Bibcode
García, M.; Herrero, A.; Castro, N.; Corral, L.; Rosenberg, A.
Bibliographical reference
Astronomy and Astrophysics, Volume 523, id.A23
Advertised on:
11
2010
Journal
Citations
20
Refereed citations
16
Description
Context. To understand the structure and evolution of massive stars,
systematic surveys of the Local Group galaxies have been undertaken, to
find these objects in environments of different chemical abundances. We
focus on the metal-poor irregular galaxy IC 1613 to analyze the stellar
and wind structure of its low-metallicity massive stars. We ultimately
aim to study the metallicity-dependent driving mechanism of the winds of
blue massive stars and use metal-poor massive stars of the Local Volume
as a proxy for the stars in the early Universe. Aims: In a
previous paper we produced a list of OB associations in IC 1613. Their
properties are not only a powerful aid towards finding the most
interesting candidate massive stars, but also reveal the structure and
recent star formation history of the galaxy. We characterize these OB
associations and study their connection with the galactic global
properties. Methods: The reddening-free Q parameter is a powerful
tool in the photometric analysis of young populations of massive stars,
since it exhibits a smaller degree of degeneracy with OB spectral types
than the B-V color. The color-magnitude diagram (Q vs. V) of the OB
associations in IC 1613 is studied to determine their age and mass, and
confirm the population of young massive stars. Results: We
identified more than 10 stars with M ≥ 50 M&sun;. Spectral
classification available for some of them confirm their massive nature,
yet we find the common discrepancy with the spectroscopically derived
masses. There is a general increasing trend of the mass of the most
massive member with the number of members of each association, but not
with the stellar density. The average diameter of the associations of
this catalog is 40 pc, half the historically considered typical size of
OB associations. Size increases with the association population. The
distribution of the groups strongly correlates with that of neutral and
ionized hydrogen. We find the largest dispersion of association ages in
the bubble region of the galaxy where hydrogen is abundant, implying
that recent star formation has proceeded over a longer period of time
than in the rest of the galaxy, and is still ongoing. Very young
associations are found at the west of the galaxy far from the bubble
region, traditionally considered the sole locus of star formation, but
still rich in neutral hydrogen. Conclusions: The contrast in the
stellar properties derived from photometry and spectroscopy (when the
latter is available) shows that the Q pseudo-color is very useful for
estimating the parameters of OB stars when only photometric observations
exist. This work helped define an extensive pool of candidate OB stars
for subsequent spectroscopic analyses designed to study the structure
and winds of metal-poor massive stars.
Based on observations made with the Isaac Newton Telescope operated on
the island of La Palma by the Isaac Newton Group in the Spanish
Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos of the Instituto de
Astrofísica de Canarias.Based on observations made with ESO
Telescopes at Paranal Observatories under programme ID 078.D-0767.Table
1 and Appendices A and B are only available in electronic form at http://www.aanda.org
Related projects
Physical properties and evolution of Massive Stars
This project aims at the searching, observation and analysis of massive stars in nearby galaxies to provide a solid empirical ground to understand their physical properties as a function of those key parameters that gobern their evolution (i.e. mass, spin, metallicity, mass loss, and binary interaction). Massive stars are central objects to
Sergio
Simón Díaz