Unraveling UBC 274: a morphological, kinematical and chemical analysis of a disrupting open cluster

TL;DR

This study provides a comprehensive morphological, kinematic, and chemical analysis of the disrupting open cluster UBC 274, revealing its dynamical state, chemical composition, and signs of mass segregation using Gaia data and high-resolution spectra.

Contribution

It offers the first detailed multi-faceted analysis of UBC 274, including membership determination, chemical abundances, and disruption features, enhancing understanding of cluster disruption processes.

Findings

UBC 274 has a highly eccentric orbit and tilted morphology consistent with disruption.

The cluster exhibits subsolar metallicity and overabundance of neutron-capture elements.

Evidence of mass segregation and high chemical homogeneity in tidal tails.

Abstract

We do a morphological, kinematic and chemical analysis of the disrupting cluster UBC 274 (2.5 Gyr, $d=1778$ pc) to study its global properties. We use HDBSCAN to obtain a new membership list up to 50 pc from its centre and up to magnitude $G=19$ using Gaia EDR3 data. We use high resolution and high signal-to-noise spectra to obtain atmospheric parameters of 6 giants and subgiants, and individual abundances of 18 chemical species. The cluster has a highly eccentric (0.93) component, tilted $\sim$10 deg with respect to the plane of the Galaxy, which is morphologically compatible with the result of a test-particle simulation of a disrupting cluster. Our abundance analysis shows that the cluster has a subsolar metallicity of [Fe/H]$=-0.08\pm0.02$. Its chemical pattern is compatible with that of Ruprecht 147, of similar age but located closer to the Sun, with the remarkable exception of neutron-capture elements, which present an overabundance of $[n\mathrm{/Fe]}\sim0.1$. The cluster's elongated morphology is associated with the internal part of its tidal tail, following the expected dynamical process of disruption. We find a significant sign of mass segregation where the most massive stars appear 1.5 times more concentrated than other stars. The cluster's overabundance of neutron-capture elements can be related to the metallicity dependence of the neutron-capture yields due to the secondary nature of these elements, predicted by some models. UBC 274 presents a high chemical homogeneity at the level of $0.03$ dex in the sampled region of its tidal tails.