Effective temperature of ionizing stars of extragalactic HII regions

TL;DR

This study estimates the effective temperature of ionizing stars in extragalactic HII regions using emission-line ratios, revealing dependencies on ionization parameters and metallicity, and finding a typical Teff range of 37-40 kK with positive gradients across spiral galaxy disks.

Contribution

Introduces a calibration of the Teff-R relation using photoionization models and proposes metallicity-dependent relationships between emission-line ratios and ionization parameters.

Findings

Teff can be estimated in the 30-40 kK range using the R index.

Most HII regions have Teff between 37 and 40 kK, averaging 38.5 kK.

Positive Teff gradients are observed along spiral galaxy disks.

Abstract

The effective temperature (Teff) of the radiation field of the ionizing star(s) of a large sample of extragalactic HII regions was estimated using the R= log([OII](3727)/[OIII]5007) index. We used a grid of photoionization models to calibrate the Teff-R relation finding that it has a strong dependence with the ionizing parameter while it shows a weak direct dependence with the metallicity (variations in Z imply variations in U) of both the stellar atmosphere of the ionizing star and the gas phase of the HII region. Since the R index varies slightly with the Teff for values larger than 40 kK, the R index can be used to derive the Teff in 30-40 kK range. A large fraction of the ionization parameter variation is due to differences in the temperature of the ionizing stars and then the use of the (relatively) low Teff dependent S2=[S II](6717+31)/Ha emission-line ratio to derive the ionization parameter is preferable over others in the literature. We propose linear metallicity dependent relationships between S2 and U. Teff and metallicity estimations for a sample of 865 HII regions, whose emission-line intensities were compiled from the literature, do not show any Teff-Z correlation. On the other hand it seems to be hints of the presence of an anti-correlation between Teff-U. We found that the majority of the studied HII regions (87%) present Teff values in the range between 37 and 40 kK, with an average value of 38.5 kK. We also studied the variation of Teff as a function of the galactocentric distance for 14 spiral galaxies. Our results are in agreement with the idea of the existence of positive Teff gradients along the disk of spiral galaxies.