A spectroscopic survey on the multiplicity of high-mass stars

By Rolf Chini, V. Hoffmeister, A. Nasseri, O. Stahl, H. Zinnecker. 2012

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The formation of stars above about 20 M⊙ and their apparently high multiplicity remain heavily debated subjects in astrophysics. We have performed a vast high-resolution radial velocity spectroscopic survey of about 250 O- and 540 B-type stars in the southern Milky Way which indicates that the majority of stars (>82 per cent) with masses above 16 M⊙ form close binary systems while this fraction rapidly drops to 20 per cent for stars of 3 M⊙. The binary fractions of O-type stars among different environment classes are: clusters (72 ± 13 per cent), associations (73 ± 8 per cent), field (43 ± 13 per cent) and runaways (69 ± 11 per cent). The high frequency of close pairs with components of similar mass argues in favour of a multiplicity originating from the formation process rather than from a tidal capture in a dense cluster. The high binary frequency of runaway O stars that we found in our survey (69 per cent compared to 19–26 per cent in previous surveys) points to the importance of ejection from young star clusters and thus supports the competitive accretion scenario.

Subfields: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Instrumentation

View Paper: https://www.semanticscholar.org/paper/1315c289ddcc0db88d084167f5ec6eaf56d80e62

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Citations in the corpus

Mass Loss: Its Effect on the Evolution and Fate of High-Mass Stars (2014, background): “…spectroscopic binary fraction among massive stars in clusters using radial velocities, which typically find an observed binary fraction of 20-60% (Chini et al. 2012, De Becker et al. 2006, Evans et al. 2006, Garcia & Mermilliod 2001, Gies 1987, Kiminki & Kobulnicky 2012, Kiminki et al. 2012,…”
PREPARING FOR AN EXPLOSION: HYDRODYNAMIC INSTABILITIES AND TURBULENCE IN PRESUPERNOVAE (2013, background): “Recent observations of mainsequence O-type stars have shown definitively that the majority of massive stars (roughly 2/3) are born in binary systems with a separation small enough that the two stars will interact before they die (Sana et al. 2012; Chini et al. 2012; Kiminki et al. 2012).”
Massive runaway and walkaway stars (2018, background): “Most young, unevolved massive stars have a nearby companion with which they form a close binary system (e.g., Sana et al. 2012; Chini et al. 2012; Kobulnicky et al. 2014; Almeida et al. 2017).”
MESA ISOCHRONES AND STELLAR TRACKS (MIST). I. SOLAR-SCALED MODELS (2016, background): “Multiplicity is extremely common among O- and B-type stars; binary mass exchange is believed to occur for & 70% of O-type stars and about a third of those stars will ultimately form a binary merger product (e.g., Chini et al. 2012; Sana et al. 2012, 2013; de Mink et al. 2014).”
Ultra-stripped supernovae: progenitors and fate (2015, background): “Given that almost all massive stars are members of close binaries (Chini et al. 2012) and 70 per cent of them interact with their c© 0000 RAS companion star (Sana et al. 2012), it is important to probe the evolution leading to SNe in close binaries.”
SOUTHERN MASSIVE STARS AT HIGH ANGULAR RESOLUTION: OBSERVATIONAL CAMPAIGN AND COMPANION DETECTION (2014, methodology): “The possible RV variability reported by Conti et al. (1977) was not confirmed by Chini et al. (2012).”
Evolutionary roads leading to low effective spins, high black hole masses, and O1/O2 rates for LIGO/Virgo binary black holes (2017, background): “This is a sound assumption for massive stars of non-negligible metallicity (Raghavan et al. 2010; Chini et al. 2012; Moe & Di Stefano 2013, 2017).”
TOWARD COMPLETE STATISTICS OF MASSIVE BINARY STARS: PENULTIMATE RESULTS FROM THE CYGNUS OB2 RADIAL VELOCITY SURVEY (2014, background): “Other large studies of binarity among massive stars include the spectroscopic surveys of Garmany et al. (1980), Sana et al. (2012), and Chini et al. (2012) as well as the imaging surveys of Kouwenhoven et al. (2007) and Mason et al. (2009).”
Delay-time distribution of core-collapse supernovae with late events resulting from binary interaction (2017, background): “…in our Galaxy and the Magellanic Clouds show that a very large fraction have one or more companions, forming a close binary system where severe interaction between the stars during their lives is unavoidable (e.g., Kobulnicky & Fryer 2007; Mason et al. 2009; Sana et al. 2012; Chini et al. 2012).”
The Wolf-Rayet stars in the Large Magellanic Cloud - A comprehensive analysis of the WN class (2014, result): “Although this binary fraction seems to be a bit low, it is in line with expectations from binary population studies (e.g. Foellmi et al. 2003a; Chini et al. 2012; Sana et al. 2012, 2013a).”
Luminous blue variables are antisocial: their isolation implies that they are kicked mass gainers in binary evolution (2014, background): “…in binary systems whose separation is small enough that they will exchange mass (Sana et al. 2012, 2008, 2009; Kiminki & Kobulnicky 2012; Kiminki et al. 2012; Kobulnicky et al. 2014; Chini et al. 2012; Mahy et al. 2009; Evans et al. 2006; De Becker et al. 2006; Garcia & Mermilliod 2001; Gies 1987).”
The search for failed supernovae with the Large Binocular Telescope: confirmation of a disappearing star (2016, background): “Massive stars have a large multiplicity fraction (> 82%; Chini et al. 2012; Sana et al. 2012).”
THE INCIDENCE OF STELLAR MERGERS AND MASS GAINERS AMONG MASSIVE STARS (2013, background): “Young massive stars are predominantly found in close binary systems (e.g. Mason et al. 2009; Sana & Evans 2011; Chini et al. 2012).”
Stellar Multiplicity (2013, background): “In addition, most high-mass stars are found in their birth environment, massive clusters or OB associations, and only ∼ 20% of all nearby O stars are found in the field, many of which are thought to be ejected “runaway” stars (e.g., Chini et al. 2012, de Wit et al. 2004).”
Mind Your Ps and Qs: The Interrelation between Period (P) and Mass-ratio (Q) Distributions of Binary Stars (2016, background): “This trend is consistent with the conclusions of Chini et al. (2012), who find the observed spectroscopic binary fraction increases by a factor of ≈ 5 - 7 between B9 and O5 primaries (see their Fig.”
EXTRACTING RADIAL VELOCITIES OF A- AND B-TYPE STARS FROM ECHELLE SPECTROGRAPH CALIBRATION SPECTRA (2015, background): “Many of the targets in our sample are previously studied binaries (Chini et al. 2012).”
THE GALACTIC O-STAR SPECTROSCOPIC SURVEY (GOSSS). II. BRIGHT SOUTHERN STARS (2013, background): “Most of 1Note that most of the archival FEROS data included in Chini et al. (2012) were obtained within OWN for the purpose of studying spectroscopic binarity.”
Spectroscopic study of early-type multiple stellar systems - II. New binary subsystems (2014, background): “Recently, Chini et al. (2012) obtained two spectra of this binary, confirming its status as SB2.”