arXiv subjects

S. Van Eck

Publications and source records attributed to S. Van Eck.

At least 37 records · Page 2Linked to original sources

arXiv2021

Sr and Ba abundance determinations: comparing machine-learning with star-by-star analyses -- High-resolution re-analysis of suspected LAMOST barium stars

A new large sample of 895 s-process-rich candidates out of 454180 giant stars surveyed by LAMOST at low spectral resolution (R ~ 1800) has been reported by Norfolk et al. (2019; hereafter N19). We aim at confirming the s-process enrichment at the higher resolution (R ~ 86000) offered by the HERMES-Mercator spectrograph, for the 15 brightest targets of the previous study sample which consists in 13 Sr-only stars and two Ba-only stars. Abundances were derived for elements Li, C, N, O, Na, Mg, Fe, Rb, Sr, Y, Zr, Nb, Ba, La, and Ce. Binarity has been tested by comparing the Gaia DR2 radial velocity with the HERMES velocity obtained 1600 - 1800 days later. Among the 15 programme stars, four show no s-process overabundances ([X/Fe] < 0.2 dex), eight show mild s-process overabundances (at least three heavy elements with 0.2 < [X/Fe] < 0.8), and three have strong overabundances (at least three heavy elements with [X/Fe] > 0.8). Among the 13 stars classified as Sr-only by the previous investigation, four have no s-process overabundances, eight are mild barium stars, and one is a strong barium star. The two Ba-only stars turn out to be both strong barium stars and are actually dwarf barium stars. They also show clear evidence for being binaries. Among the no-s stars, there are two binaries out of four, whereas only one out of the eight mild barium stars show a clear signature of radial-velocity variations. Blending effects and saturated lines have to be considered very carefully when using machine-learning techniques, especially on low-resolution spectra. Among the Sr-only stars from the previous study sample, one may expect about 60% (8/13) of them to be true mild barium stars and about 8% to be strong barium stars, and this fraction is likely close to 100% for the previous study Ba-only stars (2/2).

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arXiv2021

Atmosphere of Betelgeuse before and during the Great Dimming event revealed by tomography

Despite being the best studied red supergiant star in our Galaxy, the physics behind the photometric variability and mass loss of Betelgeuse is poorly understood. Moreover, recently the star has experienced an unusual fading with its visual magnitude reaching a historical minimum. We investigate the nature of this event with the help of a recently developed tomographic technique. Tomography allows us to probe different depths in the stellar atmosphere and to recover the corresponding disk-averaged velocity field. We apply the tomographic method to a few-year time-series high-resolution spectroscopic observations of Betelgeuse in order to relate its atmospheric dynamics to the photometric variability. Our results show that a sudden increase of the molecular opacity in the cooler upper atmosphere of Betelgeuse is likely the reason of the observed unusual decrease of the star's brightness.

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arXiv2021

Low-mass low-metallicity AGB stars as an efficient i-process site explaining CEMP-rs stars

Among Carbon-Enhanced Metal-Poor (CEMP) stars, some are found to be enriched in s-process elements (CEMP-s), in r-process elements (CEMP-r) or in both s- and r-process elements (CEMP-rs). The origin of the abundance differences between CEMP-s and CEMP-rs stars is presently unknown. It has been claimed that the i-process, whose site still remains to be identified, could better reproduce CEMP-rs abundances than the s-process. We analyze high-resolution spectra of 25 metal-poor stars, observed with the high-resolution HERMES spectrograph mounted on the Mercator telescope, La Palma, or with the UVES/VLT and HIRES/KECK spectrographs. We propose a new, robust classification method for CEMP-s and CEMP-rs stars using eight heavy element abundances. The abundance profiles of CEMP-s and CEMP-rs stars are derived and there appears to be an abundance continuum between the two stellar classes. CEMP-rs stars present most of the characteristics of extrinsic stars such as CEMP-s, CH, Barium and extrinsic S stars, with an even larger binarity rate among CEMP-rs stars than among CEMP-s stars. Stellar evolutionary tracks of an enhanced carbon composition (consistent with our abundance determinations) are necessary to explain the position of CEMP-s and CEMP-rs stars in the HR diagram using Gaia DR2 parallaxes; they are found to lie mostly on the RGB. CEMP-rs stars can be explained as being polluted by a low-mass, low-metallicity TP-AGB companion experiencing i-process nucleosynthesis after proton ingestion during its first convective thermal pulses. The global fitting of our i-process models to CEMP-rs stars is as good as the one of our s-process models to CEMP-s stars. As such, CEMP-rs stars could be renamed as CEMP-sr stars, since they represent a particular manifestation of the s-process at low-metallicities. For these objects a call for an exotic i-process site may not necessarily be required anymore.

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arXiv2020

Li-rich K giants, dust excess, and binarity

The origin of the Li-rich K giants is still highly debated. Here, we investigate the incidence of binarity among this family from a nine-year radial-velocity monitoring of a sample of 11 Li-rich K giants using the HERMES spectrograph attached to the 1.2m Mercator telescope. A sample of 13 non-Li-rich giants (8 of them being surrounded by dust according to IRAS, WISE, and ISO data) was monitored alongside. When compared to the binary frequency in a reference sample of 190 K giants (containing 17.4% of definite spectroscopic binaries -- SB -- and 6.3% of possible spectroscopic binaries -- SB?), the binary frequency appears normal among the Li-rich giants (2/11 definite binaries plus 2 possible binaries, or 18.2% SB + 18.2% SB?), after taking account of the small sample size through the hypergeometric probability distribution. Therefore, there appears to be no causal relationship between Li enrichment and binarity. Moreover, there is no correlation between Li enrichment and the presence of circumstellar dust, and the only correlation that could be found between Li enrichment and rapid rotation is that the most Li-enriched K giants appear to be fast-rotating stars. However, among the dusty K giants, the binary frequency is much higher (4/8 definite binaries plus 1 possible binary). The remaining 3 dusty K giants suffer from a radial-velocity jitter, as is expected for the most luminous K giants, which these are.

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arXiv2020

The Gaia-ESO Survey: detection and characterization of single line spectroscopic binaries

Recent and on-going large ground-based multi-object spectroscopic surveys allow to significantly increase the sample of spectroscopic binaries to get insight into their statistical properties. We investigate the repeated spectral observations of the Gaia-ESO Survey (GES) internal data release 5 to identify and characterize spectroscopic binaries with one visible component (SB1) in fields covering the discs, the bulge, the CoRot fields, and stellar clusters and associations. A statistical chi2-test is performed on spectra of the iDR5 sub-sample of approximately 43500 stars characterized by at least 2 observations and a S/N > 3. Our sample of RV variables is cleaned from contamination by pulsation/convection-induced variables using Gaia DR2 parallaxes and photometry. Monte-Carlo simulations using the SB9 catalogue of spectroscopic orbits allow to estimate our detection efficiency and to correct the SB1 rate to evaluate the GES SB1 binary fraction and its dependence with effective temperature and metallicity. We find 641 (resp., 803) FGK SB1 candidates at the 5 sigma (resp., 3 sigma) level. The orbital-period distribution is estimated from the RV standard-deviation distribution and reveals that the detected SB1 probe binaries with log(P[d]) < 4. We estimate the global GES SB1 fraction to be in the range 7-14% with a typical uncertainty of 4%. The GES SB1 frequency decreases with metallicity at a rate of -9+/-3%/dex in the metallicity range -2.7<FeH<+0.6. This anticorrelation is obtained with a confidence level higher than 93% on a homogeneous sample covering spectral types FGK and a large range of metallicities. When the present-day mass function is accounted for, this rate turns to 4+/-2%/dex with a confidence level higher than 88%. In addition we provide the variation of the SB1 fraction with metallicity separately for F, G, and K spectral types, as well as for dwarf and giant primaries.

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arXiv2020

Discovery of technetium- and niobium-rich S stars: the case for bitrinsic stars

S stars are late-type giants with overabundances of s-process elements. They come in two flavours depending on the presence or not of technetium (Tc), an element without stable isotopes. Intrinsic S stars are Tc-rich and genuine asymptotic giant branch (AGB)stars while extrinsic S stars owe their s-process overabundances to the pollution from a former AGB companion, now a white dwarf(WD). In addition to Tc, another distinctive feature between intrinsic and extrinsic S stars is the overabundance of niobium (Nb) in the latter class. We discuss the case of the S stars BD+79 156 and o1Ori whose specificity is to share the distinctive features of both intrinsic and extrinsic S stars, namely the presence of Tc along with a Nb overabundance. BD+79 156 is the first clear case of a bitrinsic star, i.e. a doubly s-process-enriched object, first through mass transfer in a binary system, and then through internal nucleosynthesis (responsible for the Tc-enrichment in BD+79 156 which must therefore have reached the AGB phase of its evolution). This hybrid nature of the s-process pattern in BD+79 156 is supported by its binary nature and its location in the HR diagram just beyond the onset of the third dredge-up on the AGB. The Tc-rich, binary S-star o1Ori with a WD companion was another long-standing candidate for a similar hybrid s-process enrichment. However the marginal overabundance of Nb derived ino1Ori does not allow to trace unambiguously the evidence of a large pollution coming from the AGB progenitor of its current WD companion. As a side product, the current study offers a new way of detecting binary AGB stars with WD companions by identifying their Tc-rich nature along with a Nb overabundance.

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arXiv2019

Tomography of cool giant and supergiant star atmospheres II. Signature of convection in the atmosphere of the red supergiant star $μ$ Cep

Red supergiants are cool massive stars and are the largest and the most luminous stars in the universe. They are characterized by irregular or semi-regular photometric variations, the physics of which is not clearly understood. The paper aims at deriving the velocity field in the red supergiant star $μ$ Cep and relating it to the photometric variability with the help of the tomographic method. The tomographic method allows to recover the line-of-sight velocity distribution over the stellar disk and within different optical-depth slices. The method is applied to a series of high-resolution spectra of $μ$ Cep, and these results are compared to those obtained from 3D radiative-hydrodynamics CO5BOLD simulations of red supergiants. Fluctuations in the velocity field are compared with photometric and spectroscopic variations, the latter being derived from the TiO band strength and serving (at least partly) a proxy of the variations in effective temperature. The tomographic method reveals a phase shift between the velocity and spectroscopic/photometric variations. This phase shift results in a hysteresis loop in the temperature - velocity plane, with a timescale of a few hundred days, similar to the photometric one. The similarity between the hysteresis loop timescale measured in $μ$ Cep and the timescale of acoustic waves disturbing the convective pattern suggests that such waves play an important role in triggering the hysteresis loops.

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arXiv2019

Barium & related stars and their white-dwarf companions I. Giant stars

This paper provides long-period and revised orbits for barium and S stars adding to previously published ones. The sample of barium stars with strong anomalies comprise all such stars present in the Lu et al. catalogue. We find orbital motion for all barium and extrinsic S stars monitored. We obtain the longest period known so far for a spectroscopic binary involving an S star, namely 57 Peg with a period of the order of 100 - 500 yr. We present the mass distribution for the barium stars, which ranges from 1 to 3 Msun, with a tail extending up to 5 Msun in the case of mild barium stars. This high-mass tail comprises mostly high-metallicity objects ([Fe/H] >= -0.1). Mass functions are compatible with WD companions and we derive their mass distribution which ranges from 0.5 to 1 Msun. Using the initial - final mass relationship established for field WDs, we derived the distribution of the mass ratio q' = MAGB,ini / MBa (where MAGB, ini is the WD progenitor initial mass, i.e., the mass of the system former primary component) which is a proxy for the initial mass ratio. It appears that the distribution of q' is highly non uniform, and significantly different for mild and strong barium stars, the latter being characterized by values mostly in excess of 1.4, whereas mild barium stars occupy the range 1 - 1.4. We investigate as well the correlation between abundances, orbital periods, metallicities, and masses (barium star and WD companion). The 105 orbits of post-mass-transfer systems presented in this paper pave the way for a comparison with binary-evolution models.

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arXiv2019

Hertzsprung-Russell diagram and mass distribution of barium stars

With the availability of parallaxes provided by the Tycho-Gaia Astrometric Solution, it is possible to construct the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram (HRD) of barium and related stars with unprecedented accuracy. A direct result from the derived HRD is that subgiant CH stars occupy the same region as barium dwarfs, contrary to what their designations imply. By comparing the position of barium stars in the HRD with STAREVOL evolutionary tracks, it is possible to evaluate their masses, provided the metallicity is known. We used an average metallicity [Fe/H] = -0.25 and derived the mass distribution of barium giants. The distribution peaks around 2.5 Msun with a tail at higher masses up to 4.5 Msun. This peak is also seen in the mass distribution of a sample of normal K and M giants used for comparison and is associated with stars located in the red clump. When we compare these mass distributions, we see a deficit of low-mass (1 - 2 Msun) barium giants. This is probably because low-mass stars reach large radii at the tip of the red giant branch, which may have resulted in an early binary interaction. Among barium giants, the high-mass tail is however dominated by stars with barium indices of less than unity, based on a visual inspection of the barium spectral line; that is, these stars have a very moderate barium line strength. We believe that these stars are not genuine barium giants, but rather bright giants, or supergiants, where the barium lines are strengthened because of a positive luminosity effect. Moreover, contrary to previous claims, we do not see differences between the mass distributions of mild and strong barium giants.

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arXiv2018

Spectroscopic binaries among AGB stars from HERMES/Mercator: the case of V Hya

We report on our search for spectroscopic binaries among a sample of AGB stars. Observations were carried out in the framework of the monitoring of radial velocities of (candidate) binary stars performed at the Mercator 1.2m telescope, using the HERMES spectrograph. We found evidence for duplicity in UV Cam, TU Tau, BL Ori, VZ Per, T Dra, and V Hya. This short communication focus on V Hya, found to behave like RV Tau of the b subtype, which are binaries surrounded by a disc.

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arXiv2018

Tomography of the red supergiant star μ Cep

A tomographic method, aiming at probing velocity fields at depth in stellar atmospheres, is applied to the red supergiant star μ Cep and to snapshots of 3D radiative-hydrodynamics simulation in order to constrain atmospheric motions and relate them to photometric variability.

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arXiv2018

Women Scientists Who Made Nuclear Astrophysics

Female role models reduce the impact on women of stereotype threat, i.e., of being at risk of conforming to a negative stereotype about one's social, gender, or racial group. This can lead women scientists to underperform or to leave their scientific career because of negative stereotypes such as, not being as talented or as interested in science as men. Sadly, history rarely provides role models for women scientists; instead, it often renders these women invisible. In response to this situation, we present a selection of twelve outstanding women who helped to develop nuclear astrophysics.

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arXiv2018

When binaries keep track of recent nucleosynthesis: The Zr - Nb pair in extrinsic stars as an s-process diagnostic

Barium stars are s-process enriched giants. They owe their chemical peculiarities to a past mass transfer phase. During which they were polluted by their binary companion, which at the time was an AGB star, but is now an extinct white dwarf. Barium stars are thus ideal targets for understanding and constraining the s-process in low and intermediate-mass AGB stars. We derive the abundances of a large number of heavy elements in order to shed light on the conditions of operation of the neutron source responsible for the production of s-elements in the former companions of the barium stars. Adopting a recently used methodology(Neyskens et al. 2015), we analyse a sample of 18 highly enriched barium stars observed with the high-resolution HERMES spectrograph mounted on the MERCATOR telescope (La Palma). We determine the stellar parameters and abundances using MARCS model atmospheres. In particular, we derive the Nb/Zr ratio which was previously shown to be a sensitive thermometer for the s-process nucleosynthesis. Indeed, in barium stars, $^{93}Zr$ has fully decayed into mono-isotopic $^{93}Nb$ , so Nb/Zr is a measure of the temperature-sensitive $^{93}Zr/Zr$ isotopic ratio. HD 28159, previously classified as K5III and initially selected to serve as a reference cool K star for our abundance analysis, turns out to be enriched in s-process elements, and as such is a new barium star. Four stars, characterised by high nitrogen abundances, also tend to have high [Nb/Zr] and [hs/ls] ratios. The derived Zr and Nb abundances provide more accurate constraints on the s-process neutron source, identified to be $^{13}C(alpha,n)^{16}O$ for barium stars. The comparison with stellar evolution and nucleosynthesis models shows that the investigated barium stars were polluted by a low-mass (2-3 Solar mass) AGB star. HD 100503 is potentially identified as the highest metallicity CEMP-rs star yet discovered.

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arXiv2017

Tomography of cool giant and supergiant star atmospheres. I. Validation of the method

Cool giant and supergiant star atmospheres are characterized by complex velocity fields originating from convection and pulsation processes which are not fully understood yet. The velocity fields impact the formation of spectral lines, which thus contain information on the dynamics of stellar atmospheres. The tomographic method allows to recover the distribution of the component of the velocity field projected on the line of sight at different optical depths in the stellar atmosphere. The computation of the contribution function to the line depression aims at correctly identifying the depth of formation of spectral lines in order to construct numerical masks probing spectral lines forming at different optical depths. The tomographic method is applied to 1D model atmospheres and to a realistic 3D radiative hydrodynamics simulation performed with CO5BOLD in order to compare their spectral line formation depths and velocity fields. In 1D model atmospheres, each spectral line forms in a restricted range of optical depths. On the other hand, in 3D simulations, the line formation depths are spread in the atmosphere mainly because of temperature and density inhomogeneities. Comparison of CCF profiles obtained from 3D synthetic spectra with velocities from the 3D simulation shows that the tomographic method correctly recovers the distribution of the velocity component projected on the line of sight in the atmosphere.

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arXiv2017

The Gaia-ESO Survey: double, triple and quadruple-line spectroscopic binary candidates

The Gaia-ESO Survey (GES) is a large spectroscopic survey that provides a unique opportunity to study the distribution of spectroscopic multiple systems among different populations of the Galaxy. We aim at detecting binarity/multiplicity for stars targeted by the GES from the analysis of the cross-correlation functions (CCFs) of the GES spectra with spectral templates. We develop a method based on the computation of the CCF successive derivatives to detect multiple peaks and determine their radial velocities, even when the peaks are strongly blended. The parameters of the detection of extrema (DOE) code have been optimized for each GES GIRAFFE and UVES setup to maximize detection. This code therefore allows to automatically detect multiple line spectroscopic binaries (SBn, n>1). We apply this method on the fourth GES internal data release and detect 354 SBn candidates (342 SB2, 11 SB3 and even one SB4), including only 9 SB2 known in the literature. This implies that about 98% of these SBn candidates are new (because of their faint visual magnitude that can reach V=19). Visual inspection of the SBn candidate spectra reveals that the most probable candidates have indeed a composite spectrum. Among SB2 candidates, an orbital solution could be computed for two previously unknown binaries: 06404608+0949173 (known as V642 Mon) in NGC 2264 and 19013257-0027338 in Berkeley 81. A detailed analysis of the unique SB4 (four peaks in the CCF) reveals that HD 74438 in the open cluster IC 2391 is a physically bound stellar quadruple system. The SB candidates belonging to stellar clusters are reviewed in detail to discard false detections. We warn against the use of atmospheric parameters for these system components rather than by SB-specific pipelines. Our implementation of an automatic detection of spectroscopic binaries within the GES has allowed an efficient discovery of many new multiple systems.

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arXiv2016

Cannibals in the thick disk: the young $α-$rich stars as evolved blue stragglers

Spectro-seismic measurements of red giants enabled the recent discovery of stars in the thick disk that are more massive than 1.4 M_sun. While it has been claimed that most of these stars are younger than the rest of the typical thick disk stars, we show evidence that they might be products of mass transfer in binary evolution, notably evolved blue stragglers. We took new measurements of the radial velocities in a sample of 26 stars from APOKASC, including 13 "young" stars and 13 "old" stars with similar stellar parameters but with masses below 1.2 M_sun and found that more of the "young" stars appear to be in binary systems with respect to the "old" stars. Furthermore, we show that the "young" stars do not follow the expected trend of [C/H] ratios versus mass for individual stars. However, with a population synthesis of low-mass stars including binary evolution and mass transfer, we can reproduce the observed [C/N] ratios versus mass. Our study shows how asteroseismology of solar-type red giants provides us with a unique opportunity to study the evolution of field blue stragglers after they have left the main-sequence.

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arXiv2015

To Ba or not to Ba: Enrichment in s-process elements in binary systems with WD companions of various masses

The enrichment in s-process elements of barium stars is known to be due to pollution by mass transfer from a companion formerly on the thermally-pulsing asymptotic giant branch (AGB), now a carbon-oxygen white-dwarf (WD). This paper investigates the relationship between the s-process enrichment in the barium star and the mass of its WD companion. It is expected that helium WDs, which have masses smaller than about 0.5 Msun and never reached the AGB phase, should not pollute with s-process elements their giant companion, which should thus never turn into a barium star. Spectra with a resolution of R ~ 86000 were obtained with the HERMES spectrograph on the 1.2-m Mercator telescope for a sample of 11 binary systems involving WD companions of various masses. We use standard 1D LTE MARCS model atmospheres coupled with the Turbospectrum radiative-transfer code to derive the atmospheric parameters using equivalent widths of FeI and Fe II lines. The abundances of s-process elements for the entire sample of 11 binary stars were derived homogeneously. The sample encompasses all levels of overabundances: from solar [s/Fe]=0 to 1.5 dex in the 2 binary systems with S-star primaries (for which dedicated MARCS model atmospheres were used). The primary components of binary systems with a WD more massive than 0.5 Msun are enriched in s-process elements. We also found a trend of increasing [s/Fe] with [C/Fe] or [(C+N)/Fe]. Our results conform to the expectation that binary systems with WD companions less massive than 0.5 Msun do not host barium stars.

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arXiv2015

Binary properties of CH and Carbon-Enhanced Metal-Poor stars

The HERMES spectrograph installed on the 1.2-m Mercator telescope has been used to monitor the radial velocity of 13 low-metallicity carbon stars, among which 7 Carbon-Enhanced Metal-Poor (CEMP) stars and 6 CH stars. All stars but one show clear evidence for binarity. New orbits are obtained for 8 systems. The sample covers an extended range in orbital periods, extending from 3.4 d (for the dwarf carbon star HE 0024-2523) to about 54 yr (for the CH star HD 26, the longest known among barium, CH and extrinsic S stars). Three systems exhibit low-amplitude velocity variations with periods close to 1 yr superimposed on a long-term trend. In the absence of an accurate photometric monitoring of these systems, it is not clear yet whether these variations are the signature of a very low-mass companion, or of regular envelope pulsations. The period - eccentricity (P - e) diagram for the 40 low-metallicity carbon stars with orbits now available shows no difference between CH and CEMP-s stars (the latter corresponding to those CEMP stars enriched in s-process elements, as are CH stars). We suggest that they must be considered as one and the same family and that their different names only stem from historical reasons. Indeed, these two families have as well very similar mass-function distributions, corresponding to companions with masses in the range 0.5 - 0.7 Msun, indicative of white-dwarf companions, adopting 0.8 - 0.9 Msun for the primary component. This result confirms that CH and CEMP-s stars obey the same mass-transfer scenario as their higher-metallicity analogs, the barium stars. The P - e diagrams of barium, CH and CEMP-s stars are indeed very similar. They reveal two different groups of systems: one with short orbital periods (P < 1000 d) and mostly circular or almost circular orbits, and another with longer-period and eccentric (e > 0.1) orbits.

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