hα.

astro-ph.SR↗

Tracing Kinematic and Chemical Properties of Sagittarius Stream by K-Giants, M-Giants, and BHB stars

We characterize the kinematic and chemical properties of $\sim$3,000 Sagittarius (Sgr) stream stars, including K-giants, M-giants, and BHBs, select from SEGUE-2, LAMOST, and SDSS separately in Integrals-of-Motion space. The orbit of Sgr stream is quite clear from the velocity vector in $X$-$Z$ plane. Stars traced by K-giants and M-giants present the apogalacticon of trailing steam is $\sim$ 100 kpc. The metallicity distributions of Sgr K-, M-giants, and BHBs present that the M-giants are on average the most metal-rich population, followed by K-giants and BHBs. All of the K-, M-giants, and BHBs indicate that the trailing arm is on average more metal-rich than leading arm, and the K-giants show that the Sgr debris is the most metal-poor part. The $α$-abundance of Sgr stars exhibits a similar trend with the Galactic halo stars at lower metallicity ([Fe/H] $<\sim$ $-$1.0 dex), and then evolve down to lower [$α$/Fe] than disk stars at higher metallicity, which is close to the evolution pattern of $α$-element of Milky Way dwarf galaxies. We find $V_Y$ and metallicity of K-giants have gradients along the direction of line-of-sight from the Galactic center in $X$-$Z$ plane, and the K-giants show that $V_Y$ increases with metallicity at [Fe/H] $>\sim-$1.5 dex. After dividing the Sgr stream into bright and faint stream according to their locations in equatorial coordinate, the K-giants and BHBs show that the bright and faint stream present different $V_Y$ and metallicities, the bright stream is on average higher in $V_Y$ and metallicity than the faint stream.

astro-ph.GA↗

Searching for Hot Subdwarf Stars in LAMOST DR1-II. Pure spectroscopic identification method for hot subdwarfs

Employing a new machine learning method, named hierarchical extreme learning machine (HELM) algorithm, we identified 56 hot subdwarf stars in the first data release (DR1) of the Large Sky Area Multi-Object Fibre Spectroscopic Telescope (LAMOST) survey. The atmospheric parameters of the stars are obtained by fitting the profiles of hydrogen (H) Balmer lines and helium (He) lines with synthetic spectra calculated from non-Local Thermodynamic Equilibrium (NLTE) model atmospheres. Five He-rich hot subdwarf stars were found in our sample with their log(nHe/nH) > -1 , while 51 stars are He-poor sdB, sdO and sdOB stars. We also confirmed the two He sequences of hot subdwarf stars found by Edelmann et al. (2003) in Teff - log(nHe/nH) diagram. The HELM algorithm works directly on the observed spectroscopy and is able to filter out spectral properties without supplementary photometric data. The results presented in this study demonstrate that the HELM algorithm is a reliable method to search for hot subdwarf stars after a suitable training is performed, and it is also suitable to search for other objects which have obvious features in their spectra or images.

astro-ph.SR↗

New hot subdwarf stars identified in Gaia DR2 with LAMOST DR5 spectra

We selected 4593 hot subdwarf candidates from the Gaia DR2 Hertzsprung-Russell (HR) diagram. By combining the sample with LAMOST DR5, we identified 294 hot subdwarf stars, including 169 sdB, 63 sdOB, 31 He-sdOB, 22 sdO, 7 He-sdO and 2 He-sdB stars. The atmospheric parameters (e.g., T_{eff} , log g, log(nHe/nH)) are obtained by fitting the hydrogen (H) and helium (He) line profiles with synthetic spectra. Two distinct He sequences of hot subdwarf stars are clearly presented in the T_{eff} - log g diagram. We found that the He-rich sequence consists of the bulk of sdB and sdOB stars as well as all of the He-sdB, He-sdO and He-sdOB stars in our samples, while all the stars in the He-weak sequence belong to the sdO spectral type, combined with a few sdB and sdOB stars. We demonstrated that the combination of Gaia DR2 and LAMOST DR5 allows one to uncover a huge number of new hot subdwarf stars in our Galaxy.

astro-ph.SR↗

New hot subdwarf stars identified in Gaia DR2 with LAMOST DR5 spectra -- II

388 hot subdwarf stars have been identified by using the Hertzsprung-Russell (HR) diagram built from the second data release (DR2) of the Gaia mission. By analyzing their observed LAMOST spectra, we characterized 186 sdB, 73 He-sdOB, 65 sdOB, 45 sdO, 12 He-sdO and 7 He-sdB stars. The atmospheric parameters of these stars (e.g., T eff , log g, log(nHe/nH)) are obtained by fitting the hydrogen (H) and helium (He) line profiles with synthetic spectra calculated from non-Local Thermodynamic Equilibrium (non-LTE) model atmospheres. Among these stars, we have 135 new identified hot subdwarfs which have not been cataloged before. Although 253 stars appear in the catalog by Geier et al. (2017) , but only 91 of them have atmospheric parameters. Together with the 294 hot subdwarf stars found by Lei et al. (2018), we identified 682 hot subdwarf stars in total by using the Gaia HR-diagram and LAMOST spectra. These results demonstrate the efficiency of our method to combine large surveys to search for hot subdwarf stars. We found a distinct gap in our He-sdOB stars based on their He abundance, which is also presented in extreme horizontal branch (EHB) stars of the globular cluster (GC) ω Cen. The number fraction of the sample size for the two sub-groups is very different between the two counterparts. However, the distinct gap between the H-sdB stars and He-sdOB stars in ω Cen is not visible in our sample. More interestingly, the He-sdB population with the highest He abundance in our sample is completely missing in ω Cen. The discrepancy between our field hot subdwarf stars and the EHB stas in ω Cen indicate different origins for the two counterparts.

astro-ph.SR↗

Metal-poor Stars Observed with the Automated Planet Finder Telescope. II. Chemodynamical Analysis of Six Low-Metallicity Stars in the Halo System of the Milky Way

In this work, we study the chemical compositions and kinematic properties of six metal-poor stars with [Fe/H] $< -2.5$ in the Galactic halo. From high-resolution (R $\sim$~110,000) spectroscopic observations obtained with the Lick/APF, we determined individual abundances for up to 23 elements, to quantitatively evaluate our sample. We identify two carbon-enhanced metal-poor stars (J1630+0953 and J2216+0246) without enhancement in neutron-capture elements (CEMP-no stars), while the rest of our sample stars are carbon-intermediate. By comparing the light-element abundances of the CEMP stars with predicted yields from non-rotating zero-metallicity massive-star models, we find that possible the progenitors of J1630+0953 and J2216+0246 could be in the 13-25 M$_{\odot}$ mass range, with explosion energies 0.3-1.8$ \times 10^{51}$ erg. In addition, the detectable abundance ratios of light and heavy elements suggest that our sample stars are likely formed from a well-mixed gas cloud, which is consistent with previous studies. We also present a kinematic analysis, which suggests that most of our program stars likely belong to the inner-halo population, with orbits passing as close as $\sim$ 2.9 kpc from the Galactic center. We discuss the implications of these results on the critical constraints on the origin and evolution of CEMP stars, as well as the nature of the Population III progenitors of the lowest metallicity stars in our Galaxy.

astro-ph.GA↗

Identifying Galactic Halo Substructure in 6D Phase-space Using $\sim$13,000 LAMOST K Giants

We construct a large halo K-giant sample by combining the positions, distances, radial velocities, and metallicities of over 13,000 LAMOST DR5 halo K giants with the Gaia DR2 proper motions, which covers a Galactocentric distance range of 5-120 kpc. Using a position-velocity clustering estimator (the 6Distance), we statistically quantify the presence of position-velocity substructure at high significance: K giants have more close pairs in position-velocity space than a smooth stellar halo. We find that the amount of substructure in the halo increases with increasing distance and metallicity. With a percolation algorithm named friends-of-friends (FoF) to identify groups, we identify members belonging to Sagittarius (Sgr) Streams, Monoceros Ring, Virgo overdensity, Hercules-Aquila Cloud, Orphan Streams and other unknown substructures and find that the Sgr streams account for a large part of grouped stars beyond 20 kpc and enhance the increase of substructure with distance and metallicity. For the first time, we identify spectroscopic members of Monoceros Ring in the south and north Galactic hemisphere, which presents a rotation of about 185 km s^{-1} and mean metallicity is -0.66 dex.

astro-ph.GA↗

Drone-based all-weather entanglement distribution

The quantum satellite is a cornerstone towards practical free-space quantum network and overcomes the photon loss over large distance. However, challenges still exist including real-time all-location coverage and multi-node construction, which may be complemented by the diversity of modern drones. Here we demonstrate the first drone-based entanglement distribution at all-weather conditions over 200 meters (test field limited), and the Clauser-Horne-Shimony-Holt S-parameter exceeds 2.49, within 35 kg take-off weight. With symmetric transmitter and receiver beam apertures and single-mode-fiber-coupling technology, such progress is ready for future quantum network with multi-node expansion. This network can be further integrated in picture-drone sizes for plug-and-play local-area coverage, or loaded onto high-altitude drones for wide-area coverage, which adds flexibility while connecting to the existing satellites and ground fiber-based quantum network.

quant-ph↗

The Apache Point Observatory Catalog of Optical Diffuse Interstellar Bands

Aiming for a new and more comprehensive DIB catalog between 4,000 and 9,000Å, we revisited the Atlas Catalog based on the observations of HD 183143 and HD 204827 (Hobbs et al. 2008 and 2009). Twenty-five medium-to-highly reddened sight lines were selected, sampling a variety of spectral types of the background star and the interstellar environments. The median SNR of these spectra is ~ 1,300 around 6,400Å. Compared to the Atlas Catalog, 22 new DIBs were found, and the boundaries of 27 (sets) of DIBs were adjusted, resulting in an updated catalog containing 559 DIBs that we refer to as the Apache Point Observatory Catalog of Optical Diffuse Interstellar Bands. Measurements were then made based on this catalog. We found our survey most sensitive between 5,500 and 7,000Å due largely to the local SNR of the spectra, the relative absence of interfering stellar lines, and the weakness of telluric residuals. For our data sample, the number of DIBs detected in a given sight line is mostly dependent on EB-V and less on the spectral type of the background star. Some dependence on fH2 is observed, but less well-determined due to the limited size of the data sample. The variations of the wavelengths of each DIB in different sight lines are generally larger than those of the known interstellar lines CH+, CH, and K I. Those variations could be due to the inherent error in the measurement, or to differences in the velocity components among sight lines.

astro-ph.GA↗

Evidence for the accretion origin of halo stars with an extreme r-process enhancement

Small stellar systems like dwarf galaxies are suggested to be the main building blocks of our Galaxy by numerical simulations in Lambda CDM models. The existence of star streams like Sagittarius tidal stream indicates that dwarf galaxies play a role in the formation of the Milky Way. However, it is unclear how many and what kind of stars in our Galaxy are originated from satellite dwarf galaxies, which could be constrained by chemical abundances of metal-poor stars. Here we report on the discovery of a metal-poor star with an extreme r-process enhancement and alpha-element deficiency. In this star, the abundance ratio of the r-process element Eu with respect to Fe is more than one order of magnitude higher than the Sun and the metallicity is 1/20 of the solar one. Such kind of stars have been found in present-day dwarf galaxies, providing the clearest chemical signature of past accretion events. The long timescale of chemical evolution of the host dwarf galaxy expected from the abundance of alpha element with respect to Fe suggests that the accretion occurred in a relatively late phase compared to most of the accretions that formed the bulk of the Milky Way halo.

astro-ph.SR↗