Bibcode
DOI
Esteban, César; Peimbert, Manuel; Torres-Peimbert, Silvia; Rodríguez, Mónica
Bibliographical reference
The Astrophysical Journal, Volume 581, Issue 1, pp. 241-257.
Advertised on:
12
2002
Journal
Citations
115
Refereed citations
95
Description
We present high-resolution observations of the giant extragalactic H II
regions NGC 604, NGC 2363, NGC 5461, and NGC 5471, based on observations
taken with the ISIS spectrograph on the William Herschel Telescope. We
have detected, for the first time, C II and O II recombination lines in
these objects. We find that recombination lines give larger
C++ and O++ abundances than collisionally excited
lines, suggesting that temperature variations may be present in the
objects. We detect [Fe IV] lines in NGC 2363 and NGC 5471, the most
confident detection of optical lines of this kind in H II regions.
Considering the temperature structure, we derive their H, He, C, N, O,
Ne, S, Ar, and Fe abundances. From the recombination lines of NGC 5461
and NGC 5471, we determine the presence of C/H and O/H gradients in
M101. We calculate the ΔY/ΔO and ΔY/ΔZ values
considering the presence of temperature variations and under the
assumption of constant temperature. We obtain a better agreement with
models of galactic chemical evolution by considering the presence of
temperature variations than by assuming that the temperature is constant
in these nebulae. Based on observations made with William Herschel
Telescope operated on the island of La Palma by the Isaac Newton Group
of Telescopes in the Spanish Observatorio del Roque de Los Muchachos of
the Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias.