Radiation-driven winds of hot luminous stars. XV. Constraints on the mass-luminosity relation of central stars of planetary nebulae

TL;DR

This study uses advanced stellar atmosphere models to analyze nine planetary nebulae central stars, revealing significant deviations from the traditional mass-luminosity relation assumed in stellar evolution theories.

Contribution

It introduces a new method to determine stellar parameters directly from wind features, challenging existing mass-luminosity assumptions for post-AGB stars.

Findings

Severe deviations from the standard mass-luminosity relation.

Accurate stellar sizes and luminosities derived without prior assumptions.

Implications for stellar evolution models of planetary nebulae central stars.

Abstract

We present a new model atmosphere analysis of nine central stars of planetary nebulae. This study is based on a new generation of realistic stellar model atmospheres for hot stars; state-of-the-art, hydrodynamically consistent, spherically symmetric model atmospheres that have been shown to correctly reproduce the observed UV spectra of massive Population I O-type stars. The information provided by the wind features (terminal velocity, mass loss rate) permits to derive the physical size of each central star, from which we can derive the stellar luminosity, mass and distance, without having to assume a relation between stellar mass and luminosity taken from the theory of stellar structure and AGB and post-AGB evolution. The results of our analysis are quite surprising: we find severe departures from the generally accepted relation between post-AGB central star mass and luminosity.