Dust production and mass loss in the Galactic globular cluster 47 Tucanae

Abstract

Dust production among post-main-sequence stars is investigated in the Galactic globular cluster 47 Tucanae (NGC 104) based on infrared photometry and spectroscopy. We identify metallic iron grains as the probable dominant opacity source in these winds. Typical evolutionary timescales of AGB stars suggest the mass-loss rates we report are too high. We suggest that this is because the iron grains are small or elongated and/or that iron condenses more efficiently than at solar metallicity. Comparison to other works suggests metallic iron is observed to be more prevalent towards lower metallicities. The reasons for this are explored, but remain unclear. Meanwhile, the luminosity at which dusty mass loss begins is largely invariant with metallicity, but its presence correlates strongly with long-period variability. This suggests that the winds of low-mass stars have a significant driver that is not radiation pressure, but may be acoustic driving by pulsations.

12 pages, 5 figures, accepted ApJ

References in corpus (16)

• Chemical Abundances for 855 Giants in the Globular Cluster Omega Centauri (NGC 5139)
• Too little radiation pressure on dust in the winds of oxygen-rich AGB stars
• HST Proper Motions and Stellar Dynamics in the Core of the Globular Cluster 47 Tucanae
• The First Empirical Mass Loss Law for Population II Giants
• Giants in the globular cluster omega Centauri: dust production, mass loss and distance
• Globular Cluster Abundances from High-Resolution Integrated Light Spectra, I: 47 Tuc
• Tracing the development of dust around evolved stars: The case of 47 Tuc
• Fundamental parameters, integrated RGB mass loss and dust production in the Galactic globular cluster 47 Tucanae
• Dust, pulsation, chromospheres and their role in driving mass loss from red giants in Galactic globular clusters
• Stellar Populations and Mass-Loss in M15: A Spitzer Detection of Dust in the Intra-Cluster Medium
• The Mass-Loss Return from Evolved Stars to the Large Magellanic Cloud II: Dust Properties for Oxygen-Rich Asymptotic Giant Branch Stars
• A spectral atlas of post-main-sequence stars in omega Centauri: kinematics, evolution, enrichment and interstellar medium
• Mass Outflow from Red Giant Stars in M13, M15, and M92
• The Clusters AgeS Experiment (CASE). II. The Eclipsing Blue Straggler OGLEGC-228 in the Globular Cluster 47 Tuc
• A Spitzer search for cold dust within globular clusters
• Modelling chromospheric line profiles as diagnostics of velocity fields in ω Centauri red giant stars

Cited by in corpus (37)

• Asteroseismology of old open clusters with Kepler: direct estimate of the integrated RGB mass loss in NGC6791 and NGC6819
• Fundamental parameters and infrared excesses of Hipparcos stars
• Surveying the Agents of Galaxy Evolution in the Tidally-Stripped, Low Metallicity Small Magellanic Cloud (SAGE-SMC) II. Cool Evolved Stars
• The Dust Budget of the SMC: Are AGB Stars the Primary Dust Source at Low Metallicity?
• Mass loss on the red giant branch: the value and metallicity dependence of Reimers' η in globular clusters
• Dust input from AGB stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud
• The Submm and mm Excess of the SMC: Magnetic Dipole Emission from Magnetic Nanoparticles?
• Iron and silicate dust growth in the Galactic interstellar medium: clues from element depletions
• Fundamental parameters, integrated RGB mass loss and dust production in the Galactic globular cluster 47 Tucanae
• Evolved Massive Stars at Low-metallicity V. Mass-Loss Rate of Red Supergiant Stars in the Small Magellanic Cloud
• Internal gas models and central black hole in 47 Tucanae using millisecond pulsars
• Dust formation in the winds of AGBs: the contribution at low metallicities
• Pulsation-triggered mass loss from AGB stars: the 60-day critical period
• Pulsation-triggered dust production by asymptotic giant branch stars
• Spitzer spectra of evolved stars in omega Centauri and their low-metallicity dust production
• The onset of the AGB wind tied to a transition between sequences in the period-luminosity diagram
• The Spitzer Spectroscopic Survey of S-type Stars
• Ejection of globular cluster interstellar media through ionization by white dwarfs
• Establishing a mass-loss rate relation for red supergiants in the Large Magellanic Cloud
• A Fresh Look at AGB stars in Galactic Open Clusters with Gaia: Impact on Stellar Models and the Initial-Final Mass Relation
• Empirical determination of the integrated red giant and horizontal branch stellar mass loss in omega Centauri
• The VISIR@VLT Mid-IR view of 47Tuc: A further step in solving the puzzle of RGB mass loss
• H-ATLAS/GAMA: The nature and characteristics of optically red galaxies detected at submillimetre wavelengths
• ALMA reveals sunburn: CO dissociation around AGB stars in the globular cluster 47 Tucanae
• VISTA variables in the Sagittarius dwarf spheroidal galaxy: pulsation- vs. dust-driven winds on the giant branches
• VISTA's view of the Sagittarius dwarf spheroidal galaxy and southern Galactic Bulge
• EU Del: exploring the onset of pulsation-driven winds in giant stars
• A Census of Thermally-Pulsing AGB stars in the Andromeda Galaxy and a First Estimate of their Contribution to the Global Dust Budget
• Circumstellar CO in metal-poor stellar winds: the highly irradiated globular cluster star 47 Tucanae V3
• A MeerKAT look at the polarization of 47 Tucanae pulsars: magnetic field implications
• Asymptotic Giant Branch Stars in the Nearby Dwarf Galaxy Leo P
• Numerical estimates of the accretion rate onto intermediate-mass black holes
• The impact of third dredge-up on the mass loss of Mira variables
• Circumstellar CO J = 3-2 detected around the evolving metal-poor ([Fe/H] ~ -1.15 dex) AGB star RU Vulpeculae
• On the impossible NGC 4372 V1 and V2: an extended AGB to the [Fe/H] = -2.2 cluster
• Synthetic extinction maps around intermediate-mass black holes in Galactic globular clusters
• The Nearby Evolved Stars Survey II: Constructing a volume-limited sample and first results from the James Clerk Maxwell Telescope