Chemical Enrichment in the Carbon-enhanced Damped Lyman $\alpha$ System

TL;DR

This paper demonstrates that the elemental abundance pattern in a carbon-rich Damped Lyman alpha system aligns with nucleosynthesis yields from faint core-collapse supernovae of primordial stars, not pair-instability supernovae.

Contribution

It provides evidence that chemical enrichment in such systems is primarily driven by core-collapse supernovae from 20-50 solar mass primordial stars, clarifying early galaxy evolution.

Findings

DLA abundance pattern matches faint core-collapse supernova yields.

Pattern inconsistent with pair-instability supernovae.

Supports core-collapse supernovae as main enrichment source for EMP stars.

Abstract

We show that the recently observed elemental abundance pattern of the carbon-rich metal-poor Damped Lyman $\alpha$ (DLA) system is in excellent agreement with the nucleosynthesis yields of faint core-collapse supernovae of primordial stars. The observed abundance pattern is not consistent with the nucleosynthesis yields of pair-instability supernovae. The DLA abundance pattern is very similar to that of carbon-rich extremely metal-poor (EMP) stars, and the contributions from low-mass stars and/or binary effects should be very small in DLAs. This suggests that chemical enrichment by the first stars in the first galaxies is driven by core-collapse supernovae from $\sim 20-50 M_\odot$ stars, and also supports the supernova scenario as the enrichment source of EMP stars in the Milky Way Galaxy.