Chemical characterisation of the X-shooter Spectral Library (XSL): [Mg/Fe] and [Ca/Fe] abundances
Palicio, P. A.; Vazdekis, A.; Sánchez-Blázquez, P.; Santos-Peral, P.
Spain, France
Abstract
Context. The X-shooter Spectral Library (XSL) is a large empirical stellar library used as a benchmark for the development of stellar population models. The inclusion of α-element abundances is crucial to disentangling the chemical evolution of any stellar system.
Aims: The aim of this paper is to provide a catalogue of high-precision, accurate magnesium and calcium abundances from a wide variety of stars that are well distributed in the Hertzsprung-Russell (HR) diagram.
Methods: We originally performed an analysis of the derived Mg and Ca abundances for medium-resolution spectra of 611 stars from the XSL Data Release 2. For this purpose, we used the GAUGUIN automated abundance estimation code to fit the ultraviolet-blue (UVB) and visible (VIS) spectra. We tested the consistency of the atmospheric parameters and chemical abundances with the Gaia DR3 and the AMBRE Project datasets.
Results: We finally obtained precise [Mg/Fe] and [Ca/Fe] abundances for 192 and 217 stars, respectively, from which 174 stars have measurements in both elements. The stars cover a broad effective temperature range of 4000 < Teff < 6500 K, surface gravity of 0.3 < log(g) < 4.8 cm s−2, and metallicity of −2.5 < [Fe/H] < +0.4 dex. We find an excellent agreement with the abundance estimates from the AMBRE:HARPS and the Gaia-RVS (Radial Velocity Spectrometer) analysis. Moreover, the resulting abundances reproduce a plateau in the metal-poor regime followed by a decreasing trend even at supersolar metallicities, as predicted by Galactic chemical evolution models.
Conclusions: This catalogue is suitable for improving the modelling of evolutionary stellar population models with empirical α enhancements, which could significantly contribute to the analysis of external galaxies' abundances in the near future.