Mg I emission lines at 12 and 18 micrometer in K giants

TL;DR

This study presents high-resolution spectra of K giants showing Mg I emission lines at 12 and 18 micrometers, and demonstrates successful non-LTE modeling to reproduce these lines, highlighting the importance of atomic data and collisional processes.

Contribution

First observational detection of Mg I emission lines at 18 micrometers in K giants and development of a detailed non-LTE modeling approach for these lines.

Findings

Successfully reproduced Mg I emission lines in giants and the Sun.

Line profiles depend critically on atomic data and collisional processes.

Energy levels with n > 9 are necessary for accurate modeling.

Abstract

The solar Mg I emission lines at 12 micrometer have already been observed and analyzed well. Previous modeling attempts for other stars have, however, been made only for Procyon and two cool evolved stars, with unsatisfactory results for the latter. We present high-resolution observational spectra for the K giants Pollux, Arcturus, and Aldebaran, which show strong Mg I emission lines at 12 micrometer as compared to the Sun. We also present the first observed stellar emission lines from Mg I at 18 micrometer and from Al I, Si I, and presumably Ca I at 12 micrometer. To produce synthetic line spectra, we employ standard non-LTE modeling for trace elements in cool stellar photospheres. We compute model atmospheres with the MARCS code, apply a comprehensive magnesium model atom, and use the radiative transfer code MULTI to solve for the magnesium occupation numbers in statistical equilibrium. We successfully reproduce the observed Mg I emission lines simultaneously in the giants and in the Sun, but show how the computed line profiles depend critically on atomic input data and how the inclusion of energy levels with n > 9 and collisions with neutral hydrogen are necessary to obtain reasonable fits.