Spitzer Space Telescope evidence in NGC 6791: no super-mass-loss at super-solar metallicity to explain helium white dwarfs?

Abstract

We use archival Spitzer Space Telescope photometry of the old, super-solar metallicity massive open cluster NGC 6791 to look for evidence of enhanced mass loss, which has been postulated to explain the optical luminosity function and low white dwarf masses in this benchmark cluster. We find a conspicuous lack of evidence for prolificacy of circumstellar dust production that would have been expected to accompany such mass loss. We also construct the optical and infrared luminosity functions, and demonstrate that these fully agree with theoretical expectations. We thus conclude that there is no evidence for the mass loss of super-solar metallicity red giants to be sufficiently high that they can avoid the helium flash at the tip of the red giant branch.

arXiv commentaccepted for publication in ApJ Letters

References in corpus (19)

• The Infrared Array Camera (IRAC) for the Spitzer Space Telescope
• The Spitzer Space Telescope Mission
• The USNO-B Catalog
• Evolution of asymptotic giant branch stars II. Optical to far-infrared isochrones with improved TP-AGB models
• The second US Naval Observatory CCD Astrograph Catalog (UCAC2)
• Absolute Calibration of the Infrared Array Camera on the Spitzer Space Telescope
• Point Source Extraction with MOPEX
• A New Version of Reimers' law of Mass Loss Based on a Physical Approach
• The mid- and far-infrared colours of AGB and post-AGB stars
• The AGB superwind speed at low metallicity
• Stellar Evolution in NGC 6791: Mass Loss on the Red Giant Branch and the Formation of Low Mass White Dwarfs
• The First Empirical Mass Loss Law for Population II Giants
• The Puzzling White Dwarf Cooling Sequence in NGC6791: A Simple Solution
• Dust, pulsation, chromospheres and their role in driving mass loss from red giants in Galactic globular clusters
• A Spitzer Space Telescope Atlas of omega Centauri: The Stellar Population, Mass Loss, and the Intracluster Medium
• The first 8-13 micron spectra of globular cluster red giants: circumstellar silicate dust grains in 47 Tucanae (NGC 104)
• Modelling Chromospheric Line Profiles in NGC2808: Evidence of Mass Loss from RGB Stars
• White Dwarfs in NGC 6791: Avoiding the Helium Flash
• HST Observations of Chromospheres in Metal Deficient Field Giants

Cited by in corpus (29)

• Asteroseismology of old open clusters with Kepler: direct estimate of the integrated RGB mass loss in NGC6791 and NGC6819
• Surveying the Agents of Galaxy Evolution in the Tidally-Stripped, Low Metallicity Small Magellanic Cloud (SAGE-SMC) II. Cool Evolved Stars
• PopStar I: Evolutionary synthesis models description
• Fundamental parameters and infrared excesses of Tycho-Gaia stars
• On type Ia supernovae and the formation of single low-mass white dwarfs
• Chemical Composition of Faint (I~21 mag) Microlensed Bulge Dwarf OGLE-2007-BLG-514S
• High resolution optical spectroscopy of Praesepe white dwarfs
• Fundamental parameters, integrated RGB mass loss and dust production in the Galactic globular cluster 47 Tucanae
• The mid-infrared colour-magnitude relation of early-type galaxies in the Coma cluster as measured by Spitzer-IRS
• Fast Winds and Mass Loss from Metal-Poor Field Giants
• Evolution and colors of helium-core white dwarf stars with high-metallicity progenitors
• Is Dust Forming on the Red Giant Branch in 47 Tuc?
• Pulsation-triggered dust production by asymptotic giant branch stars
• The onset of the AGB wind tied to a transition between sequences in the period-luminosity diagram
• The White Dwarf Age of NGC 2477
• Stellar lifetime and ultraviolet properties of the old metal-rich Galactic open cluster NGC6791: a pathway to understand the UV upturn of elliptical galaxies
• The VISIR@VLT Mid-IR view of 47Tuc: A further step in solving the puzzle of RGB mass loss
• Revisiting binary stars in population synthesis models
• A peculiar HI cloud near the distant globular cluster Pal 4
• VISTA variables in the Sagittarius dwarf spheroidal galaxy: pulsation- vs. dust-driven winds on the giant branches
• Ensemble Properties of the White Dwarf Population of the Old, Solar Metallicity Open Star Cluster Messier 67
• Comparison of the Asteroseismic Mass Scale of Red Clump Giants with Photometric Mass Estimates
• The white dwarf cooling sequence of NGC 6791: a unique tool for stellar evolution
• Mid-UV Narrow-Band Indices of Evolved Simple Stellar Populations
• EU Del: exploring the onset of pulsation-driven winds in giant stars
• Circumstellar CO in metal-poor stellar winds: the highly irradiated globular cluster star 47 Tucanae V3
• Circumstellar CO J = 3-2 detected around the evolving metal-poor ([Fe/H] ~ -1.15 dex) AGB star RU Vulpeculae
• Binarity as the solution to the stellar evolution enigma posed by NGC 6791
• The Nearby Evolved Stars Survey II: Constructing a volume-limited sample and first results from the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope