Anomalously Blue Giants: Possible Precursurs to Subdwarf B Stars

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Hst Proposal Id #8295 Binary Stars

Scientific paper

Subdwarf B {sdB} stars are evolved hot stars {24000 to 35000K} that are commonly found in the field of our Galaxy and have recently been identified in old disk, metal-rich clusters. They are likely to be one of the most important contributors to the upturn in the far-ultraviolet {FUV} flux exhibited by many elliptical galaxies and the bulge of M31. It is believed that sdB stars are core helium burning stars with very thin hydrogen envelopes. The mechanism which stripped the hydrogen envelope is not currently known. We propose that sdB stars are formed due to binary interactions. In particular, they have evolved from anomalously blue giants, which in turn have evolved from blue stragglers. These `blue' giants have been recently identified by us in NGC 188 and 6791, and are 0.1 - 0.2 mag bluer in B-V than the normal red giant stars in each cluster. If our theory is correct, a significant fraction of these giants will have white dwarf companions that could be detected in t he FUV. We propose to test this scenario in a snapshot program to obtain STIS FUV images of a dozen of the bluer giants in both clusters. The giants themselves emit a negligible amount of FUV flux and would be undetectable without a hot companion. Confirmation of the presence of hot companions would lend strong support to the theory that the anomalous giants are the binary precursors to the sdB stars.

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