The Araucaria Project: On the Tip of the Red Giant Branch Distance Determination to the Magellanic Clouds

Górski, Marek; Pietrzyński, G.; Gieren, W.; Catelan, M.; Pilecki, B.; Karczmarek, P.; Suchomska, K.; Graczyk, D.; Konorski, P.; Zgirski, Bartłomiej; Wielgórski, Piotr

doi:10.3847/0004-6256/151/6/167

Cited by 17 publications

(23 citation statements)

References 47 publications

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“…In an earlier study, Jang and Lee [17] used ten fields of OGLE-III stars in the LMC and found I TRGB 0 ¼14.485AE 0.030, which already includes their estimate of extinction A I of around 0.1 mag on average. Another determination based on OGLE-III data was performed by Górski et al [29], who used 17 fields and found I TRGB ¼ 14.62 AE 0.03, compatible with Eq. (6) within stated uncertainties.…”

Section: B Large Magellanic Cloudmentioning

confidence: 54%

Axion and neutrino bounds improved with new calibrations of the tip of the red-giant branch using geometric distance determinations

2020

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The brightness of the tip of the red-giant branch (TRGB) allows one to constrain novel energy losses that would lead to a larger core mass at helium ignition and, thus, to a brighter TRGB than expected by standard stellar models. The required absolute TRGB calibrations strongly improve with reliable geometric distances that have become available for the galaxy NGC 4258 that hosts a water megamaser and to the Large Magellanic Cloud based on 20 detached eclipsing binaries. Moreover, we revise a previous TRGB calibration in the globular cluster ω Centauri with a recent kinematical distance determination based on Gaia data release 2. All of these calibrations have similar uncertainties, and they agree with each other and with recent dedicated stellar models. Using NGC 4258 as the cleanest extragalactic case, we thus find an updated constraint on the axion-electron coupling of g ae < 1.6 × 10 −13 and μ ν < 1.5 × 10 −12 μ B (95% C.L.) on a possible neutrino dipole moment, whereas ω Centauri as the best galactic target provides instead g ae < 1.3 × 10 −13 and μ ν < 1.2 × 10 −12 μ B. The reduced observational errors imply that stellar evolution theory and bolometric corrections begin to dominate the overall uncertainties.

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Section: B Large Magellanic Cloudmentioning

confidence: 54%

Axion and neutrino bounds improved with new calibrations of the tip of the red-giant branch using geometric distance determinations

2020

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“…Table 1 presents the measured values of the TRGB in the I, V, J and K bands for the selected fields. The TRGB measurements with the Sobel filter are not given in this paper, however they have been reported for the most of the fields earlier by Górski et al (2016).…”

Section: Trgb Measurement In the Lmc And Smcmentioning

confidence: 99%

The Araucaria Project: Multi-band Calibrations of the TRGB Absolute Magnitude

Górski

Pietrzyński

Gieren

et al. 2018

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We present new empirical calibrations of the absolute magnitude of the tip of the red giant branch (TRGB) in the optical I and near-infrared J, H, and K bands in terms of the (V-K) 0 , (V-H) 0 , and (J-K) 0 colors of the red giant branch. Our calibrations are based on the measurements in 19 fields in the Large and Small Magellanic Clouds, which span a wide (V-K) 0 color range of the brightest part of the red giant branch. We use a simple edge detection technique based on the comparison of the star count difference in two adjacent bins with the estimated Poisson noise. Further, we include the reddening and geometrical corrections, as well as the precise and accurate to 2% distance to the Large Magellanic Cloud. The calibration based on a (V-K) colors can be a robust tool to calculate with a great precision the absolute magnitude of the TRGB.

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“…Finally we obtain the zero-points of the TRGB: M QT,T RGB = −4.004 ± 0.096 mag for the QT calibration and M I,T RGB = −3.970 ± 0.102 mag for the blue I calibration. Quoted uncertainties, 0.096 mag and 0.102 mag, are derived as summarized in Table 4: TRGB detection errors (0.020 mag and 0.042 mag), an extinction correction error (0.07 mag (Haschke et al 2011;Górski et al 2016)), a photometric zero-point error (0.03 mag), the QT transformation error (0.014 mag), and the LMC distance error (0.049 mag). The systematic uncertainty is dominated by the extinction error and the LMC distance error.…”

Section: The Large Magellanic Cloud As a Distance Anchormentioning

confidence: 99%

The Tip of the Red Giant Branch Distances to Type Ia Supernova Host Galaxies. Iv. Color Dependence and Zero-Point Calibration

Jang

Lee

2017

ApJ

101

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We present a revised TRGB calibration, accurate to 2.7% of distance. A modified TRGB magnitude corrected for the color dependence of the TRGB, the QT magnitude, is introduced for better measurement of the TRGB. We determine the color-magnitude relation of the TRGB from photometry of deep images of HST/ACS fields around eight nearby galaxies. The zero-point of the TRGB at the fiducial metallicity ([Fe/H]= −1.6 ((V − I) 0,T RGB = 1.5)) is obtained from photometry of two distance anchors, NGC 4258 (M106) and the LMC, to which precise geometric distances are known: M QT,T RGB = −4.023 ± 0.073 mag from NGC 4258 and M QT,T RGB = −4.004 ± 0.096 mag from the LMC. A weighted mean of the two zero-points is M QT,T RGB = −4.016 ± 0.058 mag. Quoted uncertainty is ∼ 2 times smaller than those of the previous calibrations. We compare the empirical TRGB calibration derived in this study with theoretical stellar models, finding that there are significant discrepancies, especially for red color ((F606W − F814W) 0 2.5). We provide the revised TRGB calibration in several magnitude systems for future studies. Subject headings: galaxies: distances and redshifts -galaxies: stellar content -stars : Population II 1. INTRODUCTION The Tip of the Red Giant Branch (TRGB) represents the brightest part of the Red Giant Branch (RGB) in the color-magnitude diagrams (CMDs) of old stellar systems such as globular clusters and halos in galaxies. It corresponds to the core-He flash point in the evolutionary stages of low mass stars. An implication of the TRGB as a distance indicator was suggested first by Baade (1944). In his pioneering paper introducing the concept of stellar populations I and II, he investigated the red-sensitive plates of three early type stellar systems, M32, NGC 205, and the central region (bulge) of M31, concluding that the brightest stars (RGB stars) in these three systems have similar magnitudes and colors. Sandage (1971) pointed out that photographs of the Local Group galaxies invariably show surrounding red stars, which have similar absolute magnitudes and colors. Based on the Cepheid distances to three Local Group galaxies (M31, M33 and IC 1613), he derived a mean absolute magnitude of these brightest red stars to be M V = −3.0 ± 0.2 mag.Mould et al. (1983, 1984) and Mould & Kristian (1986) carried out CCD photometry of four Local Group galaxies (M31, M33, NGC 147 and NGC 205) and determined the TRGB distances to these galaxies, which are not much different from previous distance estimates to M31 and M33 based on Cepheid variables. They adopted a bolometric magnitude of the TRGB (M bol ∼ −3.5 mag) given by Frogel et al. (1983). Freedman (1988b presented CCD photometry of two fields in IC 1613. Color-magnitude diagrams (CMDs) of these fields show a clear RGB population and the TRGB. Adopting the bolometric magnitude the TRGB (M bol ∼ −3.5 mag), she derived remarkably similar TRGB distances between the two fields, showing only 0.04 mag difference. Moreover, the TRGB distance from her photometry is in ex-

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The Araucaria Project: On the Tip of the Red Giant Branch Distance Determination to the Magellanic Clouds

Cited by 17 publications

References 47 publications

Axion and neutrino bounds improved with new calibrations of the tip of the red-giant branch using geometric distance determinations

Axion and neutrino bounds improved with new calibrations of the tip of the red-giant branch using geometric distance determinations

The Araucaria Project: Multi-band Calibrations of the TRGB Absolute Magnitude

The Tip of the Red Giant Branch Distances to Type Ia Supernova Host Galaxies. Iv. Color Dependence and Zero-Point Calibration

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