Galactic Kinematics from OB3 Stars with Distances determined from Interstellar Ca II Lines

TL;DR

This study refines distances to OB3 stars using interstellar Ca II lines, leading to improved Galactic rotation and spiral density wave parameters, enhancing our understanding of Galactic kinematics.

Contribution

It provides a correction to previous distance scales and derives detailed Galactic rotation and spiral wave parameters from OB3 star data.

Findings

Distances should be reduced by approximately 20%.

The solar neighborhood's circular velocity is about 252 km/s.

Spiral density wave wavelength is approximately 2.3 kpc.

Abstract

Based on data for 102 OB3 stars with known proper motions and radial velocities, we have tested the distances derived by Megier et al. from interstellar Ca II spectral lines. The internal reconciliation of the distance scales using the first derivative of the angular velocity of Galactic rotation {\Omega}'0 and the external reconciliation with Humphreys's distance scale for OB associations refined by Mel'nik and Dambis show that the initial distances should be reduced by \approx 20%. Given this correction, the heliocentric distances of these stars lie within the range 0.6-2.6 kpc. A kinematic analysis of these stars at a fixed Galactocentric distance of the Sun, R0=8 kpc, has allowed the following parameters to be determined:(1) the solar peculiar velocity components (U_o,V_o,W_o)=(8.9,10.3,6.8)\pm(0.6,1.0,0.4) km/s;(2) the Galactic rotation parameters {\Omega}_o=-31.5\pm0.9 km/s/kpc, {\Omega}'_o=+4.49\pm0.12 km/s/kpc^2, {\Omega}"_o=-1.05\pm0.38 km/s/kpc^3, (the corresponding Oort constants are A=17.9\pm0.5 km/s/kpc, B=-13.6\pm1.0 km/s/kpc and the circular rotation velocity of the solar neighborhood is |V_o|=252\pm14 km/s); (3) the spiral density wave parameters, namely: the perturbation amplitudes for the radial and azimuthal velocity components, respectively, f_R = -12.5\pm1.1 km/s and f_{\theta}=2.0\pm1.6 km/s; the pitch angle for the two-armed spiral pattern i=-5.3\pm0.3 degrees, with the wavelength of the spiral density wave at the solar distance being {\lambda}=2.3\pm0.2 kpc; the Sun's phase in the spiral wave {\chi}_o=-91\pm4 degrees.