2025MNRAS.544..430P -
Mon. Not. R. Astron. Soc., 544, 430-456 (2025/November-3)
Revealing the chemical structure of the Magellanic Clouds with APOGEE. III. Abundance gradients of the Small Magellanic Cloud.
POVICK J.T., NIDEVER D.L., MASSANA P., MAJEWSKI S.R., LU Y., CIONI M.-R.L., GEISLER D., MESZAROS S., NITSCHELM C., ALMEIDA A., LANE R.R. and LONGA-PENA P.
Abstract (from CDS):
We determine radial- and age-abundance gradients of the Small Magellanic Cloud (SMC) using spectra of 2062 red giant branch field stars observed by SDSS-IV / APOGEE-2S. With coverage out to $\sim$9 kpc in the SMC, these data taken with the high resolution ($R \sim 22\,500$) APOGEE H-band spectrograph afford the opportunity to measure extensive radial gradients for as many as 24 abundance ratios. The SMC has an overall metallicity ([Fe/H]) gradient of -0.0546 $\pm$ 0.0043 dex kpc–1. Ages are calculated for every star to explore the evolution of the different abundance gradients. As a function of age, many gradients flatten with decreasing age but begin to steepen for ages 3.7-5.6 Gyr, particularly in the $\alpha$-element [X/H] gradients. We previously detected similar evolutionary patterns $\sim 1.7-$3.6 Gyr earlier in the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) which are attributed to a recent interaction between the Magellanic Clouds. It is inferred that the feature in the SMC gradients was caused by the same interaction. The age-[X/Fe] trends, which track average [X/Fe] over time, are flat, demonstrating a slow enhancement with respect to Fe for the SMC. When comparing the SMC gradients to the LMC and MW, normalized to disc scale length ($R_\text{d}$), the [X/Fe] and [X/Mg] gradients are similar, but there is a dichotomy between the dwarfs and the Milky Way (MW) for the [X/H] gradients. The median MW [X/H] gradient around -0.119 dex/$R_\text{d}$ whilst the Clouds have gradients of about -0.082 dex/$R_\text{d}$ and -0.061 dex/$R_\text{d}$ for the SMC and LMC, respectively.
Abstract Copyright:
© 2025 The Author(s). Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of Royal Astronomical Society.
Journal keyword(s):
galaxies: abundances - galaxies: dwarf - galaxies: evolution - galaxies: individual: Small Magellanic Cloud - Magellanic Clouds
Simbad objects:
5
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