The time evolution of the Milky Way's oxygen abundance gradient

Mollá, M.; Díaz, Á I; Cavichia, O.; Gibson, B. K.; Maciel, W. J.; Costa, R. D.D.; Ascasibar, Y.; Few, C. G.

Abstract

© 2018 The Author(s). We study the evolution of oxygen abundance radial gradients as a function of time for the Milky Way Galaxy obtained with our MulChem chemical evolution model. We review the recent data of abundances for different objects observed in our Galactic disc. We analyse with our models the role of the growth of the stellar disc, as well as the effect of infall rate and star formation prescriptions, or the pre-enrichment of the infall gas, on the time evolution of the oxygen abundance radial distribution. We compute the radial gradient of abundances within the disc, and its corresponding evolution, taking into account the disc growth along time. We compare our predictions with the data compilation, showing a good agreement. Our models predict a very smooth evolution when the radial gradient is measured within the optical disc with a slight flattening of the gradient from ∼-0.057 dex kpc-1 at z = 4 until values around ∼-0.015 dex kpc-1 at z = 1 and basically the same gradient until the present, with small differences between models. Moreover, some models show a steepening at the last times, from z = 1 until z = 0 in agreement with data which give a variation of the gradient in a range from -0.02 to -0.04 dex kpc-1 from t = 10 Gyr until now. The gradient measured as a function of the normalized radius R/Reff is in good agreement with findings by CALIFA and MUSE, and its evolution with redshift falls within the error bars of cosmological simulations.

Citation

Mollá, M., Díaz, Á. I., Cavichia, O., Gibson, B. K., Maciel, W. J., Costa, R. D., Ascasibar, Y., & Few, C. G. (2019). The time evolution of the Milky Way's oxygen abundance gradient. Monthly notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, 482(3), 3071-3088. https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/sty2877

• Journal Article Type: Article
• Acceptance Date: Oct 19, 2018
• Online Publication Date: Oct 24, 2018
• Publication Date: Jan 1, 2019
• Deposit Date: Oct 23, 2018
• Publicly Available Date: Oct 23, 2018
• Journal: Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
• Print ISSN: 0035-8711
• Electronic ISSN: 1365-2966
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Peer Reviewed: Peer Reviewed
• Volume: 482
• Issue: 3
• Pages: 3071-3088
• DOI: https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/sty2877
• Keywords: Galaxy: abundances; Galaxy: evolution; Galaxy: formation; Galaxy: disc
• Public URL: https://hull-repository.worktribe.com/output/1125956
• Publisher URL: https://academic.oup.com/mnras/article/482/3/3071/5144233
• Contract Date: Oct 23, 2018