Temperature inhomogeneities in Mrk71 can not be discarded

TL;DR

This paper challenges recent claims that temperature inhomogeneities cannot explain abundance discrepancies in Mrk71, showing that conclusions depend heavily on data interpretation and assumptions, and that such inhomogeneities remain a plausible explanation.

Contribution

The study demonstrates that the existence of temperature inhomogeneities in Mrk71 cannot be dismissed and depends on data analysis choices, highlighting the importance of assumptions in astrophysical diagnostics.

Findings

Conclusions vary with data interpretation and assumptions.

Temperature inhomogeneities remain a viable explanation.

Different data analysis approaches can lead to opposite conclusions.

Abstract

In a very recent work, [1] claim that the scenario of temperature inhomogeneities proposed by [2] ($t2$ > 0) is not able to explain the O$^{2+}$/H$^{+}$ abundance discrepancy observed between the calculations based on the optical [OIII] collisional excited lines (CELs) and the OII recombination lines (RLs) in the star forming galaxy Mrk71. In this work, we show that conclusions of [1] depend on several assumptions on the absolute flux calibration, reddening correction and the adopted electron density. In fact, using the data of [1] in a different way and even considering their 1{\sigma} uncertainties, it is possible to reach the opposite conclusion, consistent with $t2$ = $0.097 ^{+0.008}_{-0.009}$. Therefore, the existence of temperature inhomogeneities causing the O$^{2+}$/H$^{+}$ abundance discrepancy in Mrk71 can not be ruled out.