J-PLUS: Spectral evolution of white dwarfs by PDF analysis

Journal Article · 03 February 2022 · Astronomy and Astrophysics

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/202141746 · OSTI ID:1982299

López-Sanjuan, C. ^[1]; Tremblay, P. -E. ^[2]; Ederoclite, A. ^[3]; Vázquez Ramió, H. ^[1]; Carrasco, J. M. ^[4]; Varela, J. ^[1]; Cenarro, A. J. ^[1]; Marín-Franch, A. ^[1]; Civera, T. ^[1]; Daflon, S. ^[5]; Gänsicke, B. T. ^[2]; Gentile Fusillo, N. P. ^[6]; Jiménez-Esteban, F. M. ^[7]; Alcaniz, J. ^[5]; Angulo, R. E. ^[8]; Cristóbal-Hornillos, D. ^[1]; Dupke, R. A. ^[9]; Hernández-Monteagudo, C. ^[10]; Moles, M. ^[1]; Sodré, L. ^[3]

---

1. Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas (CSIC) (Spain)
2. Univ. of Warwick, Coventry (United Kingdom)
3. Univ. of Sao Paulo (Brazil)
4. Univ. of Barcelona (Spain)
5. Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation (MCTI) (Brazil). National Observatory
6. European Southern Observatory (Germany)
7. Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Cientificas (CSIC) (Spain); Spanish Virtual Observatory (Spain)
8. Donostia International Physics Center (DIPC), San Sebastian (Spain); Basque Foundation for Science, Bilbao (Spain). IKERBASQUE
9. Ministry of Science, Technology and Innovation (MCTI) (Brazil). National Observatory; Univ. of Michigan, Ann Arbor, MI (United States); Univ. of Alabama, Tuscaloosa, AL (United States)
10. Institute of Astrophysics of the Canary Islands (Spain); Univ. of La Laguna (Spain)

We estimated the spectral evolution of white dwarfs with effective temperature using the Javalambre Photometric Local Universe Survey (J-PLUS) second data release (DR2), which provides 12 photometric optical passbands over 2176 deg². We analyzed 5926 white dwarfs with r ≤ 19.5 mag in common between a white dwarf catalog defined from Gaia EDR3 and J-PLUS DR2. We performed a Bayesian analysis by comparing the observed J-PLUS photometry with theoretical models of hydrogen- and helium-dominated atmospheres. We estimated the probability distribution functions for effective temperature (T_eff), surface gravity, parallax, and composition; and the probability of having a H-dominated atmosphere (p_H) for each source. We applied a prior in parallax, using Gaia EDR3 measurements as a reference, and derived a self-consistent prior for the atmospheric composition as a function of T_eff. We described the fraction of white dwarfs with a He-dominated atmosphere (f_He) with a linear function of the effective temperature at 5000 < T_eff < 30 000 K. We find f_He = 0.24 ± 0.01 at T_eff = 10 000 K, a change rate along the cooling sequence of 0.14 ± 0.02 per 10 kK, and a minimum He-dominated fraction of 0.08 ± 0.02 at the high-temperature end. We tested the obtained p_H by comparison with spectroscopic classifications, finding that it is reliable. We estimated the mass distribution for the 351 sources with distance d < 100 pc, mass M > 0.45 M_⊙, and T_eff > 6000 K. The result for H-dominated white dwarfs agrees with previous studies, with a dominant M = 0.59 M_⊙ peak and the presence of an excess at M ~ 0.8 M_⊙. This high-mass excess is absent in the He-dominated distribution, which presents a single peak. The J-PLUS optical data provide a reliable statistical classification of white dwarfs into H- and He-dominated atmospheres. We find a 21 ± 3% increase in the fraction of He-dominated white dwarfs from T_eff = 20 000 K to T_eff = 5000 K.

• Research Organization: US Department of Energy (USDOE), Washington, DC (United States). Office of Science, Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS)
• Sponsoring Organization: Alfred P. Sloan Foundation; National Science Foundation (NSF); USDOE Office of Science (SC)
• OSTI ID: 1982299
• Journal Information: Astronomy and Astrophysics, Journal Name: Astronomy and Astrophysics Vol. 658; ISSN 0004-6361
• Publisher: EDP SciencesCopyright Statement
• Country of Publication: United States
• Language: English