The Giraffe Inner Bulge Survey (GIBS) II. Metallicity distributions and alpha element abundances at fixed Galactic latitude

Abstract

High resolution (R$\sim$22,500) spectra for 400 red clump giants, in four fields within $-4.8^{\circ }\lesssim \mathrm{b}\lesssim -3.4^{\circ }$ and $-10^{\circ }\lesssim \mathrm{l}\lesssim +10^{\circ }$, were obtained within the GIRAFFE Inner Bulge Survey (GIBS) project. To this sample we added another $\sim$ 400 stars in Baade's Window, observed with the identical instrumental configuration. We constructed the metallicity distributions for the entire sample, as well as for each field individually, in order to investigate the presence of gradients or field-to-field variations in the shape of the distributions. The metallicity distributions in the five fields are consistent with being drawn from a single parent population, indicating the absence of a gradient along the major axis of the Galactic bar. The global metallicity distribution is well fitted by two Gaussians. The metal poor component is rather broad, with a mean at $<[Fe/H]>=-0.31$ dex and $\sigma =0.31$ dex. The metal-rich one is narrower, with mean $<[Fe/H]>=+0.26$ and $\sigma =0.2$ dex. The [Mg/Fe] ratio follows a tight trend with [Fe/H], with enhancement with respect to solar in the metal-poor regime, similar to the one observed for giant stars in the local thick disc. [Ca/Fe] abundances follow a similar trend, but with a considerably larger scatter than [Mg/Fe]. A decrease in [Mg/Fe] is observed at $[Fe/H]=-0.44$ dex. This \textit{knee} is in agreement with our previous bulge study of K-giants along the minor axis, but is 0.1 dex lower in metallicity than the one reported for the Bulge micro lensed dwarf and sub-giant stars. We found no variation in $\alpha$-element abundance distributions between different fields.

Accepted for publication in A&A

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