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The galactic chemical evolution (GCE) models determine the formation and evolution of the Milky Way Galaxy after the origin of the Universe. In our GCE models, the galaxy forms by the gradual accretion of the intergalactic gas. Various gas infall models are incorporated to form the galactic halo, thick and thin disc components. The accreted gas forms numerous generations of stars in the mass range of 0.1 to 100 Mʘ, governed by star formation rate and initial mass function in the galaxy. These stars evolve over the galactic time scale and contribute to the nucleosynthetic yields and stellar remnants at the end of their lifetime. The freshly synthesized elements from each generation of stars enrich the metallicity of the interstellar medium, which evolves over the galactic timescale. Our GCE models predict the temporal evolution of the abundance gradients and age-metallicity trends for elements up to Zn over the galactic time scale. The predicted normalized abundance gradients for C, N, O, Mg, Si, Ca, Ti, Fe, and Zn are compared with the observational data.

We use cosmological, magnetohydrodynamical simulations of Milky Way-mass galaxies from the Auriga project to study their enrichment with rapid neutron capture (r-process) elements. We implement a variety of enrichment models from both binary neutron star mergers and rare core-collapse supernovae. We focus on the abundances of (extremely) metal-poor stars, most of which were formed during the first ~Gyr of the Universe in external galaxies and later accreted onto the main galaxy. We find that the majority of metal-poor stars are r-process enriched in all our enrichment models. Neutron star merger models result in a median r-process abundance ratio which increases with metallicity, whereas the median trend in rare core-collapse supernova models is approximately flat. The scatter in r-process abundance increases for models with longer delay times or lower rates of r-process producing events. Our results are nearly perfectly converged, in part due to the mixing of gas between mesh cells in the simulations. Additionally, different Milky Way-mass galaxies show only small variation in their respective r-process abundance ratios. Current (sparse and potentially biased) observations of metal-poor stars in the Milky Way seem to prefer rare core-collapse supernovae over neutron star mergers as the dominant source of r-process elements at low metallicity, but we discuss possible caveats to our models. Dwarf galaxies which experience a single r-process event early in their history show highly enhanced r-process abundances at low metallicity, which is seen both in observations and in our simulations. We also find that the elements produced in a single event are mixed with ~10^8 Msun of gas relatively quickly, distributing the r-process elements over a large region., Accepted for publication in MNRAS. Revised version: added Figure 13 (on mixing of iron and r-process elements) and an Appendix (on iron and magnesium abundances) and updated the r-process yields (Tables 1 and 2 and normalization of abundances)

The surface lithium abundance A(Li) of warm metal-poor dwarf stars exhibits a narrow plateau down to [Fe/H]~-2.8 dex, while at lower metallicities the average value drops by 0.3 dex with a significant star-by-star scatter (called lithium meltdown). This behaviour is in conflict with predictions of standard stellar evolution models calculated with the initial A(Li) provided by the standard Big Bang nucleosynthesis. The lower red giant branch (LRGB) stars provide a complementary tool to understand the initial A(Li) distribution in metal-poor stars. We have collected a sample of high-resolution spectra of 58 LRGB stars spanning a range of [Fe/H] between ~ -7.0 dex and ~ -1.3 dex. The LRGB stars display an A(Li) distribution clearly different from that of the dwarfs, without signatures of a meltdown and with two distinct components: (a) a thin A(Li) plateau with an average A(Li)=1.09+-0.01 dex (sigma=0.07 dex), and (b) a small fraction of Li-poor stars with A(Li) lower than ~0.7 dex. The A(Li) distribution observed in LRGB stars can be reconciled with an initial abundance close to the cosmological value, by including an additional chemical element transport in stellar evolution models. The required efficiency of this transport allows us to match also the Spite plateau lithium abundance measured in the dwarfs. The emerging scenario is that all metal-poor stars formed with the same initial A(Li) but those that are likely the product of coalescence or that experienced binary mass transfer and show lower A(Li) . We conclude that A(Li) in LRGB stars is qualitatively compatible with the cosmological A(Li) value and that the meltdown observed in dwarf stars does not reflect a real drop of the abundance at birth., Comment: Accepted for publication in A&A, 7 pages, 3 figures, 2 tables

Context. The Perseus complex in the outer disk of the Galaxy hosts a number of clusters and associations of young stars. Gaia is providing a detailed characterization of their kinematic structure and evolutionary properties. Aims. Within the SPA Large Programme at the TNG, we secured HARPS-N and GIANO-B high-resolution optical and near-infrared (NIR) spectra of the young red supergiant (RSG) stars in the Perseus complex, in order to obtain accurate radial velocities, stellar parameters and detailed chemical abundances. Methods. We used spectral synthesis to best-fit hundreds of atomic and molecular lines in the spectra of the observed 27 RSGs. We obtained accurate estimates of the stellar temperature, gravity, micro and macro turbulence velocities and chemical abundances for 25 different elements. We also measured the $^{12}$C/$^{13}$C abundance ratio. Results. Our combined optical and NIR chemical study provides homogeneous half-solar iron with a small dispersion, about solar-scaled abundance ratios for the iron-peak, alpha and other light elements and a small enhancement of Na, K and neutron-capture elements, consistent with the thin disk chemistry traced by older stellar populations at a similar Galactocentric distance of about 10 kpc. We inferred enhancement of N, depletion of C and of the $^{12}$C/$^{13}$C isotopic abundance ratio, consistent with mixing processes in the stellar interiors during the RSG evolution., 12 pages, 7 figures, accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysics

We present the results of a spectro- scopic and photometric investigation of 20 objects from the open cluster Collinder 394, which contains the Cepheid BB Sgr. Besides the Cepheid, we studied tree K-giants, four B-giants, and twelve B-A-F main sequence stars. Radial velocities (RV), vsini, T eff , logg, were determined using spectroscopic model fitting and atmosphere models. We have derived the color-excesses, reddenings, and intrinsic colors for these stars using their T eff and logg from compar- ison to the atmosphere models, especially for hot stars. Proper motions, RV and GAIA DR2 2018 parallax/distance values for these stars allowed us to determine their membership in the cluster and absolute magnitudes. We found that seven stars do not belong to the cluster. The parallaxes and reddenings of 13 confidently cluster members led to the distances in a range of 630–800 pc, although the majority of them (8 objects) are located at a mean distance of 657.7±66.7 pc, and 5 objects with the Cepheid could probably belong to the cluster’s corona. All the members have [Fe/H] near 0.1 dex. The main sequence B-star No. 76 (HD 174307) has a low rotational velocity projection, and this fact allows us to determine its chemical composition to compare with that of the Cepheid BB Sgr. Its CNO and Na abundances are close to the solar one, while the Cepheid show a deficit of carbon, an overabundance of nitrogen, nearly solar oxygen, and an overabundance of sodium. Three foreground K-giants have different C abundances (from a deficit to the solar), and Na (from the solar to an overabundance) as well as a solar-like O content. The foreground F7-8 V star No. 75 (CPD −20 ◦ 7218) was revealed to be a Li-rich star, while the A7 V star No. 69 (BD −20 ◦ 5290) has an anomalous deficit of CNO with overabundances of some α, r- and s-process elements.

We describe the atomic and molecular data that were used for the abundance analyses of FGK-type stars carried out within the Gaia-ESO Survey. We present an unprecedented effort to create a homogeneous line list, which was used by several abundance analysis groups to calculate synthetic spectra and equivalent widths. The atomic data are accompanied by quality indicators and detailed references to the sources. The atomic and molecular data are made publicly available in electronic form. In general experimental transition probabilities were preferred but theoretical values were also used. Astrophysical gf-values were avoided due to the model-dependence of such a procedure. For elements whose lines are significantly affected by hyperfine structure or isotopic splitting a concerted effort has been made to collate the necessary data for the individual line components. We also performed a detailed investigation of available data for line broadening due to collisions with neutral hydrogen atoms. Synthetic spectra calculated for the Sun and Arcturus were used to assess the blending properties of the lines. Among a subset of over 1300 lines of 35 elements in the wavelength ranges from 475 nm to 685 nm and from 850 nm to 895 nm we identified about 200 lines of 24 species which have accurate gf-values and are free of blends in the spectra of the Sun and Arcturus. For the broadening due to collisions with neutral hydrogen we recommend data based on Anstee-Barklem-O'Mara theory, where available, and to avoid lines of neutral species otherwise. Theoretical broadening data by R.L. Kurucz should be used for Sc II, Ti II, and Y II lines. For ionised rare-earth species the Uns\"old approximation with an enhancement factor of 1.5 for the line width can be used. Desirable improvements in atomic data were identified for a number of species, including Al I, S I, Cr II, Na I, Si I, Ca II, and Ni I., Comment: Accepted for publication in section 12. Atomic, molecular, and nuclear data of Astronomy and Astrophysics; main part 25 pages, 8 tables, 5 figures; appendices 53 pages, 23 tables, 29 figures

We present abundances of 21 elements in a sample of 13 bright FG dwarfs drawn from the Kepler LEGACY sample to examine the applicability of the abundance-age relations to stars with properties strongly departing from solar. These stars have precise asteroseismic ages that can be compared to the abundance-based estimates. We analyse the well-known binary 16 Cyg AB for validation purposes and confirm the existence of a slight metal enhancement (~0.02 dex) in the primary, which might arise from planetary formation/ingestion. We draw attention to systematic errors in some widely-used catalogues of non-seismic parameters that may significantly bias asteroseismic inferences. In particular, we find evidence that the ASPCAP Teff scale used for the APOKASC catalogue is too cool for dwarfs and that the [Fe/H] values are underestimated by ~0.1 dex. We compare seismic ages to those inferred from empirical abundance-age relations based on ages from PARSEC isochrones and abundances obtained in the framework of the HARPS-GTO program. These calibrations take into account a dependency with the stellar effective temperature, metallicity, and/or mass. We find that the seismic and abundance-based ages differ on average by 1.5-2 Gyrs, while taking into account a dependency with one or two stellar parameters in the calibrations leads to a global improvement of up to ~0.5 Gyr. However, even in that case we find that seismic ages are systematically larger by ~0.7 Gyr. We argue that it may be ascribed to a variety of causes including the presence of small zero-point offsets between our abundances and those used to construct the calibrations or to the choice of the set of theoretical isochrones. The conclusions above are supported by the analysis of literature data for a larger number of Kepler targets. [Abridged], Comment: 23 pages, 16 figures. Accepted for publication in A&A

In the search of a sample of metal-poor bright giants using Str{\"o}mgren photometry, we serendipitously found a sample of 26 young (ages younger than 1 Gyr) metal-rich giants, some of which have high rotational velocities.We determined the chemical composition and rotational velocities of these stars in order to compare them with predictions from stellar evolution models. These stars where of spectral type A to B when on the main sequence, and we therefore wished to compare their abundance pattern to that of main-sequence A and B stars.Stellar masses were derived by comparison of the position of the stars in the colour-magnitude diagram with theoretical evolutionary tracks. These masses, together with Gaia photometry and parallaxes, were used to derive the stellar parameters. We used spectrum synthesis and model atmospheres to determine chemical abundances for 16 elements (C, N, O, Mg, Al, Ca, Fe, Sr, Y, Ba, La, Ce, Pr, Nd, Sm, and Eu) and rotational velocities.The age-metallicity degeneracy can affect photometric metallicity calibrations. We identify 15 stars as likely binary stars. All stars are in prograde motion around the Galactic centre and belong to the thin-disc population. All but one of the sample stars present low [C/Fe] and high [N/Fe] ratios together with constant [(C+N+O)/Fe], suggesting that they have undergone CNO processing and first dredge-up. The observed rotational velocities are in line with theoretical predictions of the evolution of rotating stars., Comment: Astronomy and Astrophysics - A\&A, EDP Sciences, 2021

Context. High-resolution spectroscopy in the near-infrared (NIR) is a powerful tool for characterising the physical and chemical properties of cool-star atmospheres. The current generation of NIR echelle spectrographs enables the sampling of many spectral features over the full 0.9-2.4 μm range for a detailed chemical tagging. Aims. Within the Stellar Population Astrophysics Large Program at the TNG, we used a high-resolution (R = 50 000) NIR spectrum of Arcturus acquired with the GIANO-B echelle spectrograph as a laboratory to define and calibrate an optimal line list and new diagnostic tools to derive accurate stellar parameters and chemical abundances. Methods. We inspected several hundred NIR atomic and molecular lines to derive abundances of 26 different chemical species, including CNO, iron-group, alpha, Z-odd, and neutron-capture elements. We then performed a similar analysis in the optical using Arcturus VLT-UVES spectra. Results. Through the combined NIR and optical analysis we defined a new thermometer and a new gravitometer for giant stars, based on the comparison of carbon (for the thermometer) and oxygen (for the gravitometer) abundances, as derived from atomic and molecular lines. We then derived self-consistent stellar parameters and chemical abundances of Arcturus over the full 4800-24 500 Å spectral range and compared them with previous studies in the literature. We finally discuss a number of problematic lines that may be affected by deviations from thermal equilibrium and/or chromospheric activity, as traced by the observed variability of He I at 10 830 Å.

We present ESO/VLT FORS2 low resolution spectroscopy of red giant branch stars in three massive, intermediate age ($\sim 1.7-2.3$ Gyr) star clusters in the Large Magellanic Cloud. We measure CH and CN index bands at 4300A, and 3883A, as well as [C/Fe] and [N/Fe] abundance ratios for 24, 21 and 12 member stars of NGC 1978, NGC 1651, NGC 1783, respectively. We find a significant intrinsic spread in CN in NGC 1978 and NGC 1651, a signal of multiple stellar populations (MPs) within the clusters. On the contrary, we report a null CN spread in NGC 1783 within our measurement precision. For NGC 1978, we separated the two populations in the CN distribution and we translated the CN spread into an internal N variation $\Delta$[N/Fe]$=0.63\pm0.49$ dex. For NGC 1651 and NGC 1783, we put upper limits on the N abundance variations of $\Delta$[N/Fe]$\leq 0.2, 0.4$ dex, respectively. The spectroscopic analysis confirms previous results from HST photometry, where NGC 1978 was found to host MPs in the form of N spreads, while slightly younger clusters (e.g. NGC 1783, $, Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS, 15 pages, 11 figures

We present the results of a spectroscopic and photometric investigation of 15 objects from the open cluster NGC 5662, which contains the Cepheid V Cen. Besides the Cepheid, we studied one G-supergiant, two K-giants, four B-giants, and seven main sequence stars. Radial velocities (RV), v sin i, Teff, log g, and [Fe/H] were determined using model fitting. We have derived the color-excesses, reddenings, and intrinsic colors for these stars to determine their true Teff and log g from comparison to the atmophere models, especially for hot stars, and to determine their absolute magnitudes. RV and GAIA DR2 2018 parallax/distance values for these stars allowed us to determine their membership in the cluster and to construct it 3D kinematic models. These parallaxes and reddenings led to the distances in a range of 700– 875 pc, while photometric MV gave the distances of 550–660 pc. Two objects from our list were found to be non-members of the cluster, and two other objects to be background stars. All members have [Fe/H] = −0.1±0.04 dex. The main sequence stars and B-giants have abundances of C, N, and Na close to the solar one, while the cool supergiants and giants show a deficit of carbon, an overabundance of nitrogen, and a small overabundance or close to the solar sodium content. Two Li-rich K-giants, HD 127733 and HD 127753, were discovered in the cluster.

Ancient ($>$10 Gyr) globular clusters (GCs) show chemical abundance variations in the form of patterns among certain elements, e.g. N correlates with Na and anti-correlates with O. Recently, N abundance spreads have also been observed in massive star clusters that are significantly younger than old GCs, down to an age of $\sim$2 Gyr. However, so far N has been the only element found to vary in such young objects. We report here the presence of Na abundance variations in the intermediate age massive star clusters NGC 416 ($\sim$6.5 Gyr old) and Lindsay 1 ($\sim$7.5 Gyr old) in the Small Magellanic Cloud, by combining HST and ESO-VLT MUSE observations. Using HST photometry we were able to construct ''chromosome maps'' and separate sub-populations with different N content, in the red giant branch of each cluster. MUSE spectra of individual stars belonging to each population were combined, resulting in high signal-to-noise spectra representative of each population, which were compared to search for mean differences in Na. We find a mean abundance variation of $\Delta$[Na/Fe]$=0.18\pm0.04$ dex for NGC 416 and $\Delta$[Na/Fe]$=0.24\pm0.05$ dex for Lindsay 1. In both clusters we find that the population that is enhanced in N is also enhanced in Na, which is the same pattern to the one observed in ancient GCs. Furthermore, we detect a bimodal distribution of core-helium burning Red Clump (RC) giants in the UV colour magnitude diagram of NGC 416. A comparison of the stacked MUSE spectra of the two RCs shows the same mean Na abundance difference between the two populations. The results reported in this work are a crucial hint that star clusters of a large age range share the same origin: they are the same types of objects, but only separated in age., Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRAS. 14 pages, 8 figures

We investigate the intrinsic scatter in the chemical abundances of a sample of metal-poor ([Fe/H], Comment: 14 pages, 9 figures, Accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

The extensive stellar spectroscopic datasets that are available for studies in Galactic Archeaology thanks to, for example, the Gaia-ESO Survey, now benefit from having a significant number of targets that overlap with asteroseismology projects such as Kepler, K2 and CoRoT. Combining the measurements from spectroscopy and asteroseismology allows us to attain greater accuracy with regard to the stellar parameters needed to characterise the stellar populations of the Milky Way. The aim of this Gaia-ESO Survey special project is to produce a catalogue of self-consistent stellar parameters by combining measurements from high-resolution spectroscopy and precision asteroseismology. We carried out an iterative analysis of 90 K2@Gaia-ESO red giants. The spectroscopic values of Teff were used as input in the seismic analysis to obtain log(g) values. The seismic estimates of log(g) were then used to re-determine the spectroscopic values of Teff and [Fe/H]. Only one iteration was required to obtain parameters that are in good agreement for both methods and thus, to obtain the final stellar parameters. A detailed analysis of outliers was carried out to ensure a robust determination of the parameters. The results were then combined with Gaia DR2 data to compare the seismic log(g) with a parallax-based log(g) and to investigate instances of variations in the velocity and possible binaries within the dataset. This analysis produced a high-quality catalogue of stellar parameters for 90 red giant stars observed by both K2 and Gaia-ESO that were determined through iterations between spectroscopy and asteroseismology. We compared the seismic gravities with those based on Gaia parallaxes to find an offset which is similar to other studies that have used asteroseismology. Our catalogue also includes spectroscopic chemical abundances and radial velocities, as well as indicators for possible binary detections., Comment: 33 pages, 26 figures

Eclipsing binary stars allow derivation of accurate and precise masses and radii. When they reside in star clusters, properties of even higher precision, along with additional information, can be extracted. Asteroseismology of solar-like oscillations offers similar possibilities for single stars. We improve the previously established properties of the Hyades eclipsing binary HD27130 and re-assess the asteroseismic properties of the giant star $\epsilon$ Tau. The physical properties of these members of the Hyades are then used to constrain the helium content and age of the cluster. New multi-colour light curves were combined with multi-epoch radial velocities to yield masses and radii of HD27130. $T_{\rm eff}$ was derived from spectroscopy and photometry, and verified using the Gaia parallax. We estimate the cluster age from re-evaluated asteroseismic properties of $\epsilon$ Tau while using HD27130 to constrain the helium content. The masses and radii, and $T_{\rm eff}$ of HD 27130 were found to be $M=1.0245\pm0.0024 M_{\odot}$, $R=0.9226\pm0.015 R_{\odot}$, $T_{\rm eff}=5650\pm50$ K for the primary, and $M=0.7426\pm0.0016 M_{\odot}$, $R=0.7388\pm0.026 R_{\odot}$, $T_{\rm eff}=4300\pm100$ K for the secondary component. Our re-evaluation of $\epsilon$ Tau suggests that the previous literature estimates are trustworthy, and that the Hipparcos parallax is more reliable than the Gaia DR2 parallax. The helium content of HD27130 and thus of the Hyades is found to be $Y=0.27$ but with significant model dependence. Correlations with the adopted metallicity results in a robust helium enrichment law with $\frac{\Delta Y}{\Delta Z}$ close to 1.2. We estimate the age of the Hyades to be 0.9 $\pm$ 0.1 (stat) $\pm$ 0.1 (sys) Gyr in slight tension with recent age estimates based on the cluster white dwarfs. (abridged), Comment: 14 pages, 8 figures, accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics

We analysed red giant branch stars in 16 Galactic globular clusters, computing their atmospheric parameters both from the photometry and from excitation and ionisation balances. The spectroscopic parameters are lower than the photometric ones and this discrepancy increases decreasing the metallicity, reaching, at [Fe/H]~-2.5 dex, differences of ~350 K in effective temperature and ~1 dex in surface gravity. We demonstrate that the spectroscopic parameters are inconsistent with the position of the stars in the colour-magnitude diagram, providing too low temperatures and gravities, and predicting that the stars are up to about 2.5 magnitudes brighter than the observed magnitudes. The parameter discrepancy is likely due to the inadequacies of the adopted physics, in particular the assumption of 1-dimensional geometry can be the origin of the observed slope between iron abundances and excitation potential that leads to low temperatures. However, the current modelling of 3D/NLTE radiative transfer for giant stars seems to be not able to totally erase this slope. We conclude that the spectroscopic parameters are wrong for metallicity lower than -1.5 dex and for these red giant stars photometric temperatures and gravities should be adopted. We provide a simple relation to correct the spectroscopic temperatures in order to put them onto a photometric scale., accepted for publication in A&A, 12 pages, 9 figures, 4 tables

We report the discovery of two Li-rich giant stars (fainter than the red giant branch bump) in the stellar system Omega Centauri using GIRAFFE-FLAMES spectra. These two stars have A(Li)=1.65 and 2.40 dex and they belong to the main population of the system ([Fe/H]=--1.70 and --1.82, respectively). The most Li-rich of them (#25664) has [Na/Fe]=+0.87 dex that is ~0.5 dex higher than those measured in the most Na-rich stars of Omega Centauri of similar metallicity. The chemical abundances of Li and Na in #25664 can be qualitatively explained by deep extra mixing efficient within the star during its RGB evolution or by super-asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars with masses between ~7 and 8 Msun. In the latter scenario, this Li-Na-rich star could be formed from the pure ejecta of super-AGB stars before the dilution with pristine material occurs, or, alternatively, be part of a binary system and experienced mass transfer from the companion when this latter evolved through the super-AGB phase. In both these cases, the chemical composition of this unique object could allow to look for the first time at the chemical composition of the gas processed in the interior of super-AGB stars., Comment: Accepted for publication in A&A

Asymptotic giant branch (AGB) stars in the globular cluster NGC6752 have been found to exhibit some chemical peculiarities with respect to the red giant branch (RGB) stars. A discrepancy between [FeI/H] and [FeII/H] (not observed in RGB stars) has been detected adopting spectroscopic temperatures. Moreover, a possible lack of second-population stars along the AGB was claimed. The use of photometric temperatures based on (V-K) colors was proposed to erase this iron discrepancy. Also, ad hoc scenarios have been proposed to explain the absence of second-population AGB stars. Here we analyzed a sample of 19 AGB and 14 RGB stars of NGC6752 observed with the spectrographs UVES. The two temperature scales agree very well for the RGB stars while for the AGB stars there is a systematic offset of ~100 K. We found that even if the photometric temperatures alleviate the iron discrepancy with respect to the spectroscopic ones, a systematic difference between [FeI/H] and [FeII/H] is still found among the AGB stars. An unexpected result is that the photometric temperatures do not satisfy the excitation equilibrium in the AGB stars. This suggests that standard 1D-LTE model atmospheres are unable to properly describe the thermal structure of AGB stars, at variance with the RGB stars. The use of photometric temperatures confirms the previous detection of second-population AGB stars in this cluster, with the presence of clear correlations/anticorrelations among the light element abundances. This firmly demonstrates that both first and second-population stars evolve along the AGB of NGC6752., Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ, 12 pages, 6 figures, 1 tabke

Aims: The Scutum complex in the inner disk of the Galaxy hosts a number of young clusters and associations of red supergiant stars that are heavily obscured by dust extinction. These stars are important tracers of the recent star formation and chemical enrichment history in the inner Galaxy. Methods: Within the SPA Large Programme at the TNG, we secured GIANO-B high-resolution (R ≃ 50 000) YJHK spectra of 11 red supergiants toward the Alicante 7 and Alicante 10 associations near the RSGC3 cluster. Taking advantage of the full YJHK spectral coverage of GIANO in a single exposure, we were able to measure several hundreds of atomic and molecular lines that are suitable for chemical abundance determinations. We also measured a prominent diffuse interstellar band at λ1317.8 nm (vacuum). This provides an independent reddening estimate. Results: The radial velocities, Gaia proper motions, and extinction of seven red supergiants in Alicante 7 and three in Alicante 10 are consistent with them being members of the associations. One star toward Alicante 10 has kinematics and low extinction that are inconsistent with a membership. By means of spectral synthesis and line equivalent width measurements, we obtained chemical abundances for iron-peak, CNO, alpha, other light, and a few neutron-capture elements. We found average slightly subsolar iron abundances and solar-scaled [X/Fe] abundance patterns for most of the elements, consistent with a thin-disk chemistry. We found depletion of [C/Fe], enhancement of [N/Fe], and relatively low 12C/13C < 15, which is consistent with CN cycled material and possibly some additional mixing in their atmospheres. Based on observations made with the Italian Telescopio Nazionale Galileo (TNG) operated on the island of La Palma by the Fundación Galileo Galilei of the INAF (Istituto Nazionale di Astrofisica) at the Spanish Observatorio del Roque de los Muchachos of the Instituto de Astrofisica de Canarias. This study is part of the Large Program titled SPA (Stellar population astrophysics: the detailed, age-resolved chemistry of the Milky Way disk; PI: L. Origlia), granted observing time with HARPS-N and GIANO-B echelle spectrographs at the TNG.

In our HST photometric survey, we have been searching for multiple stellar populations (MPs) in Magellanic Clouds (MCs) massive star clusters which span a significant range of ages ($\sim 1.5-11$ Gyr). In the previous papers of the series, we have shown that the age of the cluster represents one of the key factors in shaping the origin of the chemical anomalies. Here we present the analysis of four additional clusters in the MCs, namely Lindsay 38, Lindsay 113, NGC 2121 and NGC 2155, for which we recently obtained new UV HST observations. These clusters are more massive than $\sim 10^4M_{\odot}$ and have ages between $\sim 2.5-6$ Gyr, i.e. located in a previously unexplored region of the cluster age/mass diagram. We found chemical anomalies, in the form of N spreads, in three out of four clusters in the sample, namely in NGC 2121, NGC 2155 and Lindsay 113. By combining data from our survey and HST photometry for 3 additional clusters in the Milky Way (namely 47 Tuc, M15 and NGC 2419), we show that the extent of the MPs in the form of N spread is a strong function of age, with older clusters having larger N spreads with respect to the younger ones. Hence, we confirm that cluster age plays a significant role in the onset of MPs., Accepted for publication in MNRAS. 12 pages, 9 figures

Terzan 5 is a complex stellar system in the Galactic bulge, harboring stellar populations with very different iron content ({\Delta}[Fe/H] ~1 dex) and with ages differing by several Gyrs. Here we present an investigation of its variable stars. We report on the discovery and characterization of three RR Lyrae stars. For these newly discovered RR Lyrae and for six Miras of known periods we provide radial velocity and chemical abundances from spectra acquired with X-SHOOTER at the VLT. We find that the three RR Lyrae and the three short period Miras (P300 d) Miras analyzed in this study, has a radial velocity consistent with being Terzan 5 member. Its super-solar iron abundance and solar-scaled [{\alpha}/Fe] nicely match the chemical properties of the metal rich stellar population of Terzan 5 and its derived mass nicely agrees with being several Gyrs younger than the short period Miras. This young variable is an additional proof of the surprising young sub-population discovered in Terzan 5., Comment: 20 pages, 4 figures, in press on the ApJ

With the aim of probing the properties of the bright end of the Pristine survey and its effectiveness in selecting metal-poor stars, we selected a sample of bright candidate metal-poor stars combining Pristine CaHK photometry with APASS gi photometry, before the Gala second data release became available, These stars were observed with the SOPHIE spectrograph at the 1.93 in telescope of Observatoire de Haute Provence and we used photometry and parallaxes from Gaia DR2 to derive their atmospheric parameters. Chemical abundances were determined from the spectra for 40 stars of the sample. Eight stars were confirmed to be very metal-poor ([Fe/H] < -2.0), as expected from the photometric estimate. No star was found with [Fe/H] < -3.0, although for nine stars the photometric estimate was below this value. Three multiple systems are identified from their multipeaked cross-correlation functions, Two metal-poor stars with [Fe/H] approximate to -1.0 have an age estimate of about 4 Gyr. Accretion from a satellite galaxy is a possible explanation for these 'young metal-poor stars', but they could also be field blue stragglers. Galactic orbits for our sample of stars allowed us to divide them into three classes that we label 'Halo', 'Thick', and 'Thin' and tentatively identify as halo, thick disc, and thin disc. We present a new method for deriving photometric metallicities, effective temperatures, and surface gravities by combining Gala parallaxes, photometry, and Pristine CaHK photometry. Comparison with spectroscopic metallicities shows a very good agreement and suggests that we can further improve the efficiency of Pristine CaHK in selecting metal poor stars.

It has been suggested that IC 4499 is one of the very few old globulars to not host multiple populations with light-element variations. To follow-up on this very interesting result, here we have made use of accurate HST photometry and FLAMES at VLT high-resolution spectroscopy to investigate in more detail the stellar population properties of this system. We find that the red giant branch of the cluster is clearly bimodal in near-UV-optical colour-magnitude diagrams, thus suggesting that IC 4499 is actually composed by two sub-populations of stars with different nitrogen abundances. This represents the first detection of multiple populations in IC 4499. Consistently, we also find that one star out of six is Na-rich to some extent, while we do not detect any evidence of intrinsic spread in both Mg and O., The number ratio between stars with normal and enriched nitrogen is in good agreement with the number ratio - mass trend observed in Galactic globular clusters. Also, as typically found in other systems, nitrogen rich stars are more centrally concentrated than normal stars, although this result cannot be considered conclusive because of the limited field of view covered by our observations (similar to 1r(h))., On the contrary, we observe that both the RGB UV colour spread, which is a proxy of N variations, and Na abundance variations, are significantly smaller than those observed in Milky Way globular clusters with mass and metallicity comparable to IC 4499. The modest N and Na spreads observed in this system can be tentatively connected to the fact that IC 4499 likely formed in a disrupted dwarf galaxy orbiting the Milky Way, as previously proposed based on its orbit.

We present Li, Na, Al and Fe abundances of 199 lower red giant branch stars members of the stellar system Omega Centauri, using high-resolution spectra acquired with FLAMES at the Very Large Telescope. The A(Li) distribution is peaked at A(Li) ~ 1 dex with a prominent tail toward lower values. The peak of the distribution well agrees with the lithium abundances measured in lower red giant branch stars in globular clusters and Galactic field stars. Stars with A(Li) ~ 1 dex are found at metallicities lower than [Fe/H] ~ -1.3 dex but they disappear at higher metallicities. On the other hand, Li-poor stars are found at all the metallicities. The most metal-poor stars exhibit a clear Li-Na anticorrelation, with about 30% of the sample with A(Li) lower than ~ 0.8 dex, while in normal globular clusters these stars represent a small fraction. Most of the stars with [Fe/H] > -1.6 dex are Li-poor and Na-rich. The Li depletion measured in these stars is not observed in globular clusters with similar metallicities and we demonstrate that it is not caused by the proposed helium enhancements and/or young ages. Hence, these stars formed from a gas already depleted in lithium. Finally, we note that Omega Centauri includes all the populations (Li-normal/Na-normal, Li-normal/Na-rich and Li-poor/Na-rich stars) observed, to a lesser extent, in mono-metallic GCs., Accepted for publication in A&A, 10 pages, 9 figures, 2 tables

We present a detailed spectroscopic analysis of horizontal branch stars in the globular cluster NGC 3201. We collected optical (4580-5330 Å), high-resolution (∼34,000), high signal-to-noise ratio (∼200) spectra for 11 RR Lyrae stars and one red horizontal branch star with the multifiber spectrograph M2FS with the 6.5 m Magellan telescope at the Las Campanas Observatory. From measured equivalent widths, we derived atmospheric parameters and abundance ratios for α (Mg, Ca, and Ti), iron-peak (Sc, Cr, Ni, and Zn), and s-process (Y) elements. We found that NGC 3201 is a homogeneous, monometallic ([Fe/H] = -1.47 ± 0.04), α-enhanced ([α/Fe] = 0.37 ± 0.04) cluster. The relative abundances of the iron-peak and s-process elements were found to be consistent with solar values. In comparison with other large stellar samples, NGC 3201 RR Lyraes have similar chemical enrichment histories as do those of other old (t ≥ 10 Gyr) Halo components (globular clusters; red giants; blue and red horizontal branch stars; and RR Lyraes). We also provided a new average radial velocity estimate for NGC 3201 by using a template velocity curve to overcome the limit of single-epoch measurements of variable stars: Vrad = 494 ± 2 km s-1 (σ = 8 km s-1). This paper includes data gathered with the 6.5 m Magellan Telescopes located at Las Campanas Observatory, Chile.

Aims. We report 20 new lithium-rich giants discovered within the Gaia-ESO Survey, including the first Li-rich giant with an evolutionary stage confirmed by CoRoT (Convection, Rotation and planetary Transits) data. We present a detailed overview of the properties of these 20 stars., Methods. Atmospheric parameters and abundances were derived in model atmosphere analyses using medium-resolution GIRAFFE or high-resolution UVES (Ultraviolet and Visual Echelle Spectrograph) spectra. These results are part of the fifth internal data release of the Gaia-ESO Survey. The Li abundances were corrected for non-local thermodynamical equilibrium effects. Other stellar properties were investigated for additional peculiarities (the core of strong lines for signs of magnetic activity, infrared magnitudes, rotational velocities, chemical abundances, and Galactic velocities). We used Gaia DR2 parallaxes to estimate distances and luminosities., Results. The giants have A(Li) > 2.2 dex. The majority of them (14 of 20 stars) are in the CoRoT fields. Four giants are located in the field of three open clusters, but are not members. Two giants were observed in fields towards the Galactic bulge, but likely lie in the inner disc. One of the bulge field giants is super Li-rich with A(Li) = 4.0 dex., Conclusions. We identified one giant with infrared excess at 22 mu m. Two other giants, with large v sin i, might be Li-rich because of planet engulfment. Another giant is found to be barium enhanced and thus could have accreted material from a former asymptotic giant branch companion. Otherwise, in addition to the Li enrichment, the evolutionary stages are the only other connection between these new Li-rich giants. The CoRoT data confirm that one Li-rich giant is at the core-He burning stage. The other giants are concentrated in close proximity to the red giant branch luminosity bump, the core-He burning stages, or the early-asymptotic giant branch. This is very clear from the Gaia-based luminosities of the Li-rich giants. This is also seen when the CoRoT Li-rich giants are compared to a larger sample of 2252 giants observed in the CoRoT fields by the Gaia-ESO Survey, which are distributed throughout the red giant branch in the T-eff-log g diagram. These observations show that the evolutionary stage is a major factor for the Li enrichment in giants. Other processes, such as planet accretion, contribute at a smaller scale.

Investigating the chemical homogeneity of stars born from the same molecular cloud at virtually the same time is very important for our understanding of the chemical enrichment of the interstellar medium and with it the chemical evolution of the Galaxy. One major cause of inhomogeneities in the abundances of open clusters is stellar evolution of the cluster members. In this work, we investigate variations in the surface chemical composition of member stars of the old open clusterM67 as a possible consequence of atomic diffusion effects taking place during the main-sequence phase. The abundances used are obtained from high-resolution UVES/FLAMES spectra within the framework of the Gaia-ESO Survey. We find that the surface abundances of stars on the main sequence decrease with increasing mass reaching a minimum at the turn-off. After deepening of the convective envelope in subgiant branch stars, the initial surface abundances are restored.We found themeasured abundances to be consistent with the predictions of stellar evolutionary models for a cluster with the age and metallicity of M67. Our findings indicate that atomic diffusion poses a non-negligible constraint on the achievable precision of chemical tagging methods.© 2018 The Author(s) Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society., This work was supported by Sonderforschungsbereich SFB 881 'The Milky Way System' (subproject B5) of the German Research Foundation (DFG). AB acknowledges support from the SFB 881 visitor program. CBM thanks Elisabetta Caffau for fruitful discussions and Don VandenBerg for providing the isochrones shown in Fig 1. The authors would like to thank the anonymous referee for the constructive comments that helped in improving the present work.r MTC acknowledges the financial support from the Spanish Ministerio de Economia y Competitividad, through grant AYA2016-75931. AD and GT acknowledge support by the Research Council of Lithuania (MIP-082/2015). UH acknowledges support from the Swedish National Space Board (SNSB/Rymdstyrelsen). TB was supported by the project grant 'The New Milky' from the Knut and Alice Wallenberg foundation. RS acknowledges support from the Polish Ministry of Science and Higher Education. SGS and VA acknowledge the support by Fundacao para a Ciencia e Tecnologia (FCT) through national funds and a research grant (project ref. UID/FIS/04434/2013, and PTDC/FISAST/7073/2014). SGS also acknowledges the support from FCT through Investigador FCT contract of reference IF/00028/2014 and POPH/FSE (EC) by FEDER funding through the program 'Programa Operacional de Factores de Competitividade - COMPETE'. VA acknowledges the support from FCT through Investigador FCT contract IF/00650/2015/CP1273/CT0001. EJA acknowledges partial support from the Spanish Ministry for Economy and Competitiveness and FEDER funds through grant AYA2013-40611-P. ARC is supported through an Australian Research Council Discovery Project under grant DP160100637. CL thanks the Swiss National Science Foundation for supporting this research through the Ambizione grant number PZ00P2 168065. AK acknowledges support from the Swedish National Space Board (SNSB). XF acknowledges financial support from Premiale 2015 MITiC (PI B/Garilli). SLM acknowledges support from the Australian Research Council through grant DE140100598. AB acknowledges support from the Millennium Science Initiative (Chilean Ministry of Economy).r Based on data products from observations made with ESO Telescopes at the La Silla Paranal Observatory under programme ID 188.B-3002. These data products have been processed by the Cambridge Astronomy Survey Unit (CASU) at the Institute of Astronomy, University of Cambridge, and by the FLAMES/UVES reduction team at INAF/Osservatorio Astrofisico di Arcetri. These data have been obtained from the Gaia-ESO Survey Data Archive, prepared and hosted by the Wide Field Astronomy Unit, Institute for Astronomy, University of Edinburgh, which is funded by the UK Science and Technology Facilities Council. This work was partly supported by the European Union FP7 programme through ERC grant number 320360 and by the Leverhulme Trust through grant RPG-2012-541. We acknowledge the support from INAF and Ministero dell' Istruzione, dell' Universita' e della Ricerca (MIUR) in the form of the grant 'Premiale VLT 2012', and through PRIN-INAF 2014 'The Gaia-ESO Survey'. The results presented here benefit from discussions held during the Gaia-ESO workshops and conferences supported by the ESF (European Science Foundation) through the GREAT Research Network Programme. This research has made use of the SIMBAD data base, operated at CDS, Strasbourg, France and NASA's Astrophysics Data System.

A critical issue in the asymptotic giant branch (AGB) self-enrichment scenario for the formation of multiple populations in Globular Clusters (GCs) is the inability to reproduce the magnesium isotopic ratios, despite the model in principle can account for the depletion of magnesium. In this work we analyze how the uncertainties on the various p-capture cross sections affect the results related to the magnesium content of the ejecta of AGB stars. The observed distribution of the magnesium isotopes and of the overall Mg-Al trend in M13 and NGC 6752 are successfully reproduced when the proton-capture rate by 25Mg at the temperatures 100 MK, in particular the 25Mg(p, gamma)26Alm channel, is enhanced by a factor 3 with respect to the most recent experimental determinations. This assumption also allows to reproduce the full extent of the Mg spread and the Mg-Si anticorrelation observed in NGC 2419. The uncertainties in the rate of the 25Mg(p,gamma)26Alm reaction at the temperatures of interest here leave space for our assumption and we suggest that new experimental measurements are needed to settle this problem. We also discuss the competitive model based on the super massive star nucleosynthesis., accepted for publication on MNRAS

We present the first spectroscopic abundance determination of iron, alpha-elements (Si, Ca and Ti) and sodium for the Mira variable V1 in the metal-rich globular cluster NGC 5927. We use high-resolution (R~ 28,000), high signal-to-noise ratio (~200) spectra collected with WINERED, a near-infrared (NIR) spectrograph covering simultaneously the wavelength range 0.91--1.35 micron. The effective temperature and the surface gravity at the pulsation phase of the spectroscopic observation were estimated using both optical (V) and NIR time-series photometric data. We found that the Mira is metal-rich ([Fe/H]=-0.55 \pm 0.15) and moderately alpha-enhanced ([alpha/Fe]=0.15 \pm 0.01, sigma=0.2). These values agree quite well with the mean cluster abundances based on high-resolution optical spectra of several cluster red giants available in the literature ([Fe/H]=-0.47 \pm 0.06, [alpha/Fe]=+0.24 \pm 0.05). We also found a Na abundance of +0.35 \pm 0.20 that is higher than the mean cluster abundance based on optical spectra (+0.18 \pm 0.13). However, the lack of similar spectra for cluster red giants and that of corrections for departures from local-thermodynamical equilibrium prevents us from establishing whether the difference is intrinsic or connected with multiple populations. These findings indicate a strong similarity between optical and NIR metallicity scales in spite of the difference in the experimental equipment, data analysis and in the adopted spectroscopic diagnostics., Comment: Accepted for publication in the Astrophysical Journal Letters, 9 pages, 3 figures

We have derived a new thermonuclear rate with an associated uncertainty for the 10B(α, p)13C reaction by evaluating the available experimental data for the first time. We provide this rate with a much smaller uncertainty than that estimated in the literature. Our rate differs significantly from the theoretical rates adopted in the current reaction rate libraries. Utilizing this new rate, we have investigated its astrophysical implications on the heavy-element (especially, p-nuclei) production in the νp- process in a stellar model of the neutrino-driven wind of type II core-collapse supernova. It shows that our rate with a much smaller uncertainty strongly constrains the nucleosynthetic results of the light p-nulcei with A ∼ 80-100. In addition, it shows that the difference between observed and predicted abundances for light p- nuclei is quite large, implying either that the present stellar model still needs modification or that additional astrophysical sources are required to account for the origin of some p- nuclei, such as 92Mo and 94Mo.

We present a detailed analysis of the kinematic properties of the multiple populations (MPs) in the low-mass Galactic globular cluster NGC6362 based on a sample of about 500 member stars for which radial velocities (RVs), Fe and Na abundances have been homogeneously derived. At distances from the cluster center larger than about 0.5 $r_h$, we find that first (FG - Na-poor) and second generation (SG - Na-rich) stars show hints of different line-of-sight velocity dispersion profiles, with FG stars being dynamically hotter. This is the first time that differences in the velocity dispersion of MPs are detected by using only RVs. While kinematic differences between MPs in globular clusters are usually described in terms of anisotropy differences driven by the different radial distributions, this explanation seems hardly viable for NGC6362, where SG and FG stars are spatially mixed. We demonstrate that the observed difference in the velocity dispersion profiles can be accounted for by the effect of binary stars. In fact, thanks to our multi-epoch RV measurements we find that the binary fraction is significantly larger in the FG sample (f~14%) than in SG population (f, 18 pages, 6 figures; Accepted for publication in ApJ

Rup147 is the closest old open cluster, with a distance of less than 300 pc and an age of about 2.5Gyr. It is therefore well suited for testing stellar evolution models and for obtaining precise and detailed chemical abundance information. We combined photometric and astrometric information coming from literature and the Gaia mission with very high-resolution optical spectra of stars in different evolutionary stages to derive the cluster distance, age, and detailed chemical composition. We obtained spectra of six red giants using HARPS-N at the TNG. We also used ESO archive spectra of 22 main sequence stars, observed with HARPS at the 3.6m telescope. The very high resolution (115000) and the large wavelength coverage (about 380-680nm) of the twin instruments permitted us to derive atmospheric parameters, metallicity, and detailed chemical abundances of 23 species from all nucleosynthetic channels. We employed both equivalent widths and spectrum synthesis. We also re-derived the cluster distance and age using Gaia parallaxes, proper motions, and photometry in conjunction with the PARSEC stellar evolutionary models. We fully analysed those stars with radial velocity and proper motion/parallax in agreement with the cluster mean values. We also discarded one binary not previously recognised, and six stars near the MS turn-off because of their high rotation velocity. Our final sample consists of 21 stars (six giants and 15 MS stars). We measured metallicity (the cluster average [Fe/H] is +0.08, rms=0.07) and abundances of light, {\alpha}, Fe-peak, and neutron-capture elements. The Li abundance follows the expectations, showing a tight relation between temperature and abundance on the MS, at variance with M67, and we did not detect any Li-rich giant. We confirm that Rup147 is the oldest nearby open cluster. This makes it very valuable to test detailed features of stellar evolutionary models., Comment: 16 pages including 9 tables. 7 figures. Accepted by A&A

We have recently shown that the $\sim2$ Gyr old Large Magellanic Cloud star cluster NGC 1978 hosts multiple populations in terms of star-to-star abundance variations in [N/Fe]. These can be seen as a splitting or spread in the sub-giant and red giant branches (SGB and RGB) when certain photometric filter combinations are used. Due to its relative youth, NGC 1978 can be used to place stringent limits on whether multiple bursts of star-formation have taken place within the cluster, as predicted by some models for the origin of multiple populations. We carry out two distinct analyses to test whether multiple star-formation epochs have occurred within NGC 1978. First, we use UV CMDs to select stars from the first and second population along the SGB, and then compare their positions in optical CMDs, where the morphology is dominantly controlled by age as opposed to multiple population effects. We find that the two populations are indistinguishable, with age differences of $1\pm20$ Myr between them. This is in tension with predictions from the AGB scenario for the origin of multiple populations. Second, we estimate the broadness of the main sequence turnoff (MSTO) of NGC 1978 and we report that it is consistent with the observational errors. We find an upper limit of $\sim$65 Myr on the age spread in the MSTO of NGC 1978. This finding is in conflict with the age spread scenario as origin of the extended MSTO in intermediate age clusters, while it fully supports predictions from the stellar rotation model., 11 pages, 10 figures, accepted for publication on MNRAS