Tracing the Milky Way: Calibrating chemical ages with high-precision Kepler data

Fuente: arXiv
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Main Authors: Casali, G., Montalbàn, J., Miglio, A., Casagrande, L., Magrini, L., Chiappini, C., Bragaglia, A., Matteuzzi, M., Brogaard, K., Stokholm, A., Grisoni, V., Tailo, M., Willett, E.
Format: Preprint
Published: 2025
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author Casali, G.
Montalbàn, J.
Miglio, A.
Casagrande, L.
Magrini, L.
Chiappini, C.
Bragaglia, A.
Matteuzzi, M.
Brogaard, K.
Stokholm, A.
Grisoni, V.
Tailo, M.
Willett, E.
author_facet Casali, G.
Montalbàn, J.
Miglio, A.
Casagrande, L.
Magrini, L.
Chiappini, C.
Bragaglia, A.
Matteuzzi, M.
Brogaard, K.
Stokholm, A.
Grisoni, V.
Tailo, M.
Willett, E.
contents Chemical clocks offer a powerful tool for estimating stellar ages from spectroscopic surveys. We present a new detailed spectroscopic analysis of 68 Kepler red giant stars to provide a suite of high-precision abundances along with asteroseismic ages with better than 10 percent precision from individual mode frequencies. We obtained several chemical clocks as ratios between s-process elements (Y, Zr, Ba, La, Ce) and alpha-elements (Mg, Ca, Si, Al, Ti). Our data show that [Ce/Mg] and [Zr/Ti] display a remarkably tight correlation with stellar ages, with abundance dispersions of 0.08 and 0.01 dex respectively and below 3 Gyr in ages, across the entire Galactic chronochemical history. While improving the precision floor of spectroscopic surveys is critical for broadening the scope and applicability of chemical clocks, the intrinsic accuracy of our relations -- enabled by high-resolution chemical abundances and stellar ages in our sample -- allows us to draw meaningful conclusions about age trends across stellar populations. By applying our relations to the APOGEE and Gaia-ESO surveys, we are able to differentiate the low- and high-alpha sequences in age, recover the age-metallicity relation, observe the disc flaring of the Milky Way, and identify a population of old metal-rich stars.
format Preprint
id arxiv_https___arxiv_org_abs_2506_15546
institution arXiv
publishDate 2025
record_format arxiv
spellingShingle Tracing the Milky Way: Calibrating chemical ages with high-precision Kepler data
Casali, G.
Montalbàn, J.
Miglio, A.
Casagrande, L.
Magrini, L.
Chiappini, C.
Bragaglia, A.
Matteuzzi, M.
Brogaard, K.
Stokholm, A.
Grisoni, V.
Tailo, M.
Willett, E.
Astrophysics of Galaxies
Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
Chemical clocks offer a powerful tool for estimating stellar ages from spectroscopic surveys. We present a new detailed spectroscopic analysis of 68 Kepler red giant stars to provide a suite of high-precision abundances along with asteroseismic ages with better than 10 percent precision from individual mode frequencies. We obtained several chemical clocks as ratios between s-process elements (Y, Zr, Ba, La, Ce) and alpha-elements (Mg, Ca, Si, Al, Ti). Our data show that [Ce/Mg] and [Zr/Ti] display a remarkably tight correlation with stellar ages, with abundance dispersions of 0.08 and 0.01 dex respectively and below 3 Gyr in ages, across the entire Galactic chronochemical history. While improving the precision floor of spectroscopic surveys is critical for broadening the scope and applicability of chemical clocks, the intrinsic accuracy of our relations -- enabled by high-resolution chemical abundances and stellar ages in our sample -- allows us to draw meaningful conclusions about age trends across stellar populations. By applying our relations to the APOGEE and Gaia-ESO surveys, we are able to differentiate the low- and high-alpha sequences in age, recover the age-metallicity relation, observe the disc flaring of the Milky Way, and identify a population of old metal-rich stars.
title Tracing the Milky Way: Calibrating chemical ages with high-precision Kepler data
topic Astrophysics of Galaxies
Solar and Stellar Astrophysics
url https://arxiv.org/abs/2506.15546