No Arabic abstract
We utilize state-of-the-art 3D hydrodynamical and classical 1D stellar model atmospheres to study the influence of convection on the formation properties of various atomic and molecular spectral lines in the atmospheres of four red giant stars, located close to the base of the red giant branch, RGB ($T_{mathrm eff}approx5000$ K, $log g=2.5$), and characterized by four different metallicities, [M/H] = 0.0, -1.0, -2.0, -3.0. The role of convection in the spectral line formation is assessed with the aid of abundance corrections, i.e., the differences in abundances predicted for a given equivalent width of a particular spectral line with the 3D and 1D model atmospheres. We find that for lines of certain neutral atoms the abundance corrections strongly depend both on metallicity of a given model atmosphere and the line excitation potential. While abundance corrections for all lines of both neutral and ionized elements tend to be small at solar metallicity, for lines of neutral elements with low ionization potential and low-to-intermediate $chi$ they quickly increase with decreasing metallicity, reaching in their extremes to -0.6...-0.8 dex. In all such cases the large abundance corrections are due to horizontal temperature fluctuations in the 3D hydrodynamical models. Abundance corrections of molecular lines are very sensitive to metallicity of the underlying model atmosphere and may be larger (in absolute value) than -0.5 dex at [M/H] = -3.0 (-1.5 dex in the case of CO). We also find that an approximate treatment of scattering in the 3D model calculations leads to the abundance corrections that are altered by less than ~0.1 dex, both for atomic and molecular (CO) lines, with respect to the model where scattering is treated as true absorption throughout the entire atmosphere, with the largest differences for the resonance and low-excitation lines.
Context. Although oxygen is an important tracer of Galactic chemical evolution, measurements of its abundance in the atmospheres of the oldest Galactic stars are still scarce and rather imprecise. At the lowest end of the metallicity scale, oxygen can only be measured in giant stars and in most of cases such measurements rely on a single forbidden [O I] 630 nm line that is very weak and frequently blended with telluric lines. Although molecular OH lines located in the ultraviolet and infrared could also be used for the diagnostics, oxygen abundances obtained from the OH lines and the [O I] 630 nm line are usually discrepant to a level of ~0.3-0.4 dex. Aims. We study the influence of convection on the formation of the infrared (IR) OH lines and the forbidden [O I] 630 nm line in the atmospheres of extremely metal-poor (EMP) red giant stars. Methods. We used high-resolution and high signal-to-noise ratio spectra of four EMP red giant stars obtained with the VLT CRIRES spectrograph. For each EMP star, 4-14 IR OH vibrational-rotational lines located in the spectral range of 1514-1548 and 1595-1632 nm were used to determine oxygen abundances by employing standard 1D LTE abundance analysis methodology. We then corrected the 1D LTE abundances obtained from each individual OH line for the 3D hydrodynamical effects. Results. We find that the influence of convection on the formation of [O I] 630 nm line in the atmospheres of EMP giants studied here is minor, which leads to very small 3D-1D abundance corrections (< -0.01 dex). On the contrary, IR OH lines are strongly affected by convection and thus the abundance corrections for these lines are significant, 3D-1D ~ -0.2 ... -0.3 dex. These abundance corrections do indeed bring the 1D LTE oxygen abundances of EMP red giants obtained using IR OH lines into better agreement with those determined from the [O I] 630 nm line.
Context. Europium is an almost pure r-process element, which may be useful as a reference in nucleocosmochronology. Aims. To determine the photospheric solar abundance using CO5BOLD 3-D hydrodynamical model atmospheres. Methods. Disc-centre and integrated-flux observed solar spectra are used. The europium abundance is derived from the equivalent width measurements. As a reference 1D model atmospheres have been used, in addition. Results. The europium photospheric solar abundance is 0.52 +- 0.02 in agreement with previous determinations. We also determine the photospheric isotopic fraction of Eu(151) to be 49 % +- 2.3 % from the intensity spectra and 50% +-2.3 from the flux spectra. This compares well to the the meteoritic isotopic fraction 47.8%. We explore the 3D corrections also for dwarfs and sub-giants in the temperature range ~5000 K to ~6500 K and solar and 1/10--solar metallicities and find them to be negligible for all the models investigated. Conclusions. Our photospheric Eu abundance is in good agreement with previous determinations based on 1D models. This is in line with our conclusion that 3D effects for this element are negligible in the case of the Sun.
Context. Departures from local thermodynamic equilibrium (LTE) distort the calcium abundance derived from stellar spectra in various ways, depending on the lines used and the stellar atmospheric parameters. The collection of atomic data adopted in non-LTE (NLTE) calculations must be sufficiently complete and accurate. Aims. We derive NLTE abundances from high-quality observations and reliable stellar parameters using a model atom built afresh for this work, and check the consistency of our results over a wide wavelength range with transitions of atomic and singly ionised calcium. Methods. We built and tested Ca i and Ca ii model atoms with state-of-the-art radiative and collisional data, and tested their performance deriving the Ca abundance in three benchmark stars: Procyon, the Sun, and Arcturus. We have excellent-quality observations and accurate stellar parameters for these stars. Two methods to derive the LTE / NLTE abundances were used and compared. The LTE / NLTE centre-to-limb variation (CLV) of Ca lines in the Sun was also investigated. Results. The two methods used give similar results in all three stars. Several discrepancies found in LTE do not appear in our NLTE results; in particular the agreement between abundances in the visual and infra-red (IR) and the Ca i and Ca ii ionisation balance is improved overall, although substantial line-to-line scatter remains. The CLV of the calcium lines around 6165 Angs can be partially reproduced. We suspect differences between our modelling and CLV results are due to inhomogeneities in the atmosphere that require 3D modelling.
We compute models of the transmission spectra of planets HD 209458b, HD 189733b, and generic hot Jupiters. We examine the effects of temperature, surface gravity, and metallicity for the generic planets as a guide to understanding transmission spectra in general. We find that carbon dioxide absorption at 4.4 and 15 microns is prominent at high metallicity, and is a clear metallicity indicator. For HD 209458b and HD 189733b, we compute spectra for both one-dimensional and three-dimensional model atmospheres and examine the differences between them. The differences are usually small, but can be large if atmospheric temperatures are near important chemical abundance boundaries. The calculations for the 3D atmospheres, and their comparison with data, serve as constraints on these dynamical models that complement the secondary eclipse and light curve data sets. For HD 209458b, even if TiO and VO gases are abundant on the day side, their abundances can be considerably reduced on the cooler planetary limb. However, given the predicted limb temperatures and TiO abundances, the models optical opacity is too high. For HD 189733b we find a good match with some infrared data sets and constrain the altitude of a postulated haze layer. For this planet, substantial differences can exist between the transmission spectra of the leading and trailing hemispheres, which is an excellent probe of carbon chemistry. In thermochemical equilibrium, the cooler leading hemisphere is methane-dominated, and the hotter trailing hemisphere is CO-dominated, but these differences may be eliminated by non-equilibrium chemistry due to vertical mixing. It may be possible to constrain the carbon chemistry of this planet, and its spatial variation, with JWST.
We present an overview of the current status of our efforts to derive the microturbulence and macroturbulence parameters (ximic and ximac) from the CIFIST grid of CO5BOLD 3D model atmospheres as a function of the basic stellar parameters Teff, log g, and [M/H]. The latest results for the Sun and Procyon show that the derived microturbulence parameter depends significantly on the numerical resolution of the underlying 3D simulation, confirming that `low-resolution models tend to underestimate the true value of ximic. Extending the investigation to twelve further simulations with different Teff, log g, and [M/H], we obtain a first impression of the predicted trend of ximic over the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram: in agreement with empirical evidence, microturbulence increases towards higher effective temperature and lower gravity. The metallicity dependence of ximic must be interpreted with care, since it also reflects the deviation between the 1D and 3D photospheric temperature stratifications that increases systematically towards lower metallicity.