English

On the Metallicity Dependence of Classical Cepheid Light Amplitudes

Cosmology and Nongalactic Astrophysics 2015-06-12 v1 Solar and Stellar Astrophysics

Abstract

Classical Cepheids remain a cornerstone of the cosmic distance scale, and thus characterizing the dependence of their light amplitude on metallicity is important. Period-amplitude diagrams constructed for longer-period classical Cepheids in IC 1613, NGC 3109, SMC, NGC 6822, LMC, and the Milky Way imply that very metal-poor Cepheids typically exhibit smaller V-band amplitudes than their metal-rich counterparts. The results provide an alternate interpretation relative to arguments for a null and converse metallicity dependence. The empirical results can be employed to check predictions from theoretical models, to approximate mean abundances for target populations hosting numerous long-period Cepheids, and to facilitate the identification of potentially blended or peculiar objects.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.1211.4026,
  title  = {On the Metallicity Dependence of Classical Cepheid Light Amplitudes},
  author = {Daniel J. Majaess and David G. Turner and Wolfgang P. Gieren and Leonid N. Berdnikov and David J. Lane},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:1211.4026},
  year   = {2015}
}

Comments

To appear in ApSS