Astronomy and Astrophysics – Astrophysics
Scientific paper
1999-02-15
Astronomy and Astrophysics
Astrophysics
Accepted for publication in ApJ, June 20, 1999 issue
Scientific paper
10.1086/307324
We present observations with the Hubble Space Telescope Wide Field Planetary Camera 2 of three fields centered on super-metal-rich globular clusters in the bulge of M31. Our (I,V-I) color-magnitude diagrams reach as faint as I ~ 26.5 mag and clearly reveal the magnitude of the first ascent red giant branch (RGB) tip. We find that the apparent I magnitude of the RGB tip does not become brighter near the center of M31 as concluded by previous investigators. Our observations and artificial star experiments presented in this study strongly support the idea that previous very bright stars were likely the result of spurious detections of blended stars due to crowding in lower resolution images. On the contrary, our observations indicate that, at a mean projected galactocentric distance of 1.1 kpc, the RGB tip is some 1.3 magnitudes fainter than it is at 7 kpc. An analysis of this difference in RGB tip magnitude suggests that the M31 bulge stellar population has a mean metallicity close to that of the Sun.
Bridges Terry James
Jablonka Pascale
Maeder Andre
Meylan George
Meynet George
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