A Search for Candidate Li-Rich Giant Stars in SDSS DR10

TL;DR

This study searches for lithium-rich giant stars in the SDSS DR10 dataset, developing a method to distinguish stellar types and identifying promising candidates for further research.

Contribution

It introduces a new approach to identify Li-rich giants using spectral line features and multi-dimensional cuts, building on previous methods for stellar classification.

Findings

Identified a set of high-likelihood Li-rich giant star candidates.

Developed a spectral feature-based method to separate stellar evolutionary stages.

Provided a catalog of potential Li-rich giants for future detailed analysis.

Abstract

We report the results of a search for candidate Li-rich giants among 569,738 stars of the SDSS DR10 dataset. With small variations, our approach is based on that taken in an earlier search for EMP/CEMP stars and uses the same dataset. As part of our investigation, we demonstrate a method for separating post-main sequence and main sequence stars cooler than Teff ~ 5800 K using our feature strength measures of the Sr II 4078, Fe I 4072, and Ca I 4227 lines. By taking carefully selected cuts in a multi-dimensional phase space, we isolate a sample of potential Li-rich giant stars. From these, using detailed comparison with dwarf and giant MILES stars, and our own individual spectral classifications, we identify a set of high likelihood candidate Li-rich giant stars. We offer these for further study to promote an understanding of these enigmatic objects.