The Detailed Chemical Properties of M31 Star Clusters. I. Fe, Alpha and Light Elements

Abstract

We present ages, Fe/H] and abundances of the a elements Ca I, Si I, Ti I, Ti II, and light elements Mg I, Na I, and Al I for 31 globular clusters (GCs) in M31, which were obtained from high-resolution, high signal-to-noise ratio > 60 echelle spectra of their integrated light (IL). All abundances and ages are obtained using our original technique for high-resolution IL abundance analysis of GCs. This sample provides a never before seen picture of the chemical history of M31. The GCs are dispersed throughout the inner and outer halo, from 2.5 kpc < R_(M31) < 117 kpc. We find a range of Fe/H] within 20 kpc of the center of M31, and a constant Fe/H] ~-1.6 for the outer halo clusters. We find evidence for at least one massive GC in M31 with an age between 1 and 5 Gyr. The ɑ-element ratios are generally similar to the Milky Way GC and field star ratios. We also find chemical evidence for a late-time accretion origin for at least one cluster, which has a different abundance pattern than other clusters at similar metallicity. We find evidence for star-to-star abundance variations in Mg, Na, and Al in the GCs in our sample, and find correlations of Ca, Mg, Na, and possibly Al abundance ratios with cluster luminosity and velocity dispersion, which can potentially be used to constrain GC self-enrichment scenarios. Data presented here were obtained with the HIRES echelle spectrograph on the Keck I telescope.

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