The chemical imprint of the bursty nature of Milky Way's progenitors

Abstract

Carbon enhanced metal poor (CEMP) stars with low abundances of neutron capture elements (CEMP-no stars) are ubiquitous among metal poor stars in the Milky Way. Recent observations have uncovered their two subgroups that differ in the carbon to magnesium ([C/Mg]) abundance ratio. Here we demonstrate that similar abundance patterns are also present in Milky Way-like galaxies in the EAGLE cosmological hydrodynamical simulation, where these patterns originate from the fact that stars may form from gas enriched predominantly by asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars or by type-II supernovae. This occurs when stars form in the poorly mixed interstellar medium of Milky Way progenitor galaxies that are undergoing bursty star formation. The CEMP-no stars with lower [C/Mg] form at the onset of a starburst from gas enriched by low metallicity type-II supernovae that power a strong outflow, quenching further star formation. When star formation resumes following cosmological gas accretion, the CEMP-no stars with higher [C/Mg] form, with enrichment by AGB ejecta evident in their higher abundance of barium and lower abundance of magnesium. This suggests that bursty star formation in the progenitors of the Galaxy leaves a permanent imprint in the abundance patterns of CEMP stars.

arXiv comment5 pages, 4 figures, Accepted in MNRAS letters, Comments Welcome

References in corpus (33)

• The cosmological simulation code GADGET-2
• The EAGLE project: Simulating the evolution and assembly of galaxies and their environments
• Populating a cluster of galaxies - I. Results at z=0
• The EAGLE simulations of galaxy formation: calibration of subgrid physics and model variations
• Substructures in hydrodynamical cluster simulations
• Illuminating Gravitational Waves: A Concordant Picture of Photons from a Neutron Star Merger
• Chemical enrichment in cosmological, smoothed particle hydrodynamics simulations
• On the relation between the Schmidt and Kennicutt-Schmidt star formation laws and its implications for numerical simulations
• Gusty, gaseous flows of FIRE: galactic winds in cosmological simulations with explicit stellar feedback
• Near-Field Cosmology with Metal-Poor Stars
• Carbon Enhanced Metal-Poor Stars. I. Chemical Compositions of 26 Stars
• The EAGLE simulations of galaxy formation: public release of halo and galaxy catalogues
• First-generation black-hole-forming supernovae and the metal abundance pattern of a very iron-poor star
• A single low-energy, iron-poor supernova as the source of metals in the star SMSS J 031300.36-670839.3
• Carbon-Enhanced Metal-Poor Star Frequencies in the Galaxy: Corrections for the Effect of Evolutionary Status on Carbon Abundances
• Variations in the Abundance Pattern of Extremely Metal-poor Stars and Nucleosynthesis in Population III Supernovae
• A holistic approach to carbon-enhanced metal-poor stars
• The Origin of r-Process Elements in the Milky Way
• The Frequency of Carbon-Enhanced Metal-Poor Stars in the Galaxy from the HERES sample
• Observational Constraints on First-Star Nucleosynthesis. I. Evidence for Multiple Progenitors of CEMP-no Stars
• TOPoS: II. On the bimodality of carbon abundance in CEMP stars. Implications on the early chemical evolution of galaxies
• Breathing in Low Mass Galaxies: A Study of Episodic Star Formation
• HE 1327-2326, an unevolved star with [Fe/H]<-5.0. II. New 3D-1D corrected abundances from a VLT/UVES spectrum
• The role of binaries in the enrichment of the early Galactic halo. III. Carbon-enhanced metal-poor stars -- CEMP-s stars
• Carbon-enhanced metal-poor stars: the most pristine objects?
• Abundance Profiling of Extremely Metal-Poor Stars and Supernova Properties in the Early Universe
• Connecting the first galaxies with ultra faint dwarfs in the Local Group: chemical signatures of Population~III stars
• Descendants of the first stars: the distinct chemical signature of second generation stars
• Classification of extremely metal-poor stars: absent region in A(C)-[Fe/H] plane and the role of dust cooling
• The EAGLE simulations of galaxy formation: Public release of particle data
• Origins of carbon-enhanced metal-poor stars
• Pre-supernova mixing in CEMP-no source stars
• CEMPlifying reionization

Cited by in corpus (4)

• The MUSE Ultra Deep Field (MUDF). II. Survey design and the gaseous properties of galaxy groups at 0.5 < z < 1.5
• Implications of inhomogeneous metal mixing for stellar archaeology
• Understanding the origin of CEMP-no stars through ultra-faint dwarfs
• The haloes that reionized the Universe