Using chemical tagging to redefine the interface of the Galactic disk and halo

TL;DR

This study uses chemical abundance patterns in stars from the APOGEE survey to redefine the boundaries and characteristics of the Galactic disk and halo, revealing new insights into their composition and transition regions.

Contribution

It introduces a chemical tagging method to distinguish Galactic components and suggests new chemical abundance planes for labeling these structures independently of kinematics.

Findings

Identification of an $oldsymbol{ ext{alpha}}$-poor and $oldsymbol{ ext{alpha}}$-rich sequence in the halo.

Evidence that the thick disk and halo are not fully chemically distinct.

The thin disk may extend to lower metallicities than previously thought.

Abstract

We present a chemical abundance distribution study in 14 $\alpha$, odd-Z, even-Z, light, and Fe-peak elements of approximately 3200 intermediate metallicity giant stars from the APOGEE survey. The main aim of our analysis is to explore the Galactic disk-halo transition region between -1.20 $<$ [Fe/H] $<$ -0.55 as a means to study chemical difference (and similarities) between these components. In this paper, we show that there is an $\alpha$-poor and $\alpha$-rich sequence within both the metal-poor and intermediate metallicity regions. Using the Galactic rest-frame radial velocity and spatial positions, we further separate our sample into the canonical Galactic components. We then studied the abundances ratios, of Mg, Ti, Si, Ca, O, S, Al, C+N, Na, Ni, Mn, V, and K for each of the components and found the following: (1) the $\alpha$-poor halo subgroup is chemically distinct in the $\alpha$-elements (particularly O, Mg, and S), Al, C+N, and Ni from the $\alpha$-rich halo, consistent with the literature confirming the existence of an $\alpha$-poor accreted halo population; (2) the canonical thick disk and halo are not chemically distinct in all elements indicating a smooth transition between the thick disk and halo; (3) a subsample of the $\alpha$-poor stars at metallicities as low as [Fe/H] $\sim$ -0.85 dex are chemically and dynamically consistent with the thin disk indicating that the thin disk may extend to lower metallicities than previously thought, and (4) that the location of the most metal-poor thin disk stars are consistent with a negative radial metallicity gradient. Finally, we used our analysis to suggest a new set of chemical abundance planes ([$\alpha$/Fe], [C+N/Fe], [Al/Fe], and [Mg/Mn]) that may be able to chemically label the Galactic components in a clean and efficient way independent of kinematics.