The Dawes Review 2: Nucleosynthesis and stellar yields of low and intermediate-mass single stars

TL;DR

This review summarizes the current understanding of nucleosynthesis and stellar yields in low and intermediate-mass stars, highlighting recent observational constraints, uncertainties, and efforts to produce comprehensive yield models across different metallicities.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of stellar evolution, nucleosynthesis, and yields for stars up to 10Msun, incorporating latest observational data and addressing key uncertainties.

Findings

Recurrent mixing alters surface compositions in low/intermediate-mass stars.

Stellar yields vary significantly with metallicity and mass.

Recent models aim to produce homogeneous yields across different conditions.

Abstract

The chemical evolution of the Universe is governed by the chemical yields from stars, which in turn is determined primarily by the initial stellar mass. Even stars as low as 0.9Msun can, at low metallicity, contribute to the chemical evolution of elements. Stars less massive than about 10Msun experience recurrent mixing events that can significantly change the surface composition of the envelope, with observed enrichments in carbon, nitrogen, fluorine, and heavy elements synthesized by the slow neutron capture process (the s-process). Low and intermediate mass stars release their nucleosynthesis products through stellar outflows or winds, in contrast to massive stars that explode as core-collapse supernovae. Here we review the stellar evolution and nucleosynthesis for single stars up to ~10Msun from the main sequence through to the tip of the asymptotic giant branch (AGB). We include a discussion of the main uncertainties that affect theoretical calculations and review the latest observational data, which are used to constrain uncertain details of the stellar models. We finish with a review of the stellar yields available for stars less massive than about 10Msun and discuss efforts by various groups to address these issues and provide homogeneous yields for low and intermediate-mass stars covering a broad range of metallicities.