Bibcode
DOI
Urbaneja, M. A.; Herrero, A.; Bresolin, F.; Kudritzki, R.-P.; Gieren, W.; Puls, J.; Przybilla, N.; Najarro, F.; Pietrzyński, G.
Bibliographical reference
The Astrophysical Journal, Volume 622, Issue 2, pp. 862-877.
Advertised on:
4
2005
Journal
Citations
77
Refereed citations
60
Description
We have carried out a detailed spectral analysis of six early B-type
supergiants in the Sculptor Group spiral galaxy NGC 300. To this end, we
used state-of-the-art unified blanketed non-local thermodynamic
equilibrium model atmospheres (computed with the code FASTWIND), aimed
at the determination of the stellar parameters and of detailed surface
abundance patterns. We discuss the individual evolutionary stage of each
star in view of their CNO surface abundance, which we compare to massive
star evolutionary models with rotation. Although the quantitative
comparison does not yield a good agreement, the qualitative behavior is
consistent with the model predictions. This issue supports the idea
that, although rather evolved, the stars are directly evolving from the
main sequence and therefore are in a pre-red supergiant phase. We derive
the stellar abundance gradients in the disk of NGC 300 for the elements
O, Mg, and Si. Using the available literature data on H II regions in
NGC 300, we carry out a detailed comparison of nebular oxygen abundances
resulting from different, widely used empirical calibrations. Finally,
we compare the abundance gradients derived from the interstellar medium
to those derived from the blue supergiants studied in this paper. We
find a O/H abundance gradient of -0.033+/-0.026 dex arcmin-1
over a distance equal to the isophotal radius of the galaxy. This trend
is also followed in good agreement by Mg and Si abundances. The
abundance gradients derived from our stellar data are shallower than
those obtained from most previous H II region analyses, and we obtain a
lower oxygen abundance in the central region of the galaxy (8.57+/-0.13
dex), which is, however, in agreement with the H II region abundance
results derived with recent calibrations of several statistical
indicators.
Based on observations obtained at the ESO Very Large Telescope.