The Hobby-Eberly Telescope "Chemical Abundances of Stars in the Halo" (CASH) Project. I. The Lithium-, s-, and r-Enhanced Metal-Poor Giant HKII 17435-00532

TL;DR

This study presents a detailed chemical abundance analysis of a metal-poor giant star, revealing unusual lithium enrichment and s- and r-process element enhancements, suggesting complex stellar evolution and possible binary interactions.

Contribution

First detailed abundance analysis of HKII 17435-00532, identifying unique chemical signatures and proposing explanations for lithium enrichment and element enhancements.

Findings

Star has high lithium abundance (log eps Li=+2.1).

Star shows enhancement of s- and r-process elements.

Possible binary system with mass transfer history.

Abstract

We present the first detailed abundance analysis of the metal-poor giant HKII 17435-00532. This star was observed as part of the University of Texas long-term project "Chemical Abundances of Stars in the Halo" (CASH). A spectrum was obtained with the High Resolution Spectrograph (HRS) on the Hobby-Eberly Telescope with a resolving power of R~15,000. Our analysis reveals that this star may be located on the red giant branch, red horizontal branch, or early asymptotic giant branch. We find that this metal-poor ([Fe/H]=-2.2) star has an unusually high lithium abundance (log eps (Li)=+2.1), mild carbon ([C/Fe]=+0.7) and sodium ([Na/Fe]=+0.6) enhancement, as well as enhancement of both s-process ([Ba/Fe]=+0.8) and r-process ([Eu/Fe]=+0.5) material. The high Li abundance can be explained by self-enrichment through extra mixing that connects the convective envelope with the outer regions of the H-burning shell. If so, HKII 17435-00532 is the most metal-poor star in which this short-lived phase of Li enrichment has been observed. The Na and n-capture enrichment can be explained by mass transfer from a companion that passed through the thermally-pulsing AGB phase of evolution with only a small initial enrichment of r-process material present in the birth cloud. Despite the current non-detection of radial velocity variations (over ~180 days), it is possible that HKII 17435-00532 is in a long-period or highly-inclined binary system, similar to other stars with similar n-capture enrichment patterns.