Bibcode
Lardo, C.; Battaglia, G.; Pancino, E.; Romano, D.; de Boer, T. J. L.; Starkenburg, E.; Tolstoy, E.; Irwin, M. J.; Jablonka, P.; Tosi, M.
Bibliographical reference
Astronomy and Astrophysics, Volume 585, id.A70, 18 pp.
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1
2016
Journal
Citations
25
Refereed citations
25
Description
We present [C/Fe] and [N/Fe] abundance ratios and CH(λ4300) and
S(λ3883) index measurements for 94 red giant branch (RGB) stars
in the Sculptor dwarf spheroidal galaxy from VLT/VIMOS MOS observations
at a resolving power R = 1150 at 4020 Å. This is the first time
that [N/Fe] abundances are derived for a large number of stars in a
dwarf spheroidal. We found a trend for the [C/Fe] abundance to decrease
with increasing luminosity on the RGB across the whole metallicity
range, a phenomenon observed in both field and globular cluster giants,
which can be interpreted in the framework of evolutionary mixing of
partially processed CNO material. Both our measurements of [C/Fe] and
[N/Fe] are in good agreement with the theoretical predictions for stars
at similar luminosity and metallicity. We detected a dispersion in the
carbon abundance at a given [Fe/H], which cannot be ascribed to
measurement uncertainties alone. We interpret this observational
evidence as the result of the contribution of different nucleosynthesis
sources over time to a not well-mixed interstellar medium. We report the
discovery of two new carbon-enhanced, metal-poor stars. These are likely
the result of pollution from material enriched by asymptotic giant
branch stars, as indicated by our estimates of [Ba/Fe] >+1. We also
attempted a search for dissolved globular clusters in the field of the
galaxy by looking for the distinctive C-N pattern of second population
globular clusters stars in a previously detected, very metal-poor,
chemodynamical substructure. We do not detect chemical anomalies among
this group of stars. However, small number statistics and limited
spatial coverage do not allow us to exclude the hypotheses that this
substructure forms part of a tidally shredded globular cluster.
Based on observations made with ESO Telescopes at the La Silla Paranal
Observatory under programme ID 091.D-0089