Journal article
Hot Stars in Old Stellar Populations: A Continuing Need for Intermediate Ages
Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Vol.362(1), pp.2-8
06/15/2005
Handle:
https://hdl.handle.net/2376/116537
Abstract
Mon.Not.Roy.Astron.Soc. 362 (2005) 2-8 We investigate the effect of a small contamination of hot, old, metal-poor
starlight on the inferred stellar populations of early-type galaxies in the
core of the Coma Cluster. We find that the required correction to the Balmer
and metal absorption-line strengths for old, metal-poor stars does not
significantly affect the inferred age of the stellar population when the Hbeta
strength is large. Intermediate-aged populations are therefore still needed to
explain enhanced Balmer-line strengths in early-type galaxies. This gives us
increased confidence in our age estimates for these objects. For galaxies with
weak Balmer-line strengths corresponding to very old populations (t>10 Gyr),
however, a correction for hot stars may indeed alter the inferred age, as
previously suggested. Finally, the inferred metallicity [Z/H] will always be
higher after any correction for old, metal-poor starlight than without, but the
enhancement ratios [E/Fe] will strengthen only slightly.
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Details
- Title
- Hot Stars in Old Stellar Populations: A Continuing Need for Intermediate Ages
- Creators
- S. C Trager - Kapteyn Astronomical InstituteGuy Worthey - Washington State UniversityS. M Faber - UCO/Lick ObservatoryAlan Dressler - OCIW
- Publication Details
- Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, Vol.362(1), pp.2-8
- Academic Unit
- Physics and Astronomy, Department of
- Identifiers
- 99900548143201842
- Language
- English
- Resource Type
- Journal article