The Mass-Loss Return From Evolved Stars to The Large Magellanic Cloud VI: Luminosities and Mass-Loss Rates on Population Scales

TL;DR

This study applies a comprehensive grid of radiative transfer models to the entire evolved stellar population of the Large Magellanic Cloud, deriving luminosities, mass-loss rates, and chemical compositions to understand their contribution to the interstellar medium.

Contribution

It is the first large-scale application of the GRAMS model grid to the LMC, providing detailed parameters for thousands of evolved stars and insights into their dust and mass-loss properties.

Findings

Dust injection rate to the LMC ISM is about 1.5x10^(-5) solar masses/yr.

Carbon stars contribute 2.5 times more dust than O-rich AGB stars.

A bolometric correction factor for C-rich AGB stars was derived as a function of J-K color.

Abstract

We present results from the first application of the Grid of Red Supergiant and Asymptotic Giant Branch ModelS (GRAMS) model grid to the entire evolved stellar population of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC). GRAMS is a pre-computed grid of 80,843 radiative transfer (RT) models of evolved stars and circumstellar dust shells composed of either silicate or carbonaceous dust. We fit GRAMS models to ~30,000 Asymptotic Giant Branch (AGB) and Red Supergiant (RSG) stars in the LMC, using 12 bands of photometry from the optical to the mid-infrared. Our published dataset consists of thousands of evolved stars with individually determined evolutionary parameters such as luminosity and mass-loss rate. The GRAMS grid has a greater than 80% accuracy rate discriminating between Oxygen- and Carbon-rich chemistry. The global dust injection rate to the interstellar medium (ISM) of the LMC from RSGs and AGB stars is on the order of 1.5x10^(-5) solar masses/yr, equivalent to a total mass injection rate (including the gas) into the ISM of ~5x10^(-3) solar masses/yr. Carbon stars inject two and a half times as much dust into the ISM as do O-rich AGB stars, but the same amount of mass. We determine a bolometric correction factor for C-rich AGB stars in the K band as a function of J - K color, BC(K) = -0.40(J-K)^2 + 1.83(J-K) + 1.29. We determine several IR color proxies for the dust mass-loss rate (MLR) from C-rich AGB stars, such as log (MLR) = (-18.90)/((K-[8.0])+3.37)-5.93. We find that a larger fraction of AGB stars exhibiting the `long-secondary period' phenomenon are O-rich than stars dominated by radial pulsations, and AGB stars without detectable mass-loss do not appear on either the first-overtone or fundamental-mode pulsation sequences.