The mysterious age invariance of the planetary nebula luminosity function bright cut-off
Planetary nebulae mark the end of the active life of 90% of all stars. They trace the transition from a red giant to a degenerate white dwarf. Stellar models predicted that only stars above approximately twice the solar mass could form a bright nebula. But the ubiquitous presence of bright planetary...
| Autores: | , , |
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| Tipo de recurso: | artículo |
| Estado: | Versión publicada |
| Fecha de publicación: | 2018 |
| País: | Argentina |
| Institución: | Consejo Nacional de Investigaciones Científicas y Técnicas |
| Repositorio: | CONICET Digital (CONICET) |
| Idioma: | inglés |
| OAI Identifier: | oai:ri.conicet.gov.ar:11336/82487 |
| Acceso en línea: | http://hdl.handle.net/11336/82487 |
| Access Level: | acceso abierto |
| Palabra clave: | Interstellar Medium Stellar Evolution https://purl.org/becyt/ford/1.3 https://purl.org/becyt/ford/1 |
| Sumario: | Planetary nebulae mark the end of the active life of 90% of all stars. They trace the transition from a red giant to a degenerate white dwarf. Stellar models predicted that only stars above approximately twice the solar mass could form a bright nebula. But the ubiquitous presence of bright planetary nebulae in old stellar populations, such as elliptical galaxies, contradicts this: Such high-mass stars are not present in old systems. The planetary nebula luminosity function, and especially its bright cut-off, is almost invariant between young spiral galaxies, with high-mass stars, and old elliptical galaxies, with only low-mass stars. Here, we show that new evolutionary tracks of low-mass stars are capable of explaining in a simple manner this decades-old mystery. The agreement between the observed luminosity function and computed stellar evolution validates the latest theoretical modelling. With these models, the planetary nebula luminosity function provides a powerful diagnostic to derive star formation histories of intermediate-age stars. The new models predict that the Sun at the end of its life will also form a planetary nebula, but it will be faint. |
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