English

Photometric Metallicities for 367,324 stars of Omega Centauri

Solar and Stellar Astrophysics 2026-04-17 v1 Astrophysics of Galaxies

Abstract

Omega Centauri is the most massive and chemically complex multi-population globular cluster with a wide metallicity range that has been extensively studied photometrically and spectroscopically. Using the wide metallicity range of omega Cen, HST photometry (F275W, F336W, F435W, F625W), and MUSE spectroscopy ([M/H]), we derive [M/H]- and M_{F625W}-dependent stellar loci to estimate photometric metallicities from HST colors. Our tests yield metallicity precisions of 0.10\,dex for giants and 0.22\,dex for fainter dwarfs. We construct a photometric metallicity catalog from simultaneous F336W, F435W, and F625W observations (plus F275W where available), containing 20,778 giants and 346,546 dwarfs. A subsample of 20,533 giants is used to study the spatial metallicity distribution and gradient. We find no significant metallicity gradient within the half-light radius, consistent with previous work. Moreover, the previously reported ring-like structure is less pronounced in our data, and no physically significant, irregular two-dimensional metallicity pattern is detected, indicating that the stellar subpopulations are well mixed within the half-light radius. Our catalog significantly extends the metallicity sample of omega Cen, and this approach can be applied to other HST data to estimate photometric metallicities.

Keywords

Cite

@article{arxiv.2604.15103,
  title  = {Photometric Metallicities for 367,324 stars of Omega Centauri},
  author = {Xue Lu and Haibo Yuan and Bowen Huang and Tao Wang and Timothy C. Beers},
  journal= {arXiv preprint arXiv:2604.15103},
  year   = {2026}
}

Comments

13 pages, 12 figures, accepted for publication in ApJS