Table · dataset · 2026
He abundances in galactic O-type stars
Listed in IVOA Registry (Virtual Observatory)
The presence of massive O-type stars with surfaces enriched by CNO-cycle products has been known since the early 1980s.
Description
For many years, internal rotational mixing was assumed to be the dominant mechanism responsible for this chemical contamination. However, accumulating evidence suggests that binary interaction may play an equally important, if not dominant, role.
We aim to carry out a large-scale investigation of surface helium (He) abundances in Galactic O-type stars, based on the results from the analysis of high-quality spectroscopic data from the IACOB project. We perform a homogeneous spectroscopic analysis of 318 Galactic O-type stars with the iacob-broad and fastwind/iacob-gbat tools, deriving rotational velocities, atmospheric parameters, and He abundances. We also account for the influence of binarity, and parameter degeneracies on the abundance determinations.
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We present homogeneously determined surface He abundances (YHe=N(He)/N(H)) for the so far largest, statistically significant sample of Galactic O-type stars. About 60% of the stars show He abundances consistent with the cosmic abundance standard of YHe=0.098+/-0.002. For another 18% of the stars, we obtain anomalously low He abundance estimates, reaching values down to 0.07.
These unusual He abundances might be a consequence of flux contamination of the analyzed spectra by a faint companion. The remaining 22% display clear He enrichment (YHe>0.13). We provide observational evidence indicating that most of these He-enriched stars are likely the products of binary interaction.Our study highlights how large spectroscopic surveys are gradually opening robust observational avenues to identify the products of massive binary interaction.
It also emphasizes the need for caution when interpreting the spectroscopic properties of apparently single O-type stars. A significant fraction may in fact be the outcome of binary evolution rather than isolated stellar birth.
Links
Where it is published
- Reference page cdsarc.cds.unistra.fr/viz-bin/cat/J/A+A/711/A151 ↗
landing page · from IVOA Registry
Documentation and papers
- ADS 2026A&A...711A.151S ui.adsabs.harvard.edu/abs/2026A%26A...711A.151S ↗
publication · from IVOA Registry
Catalogue records · 2
- VOResource record dc.g-vo.org/oai.xml?verb=GetRecord&metadataPrefix=ivo_vor&identifier=ivo%3… ↗
metadata API · from IVOA Registry
- Registry record (GAVO) dc.g-vo.org/I/cds.vizier/j/a%2Ba/711/a151 ↗
catalogue entry · from IVOA Registry
Topics
- Stated by source
- Optical
- From keywords
- Astronomy & Astrophysics
Provenance · 1 source records, 8 field assertions
| Source | Key | Last seen | Raw |
|---|---|---|---|
| IVOA Registry (Virtual Observatory) | ivo://cds.vizier/j/a+a/711/a151 | 13 d ago | JSON v1 |
| Field | Assertion | Extractor | Evidence |
|---|---|---|---|
| access_level | source · IVOA Registry | connector:ivoa_registry@1.0.0 | |
| concepts[field].local:field:astronomy | mapping · IVOA Registry | connector:ivoa_registry@1.0.0 | |
| concepts[modality].ivoa_waveband:optical | source · IVOA Registry | connector:ivoa_registry@1.0.0 | |
| description | source · IVOA Registry | connector:ivoa_registry@1.0.0 | rr.resource.res_description |
| license_text | source · IVOA Registry | connector:ivoa_registry@1.0.0 | |
| publication_date | source · IVOA Registry | connector:ivoa_registry@1.0.0 | |
| title | source · IVOA Registry | connector:ivoa_registry@1.0.0 | rr.resource.res_title |
| updated_date | source · IVOA Registry | connector:ivoa_registry@1.0.0 |