Infrared Spectroscopic Study of 8 Galactic Globular Clusters

Abstract

We have obtained medium-resolution infrared K band spectra of 44 giants in seven heavily reddened clusters in the Galactic bulge, as well as 12 giants in omega Centauri. We measure the equivalent widths of the Na doublet, the Ca triplet, and the CO band head, and then apply the new technique of Frogel et al to determine the metallicity of each star. Averaging these values, we estimate the metallicity for each cluster, and compare our new [Fe/H] values with previous determinations from the literature. Our estimates for each cluster are: NGC 6256 (-1.35), NGC 6539 (-0.79), HP 1 (-1.30), Liller 1 (-0.36), Palomar 6 (-0.52), Terzan 2 (-0.87), and Terzan 4 (-1.62). We briefly discuss differences between the various [Fe/H] scales on which it was possible to base our calibration, which is found to be the largest uncertainty in using this technique to determine metallicities.

13 pages, 11 figures, accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal

References in corpus (2)

• A Globular Cluster Metallicity Scale Based on the Abundance of Fe II
• A near-infrared spectroscopic screening of the red giant populations in omega Centauri

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