The Impact of the New $^{59}$Fe Decay Rates on $^{60}$Fe and $^{26}$Al Nucleosynthesis in Massive Stars
Abstract
The diffuse -ray emission from short-lived radioactive Al and Fe provides a direct probe of ongoing nucleosynthesis in the Galaxy. However, theoretical models have long struggled to reproduce the observed Fe/Al flux ratio, typically predicting values significantly higher than constraints derived from INTEGRAL/SPI observations. In this work, we investigate the impact of the recently measured, temperature-dependent stellar decay rate of Fe on the nucleosynthesis of these isotopes. We compute a grid of non-rotating massive star models (- M) at solar metallicity using the MESA code, coupled with a rigorous numerical resolution analysis. We find that the updated rate significantly suppresses the net production of Fe by approximately 0.28 dex () compared to models using LMP theoretical rates, while leaving Al yields virtually unchanged. This reduction is primarily driven by the enhanced decay during convective carbon shell burning. Integrating these yields over a standard Salpeter Initial Mass Function, we predict a Galactic flux ratio of , which is in excellent agreement with the observed value of . Furthermore, this ratio exhibits a weak dependence on the IMF slope. Our results indicate that the updated nuclear physics input significantly alleviates the long-standing Fe overproduction problem, bringing theoretical predictions into much closer alignment with current Galactic observations.
Comments: Accepted for publication in The Astrophysical Journal (ApJ)
Cite
@article{arxiv.2605.29381,
title = {The Impact of the New $^{59}$Fe Decay Rates on $^{60}$Fe and $^{26}$Al Nucleosynthesis in Massive Stars},
author = {Bingyang Tan and Wenyu Xin and Ruizheng Jiang and Gang Zhao and Koh Takahashi},
journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2605.29381},
year = {2026}
}