# The Earliest Phases of Galaxy Evolution

## 1 Introduction

The importance of developing an understanding of the earliest phases of galaxy evolution is clear. For example, one might hope to explain details of the heavy element abundance distributions measured in high-redshift galaxies and the metallic systems associated with damped Lyman-alpha systems (e.g., Pettini et al. 1997). Another important reason is that one can compare the abundances of extremely-metal-poor stars with the predictions of chemical evolution models, and thereby impose severe constraints on the theoretical nucleosynthesis calculations in massive stars ($`M10`$ $`M_{}`$). The most massive stars present at the first epoch of star formation were, of course, the first to restore chemically-enriched gas back into the interstellar medium. Because of their long main-sequence lifetimes and lack of deep convection zones, the lower-mass stars ($`M0.8`$ $`M_{}`$) which formed at that same time have preserved the patterns of elemental abundances generated by the initial burst of star formation.

Many studies concerning the predicted nucleosynthetic yields of massive stars have appeared in the last few years, all of which attempt to take into account the effect of the initial stellar metallicity on the final yields (Maeder 1992; Woosley & Weaver, hereafter WW95; Langer & Henkel 1996, Thielemann et al. 1996, hereafter TNH96). The most dramatic differences are found between the predicted yields from stars with metallicity $`\mathrm{Z}=0`$ and stars with $`\mathrm{Z}0`$, as shown by the calculations of WW95. From the standpoint of Galactic chemical evolution such a difference is not so important, because very few stars with truly zero metal content must have ever existed, as only a few supernovae (SN) explosions are required to raise the metallic content of the ISM to a non-zero value within a few million years. For stars with $`\mathrm{Z}>0`$, the effects of small differences in initial stellar metallicity on the predicted final yields of heavy elements appear to be almost negligible.

Several studies, such as Arnett (1995), WW95, and TNH96, include approximate treatments of explosive nucleosynthesis on the final predicted yields of chemical elements. The effects of mass loss by stellar winds in very massive stars ($`M>3040`$ $`M_{}`$) on the nucleosynthetic yields has been investigated by Maeder (1992), Woosley et al. (1993; 1995), and Langer & Henkel (1996). The net effect of mass loss is to decrease the total yield of metals produced by massive stars because of the helium which is subtracted from further processing. We took into account the presence of mass loss in massive stars by adopting the mass-mass of the He-core relation of Maeder and Meynet (1989).

There are, of course, many uncertainties still present in modern nucleosynthesis calculations, as is aptly illustrated by the disparity among various studies concerning the yield of iron (and other iron-peak elements) produced in massive stars. In the WW95 study, for example, the iron yield does not exhibit a monotonic behaviour as a function of the initial stellar mass, as it decreases for masses larger than $`35`$ $`M_{}`$. By contrast, in TNH96 the iron yield is an ever-increasing function of the initial stellar mass, but it is systematically lower than the yields of WW95 for masses smaller than $``$ 30 $`M_{}`$. The reason for these differences can be traced to the different physical inputs to the two sets of calculations, namely, the iron and helium core masses, the assumed rate of the $`{}_{}{}^{12}C(\alpha ,\gamma )^{16}O`$ reaction, differences in the adopted explosion mechanism, etc. (see WW95 for a detailed discussion).

Given the “flexibility” of the predicted yields of heavy elements, it is of interest to explore the nature and the magnitude of differences which arise in models of Galactic chemical evolution as a result of the use of the different yields. In this paper, we compare yields from different authors by means of a model of chemical evolution for our Galaxy which reproduces the main observational features (Chiappini et al. 1997), and compare the predictions with one of the largest sample of abundances ever used for this purpose (see also Samland 1998). Particular emphasis is given to the predictions for very-metal-poor stars since they place the strongest constraints on the available yields for massive stars and on the different theories for the progenitors of type Ia SNe.

In performing this comparison we use a statistical analysis discussed by Ryan et al. (1996) in order to define the best fit to the data, which always show a considerable spread, and to compare these best fits with the theoretical predictions. The main aim of this paper is to provide the best fits of a large number of elemental ratios as functions of \[Fe/H\] and compare them with detailed model predictions in order to impose constraints on the nucleosynthesis in massive stars, type Ia SN progenitors, timescale for the formation of the halo and thick disk and finally to predict the behaviour of the relative abundance ratios as functions of redshift in the context of different cosmological models. In fact, abundance ratios can be used either as cosmic clocks or to infer the nature of high -redshift objects.

The paper is organized as follows. In §2 we summarize the available observational data from literature studies of the elemental abundances in metal-poor stars. In §3 we describe the statistical method adopted to describe the best fit to the observed data. A brief description of the chemical evolution model is given in §4. In §5 we discuss a prediction of the \[O/Fe\] ratio for objects formed at high redshift. In §6 our results are presented and some conclusions drawn.

## 2 Observational Data

Over the past few decades, many studies of very-metal-poor stars have been carried out (e.g., Wallerstein et al. 1963; Spite & Spite 1978; Luck & Bond 1985; Magain 1987; Gilroy et al. 1988; Peterson et al. 1990; Gratton & Sneden 1988,1991; McWilliam et al. 1995; Ryan et al. 1991; 1996). The most recent results, based on stars selected from the HK survey of Beers et al. (1985; 1992), have probed the nature of the relative abundances of elements in large samples of stars at extremely low metallicity. In the McWilliam et al. (1995) study, for instance, the abundances of several heavy elements are derived for 33 extremely-metal-deficient giants, with $`4.0[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]2.0`$. They found previously unnoticed trends of \[Cr/Fe\], \[Mn/Fe\] and \[Co/Fe\] with \[Fe/H\]. Both \[Cr/Fe\] and \[Mn/Fe\] exhibit a decline of about 0.5 dex with decreasing iron abundance between $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=2.4`$ and $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=4.0`$. On the other hand, \[Co/Fe\] increases by about 0.5 dex over the same range in iron abundance. They confirmed the well known decline in \[Al/Fe\], \[Sr/Fe\] and \[Ba/Fe\] with decreasing \[Fe/H\]. The remarkable fact is that all six of these abundance ratios show a sudden change of slope near $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=2.4`$. McWilliam et al. concluded that a distinct phase of nucleosynthesis occurred before the Galaxy reached an abundance $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]2.4`$, their preferred scenario being that of variable stellar yields, either changing with mass, metallicity, or both.

Concerning the $`\alpha `$-elements, McWilliam et al. found \[Mg/Fe\], \[Si/Fe\] and \[Ca/Fe\] to be overabundant relative to iron (\[$`\alpha `$/Fe\] $`=+0.44\pm 0.02`$ dex), confirming the trends found for other halo stars at higher abundances. The element titanium, often considered to be an alpha element, exhibited a smaller overabundance relative to iron, \[Ti/Fe\]$`=+0.31`$ dex. This difference was interpreted as due to a larger contribution to Ti from type Ia SN. However, at very low metallicities \[Mg/Fe\] appears to decrease whereas \[Ti/Mg\] and \[Ca/Mg\] increase by $``$0.2 dex from $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=2.0`$ to $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=4.0`$. McWilliam et al. interpreted this as the possible effect of metallicity-dependent yields. Another remarkable result of their study is the large spread (up to 3 dex for a given \[Fe/H\]) observed in the abundance ratios of some of the heavy elements, especially in \[Sr/Fe\] and \[Ba/Fe\], which they interpreted as intrinsic and due to incomplete mixing of the ISM of the early Galaxy. The same conclusion had been already reached by Ryan et al. (1991) and Primas et al. (1994) from the spread they observed in \[Sr/Fe\] and \[Ba/Fe\] ratios at very low metallicities.

Ryan et al. (1996) obtained abundances for 19 extremely-metal-poor stars (giants and dwarfs). They found that the $`\alpha `$ elements (Mg, Si, Ca and Ti) have almost uniform overabundances relative to iron down to \[Fe/H\]$``$4, which is the current limit of observations. They also observed a slight increase in the \[Mg/Fe\] ratio at $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]<`$2.5. These authors found that Ti behaves like the other $`\alpha `$-elements and confirmed the underabundance of \[Cr/Fe\] and \[Mn/Fe\], and the underabundance of \[Co/Fe\], in stars with $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]<2.5`$, as reported by McWilliam et al. . These authors concluded that there is a real star-to-star abundance differences at the lowest metallicities, and that this spread exists for both dwarfs and giants, indicating that the observed spread cannot be explained by appealing to mixing processes within the stars themselves. Ryan et al. also discussed a model in which an assumed correlation between SN iron-peak yields and explosive energies is able to explain the existence of well-defined (low scatter) trends among a number of heavy elements (such as Cr, Mn, and Co) down to an abundance $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]2.7`$, despite the fact that enrichment of the ISM of the proto-halo took place under chaotic and inhomogeneous mixing conditions.

The most important recent study on disk stars is that of Edvardsson et al. (1993), who derived abundances of O, Na, Mg, Al, Si, Ca, Ti, Fe, Ni, Y, Zr, Ba and Nd as well as individual photometric ages for 189 nearby disk population F and G dwarfs. They also estimated, from kinematical data, the orbital parameters of the stars and derived estimates of the Galactocentric distances of the stellar birthplaces. From their high signal-to-noise spectra and a careful treatment of stellar temperatures, Edvardsson et al. obtained iron abundances and abundance ratios relative to iron for most elements with accuracies at a level of 0.05 dex. They found a considerable variation in the metallicity of stars formed at a given time in the disk, implying only a weak correlation between age and metallicity. Their result strongly suggests there is no single age-metallicity relation, but rather several such relations due to different chemical evolution rates in different parts of the Galaxy. Metal-poor ($`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]<0.4`$) stars in their sample were shown to be relatively overabundant in the $`\alpha `$-elements, confirming all the previous studies, but the most interesting finding is that the \[$`\alpha `$/Fe\] ratios for these metal-poor stars decreases with increasing Galactocentric distance. This implies that star formation started first and proceeded more vigorously in the Galactic center than farther out in the disk, confirming theoretical suggestions about an inside-out formation of the Galaxy (Chiosi & Matteucci, 1980; Matteucci & François 1989, hereafter MF89, Burkert et al. 1992). The scatter found in abundance ratios such as \[Si/Fe\] is only about 0.05 dex, about 50 times less than the corresponding range in \[Fe/H\]. In their work they discussed possible explanations for this effect, including orbital diffusion and infall of unenriched material. On the other hand, François & Matteucci (1993) showed that orbital diffusion, coupled with the fact that the Galaxy formed at different rates at different Galactocentric distances, can explain most of the observed spread in \[Fe/H\] and \[$`\alpha `$/Fe\], and also the fact that the spread in the abundance ratios is smaller than the range in absolute abundances.

In this paper we will restrict our attention only to C, N, O, Mg, Si, S, Ca, and Fe as they are the elements for which data of good quality are available and because they allow us to study in particular the \[$`\alpha `$/Fe\] ratios, which are very useful tools to constrain stellar nucleosynthesis, Galactic evolution, and the nature of high-redshift objects.

### 2.1 Oxygen

The element oxygen deserves a special discussion. The main concern in abundance studies of this element arises due to the paucity of samples of significant size analysed in a homogeneous way. In combined samples, the possible existence of systematic offsets between different sets of data and the discrepancy between O abundances determined using high-excitation permitted and low-excitation forbidden lines (the first usually observed in dwarfs, the latter in giants) limits our ability to interpret observed trends. In an effort to remove the discrepancy between dwarfs and giants, Gratton et al. (1996) reanalyzed the abundances of O and Fe in a large sample of stars in the solar neighbourhood, taking into account recent higher temperature estimates in the analysis of dwarfs, and departures from the LTE assumption when considering the formation of high-excitation permitted OI lines. They found that the \[O/Fe\] ratio is nearly constant (\[O/Fe\] $`+`$0.5 dex) among inner-halo and thick-disk stars. Moreover, their data suggest that the \[O/Fe\] decreases by $``$ 0.2 dex while the \[O/H\] ratio remains constant during the transition between thick- and thin- disk phases, indicating a sudden decrease in star formation at that epoch.

In a recent paper Israelian et al. (1998) performed a detailed abundance analysis of 23 unevolved metal-poor stars and found that the \[O/Fe\] ratio increases from 0.6 to 1.0 between \[Fe/H\] -1.5 and -3. In that paper the abundances were determined using the OH bands in the near UV, with high resolution. They also address the long standing controversy, mentioned above, between oxygen abundances from forbidden and permitted lines and show that this can be resolved. As our paper was already submitted these data were not included in the present investigation but their implications are discussed in §3.

### 2.2 Carbon

The results on carbon are still somewhat controversial. Laird (1985) determined carbon abundances in a large sample of halo an disk dwarfs, and found \[C/Fe\]$`=0.22`$ dex , with an intrinsic scatter of 0.1 dex, over the entire metallicity range considered ($`2.5[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]+0.5`$). However, an analysis of the \[C/Fe\] ratio as a function of the effective temperature indicated a systematic offset in the derived abundances; a correction of 0.20 dex was applied to all the \[C/Fe\] determinations, resulting in roughly solar values. Tomkin et al. (1986) examined 32 halo dwarfs with abundances in the range $`2.5[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]0.7`$ dex and found that \[C/Fe\] $`=0.2\pm 0.15`$ dex for $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]>1.8`$ dex. Carbon et al. (1987) derived carbon abundances for 83 dwarfs in the metallicity range $`2.5[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]0.6`$. They found a solar \[C/Fe\] ratio over most of the metallicity range, with a star-to-star scatter of 0.18 dex. They also noticed a slight increase of \[C/Fe\] at very low metallicities, but noted that this upturn is sensitive to the assumed O abundance. Wheeler et al. (1989) reanalyzed all three surveys and attempted to place them onto a common effective temperature scale. The overall trend of slightly increasing \[C/Fe\] ratio at low metallicities did not disappear.

One important recent result which may be of considerable significance to the chemical evolution of the early Galaxy is the fact that the most metal-poor stars exhibit a surprisingly high incidence of carbon enrichment. Roughly 15% of the stars in the sample of Beers et al. (1992) with $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]<2.5`$ have CH (G-band) features which are stronger than normal (see figure 1 of Norris, Ryan, & Beers 1997a). Large \[C/Fe\] ratios appear to exist among a number of extremely-metal-poor dwarfs and subgiants, as well as giants. Among the carbon-rich stars at extremely low abundance is the r-process enhanced star CS 22892-052, discussed in detail by Sneden et al. (1994, 1996), and Norris et al. (1997a). High-resolution spectroscopic studies of other stars with $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]<2.5`$ and large carbon abundances have been presented by Barbuy et al. (1997), Norris et al. (1997a), Norris et al. (1997b), and Bonifacio et al.  (1998). The most extreme cases exhibit \[C/Fe\] ratios roughly 2 dex above the solar value. The mechanism by which carbon has been produced and/or enhanced in these extreme stars is still unknown. Since it remains possible that all or most of the carbon-enhancement may be due to mixing processes within the stars themselves, or due to the transfer of material from an evolved companion star, we have chosen not to include these stars in the data for our present study.

The apparently constant and solar \[C/Fe\] ratio over the range from $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]2.5`$ to disk metallicities would seem to indicate that C and Fe, although produced through different nucleosynthesis mechanisms (C being produced through the triple$`\alpha `$ process during hydrostatic helium burning in stars of all masses, whereas Fe is synthesized in explosive burning conditions), are originating from similar stellar mass ranges. In other words, the two elements should be mainly produced in the same relative proportions. Anderson & Edvardsson (1994) determined the \[C/Fe\] ratio in 85 dwarfs in the metallicity range $`1.0[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]+0.25`$ and found that this ratio is slowly decreasing with time and increasing metallicity in the disk. This would indicate a slightly more significant production of carbon from massive stars relative to their iron production. Moreover, Tomkin et al. (1995) determined C abundances in 105 dwarfs in the range $`0.8[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]+0.2`$ and found a moderate enrichment of C in metal-deficient stars, on the order of \[C/Fe\]$`=+0.2\pm 0.05`$ at $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=0.8`$. Such a behaviour is qualitatively similar to that seen for $`\alpha `$-elements and oxygen. The carbon isotope <sup>13</sup>C seems to show a predominantly secondary origin, confirmed by the behavior of the <sup>12</sup>C/<sup>13</sup>C ratio in the ISM along the Galactic disk (increasing with decreasing iron abundance – see Wilson & Matteucci, 1992; Wilson & Rood 1994).

### 2.3 Nitrogen

Nitrogen abundances derived from stellar spectroscopy, especially at low metallicities, are the most uncertain. Laird (1985) determined nitrogen abundances in 116 dwarfs. The survey covered the metallicity range $`2.5[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]+0.5`$, with most of the stars having $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]>2.0`$. He found \[N/Fe\]$`=0.67\pm 0.2`$ over the entire metallicity range. As discussed by Laird (1985) the reason for this offset is not clear and may be related to a systematic error in the temperature scale. He then applied an offset of $`+`$0.65 dex to all the \[N/Fe\] ratios.

Carbon et al. (1987) derived nitrogen abundances for 83 dwarfs in the range $`2.5[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]0.6`$, with the majority of stars having $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]<1.5`$. In the present investigation we are adopting the Carbon et al. data for N without any correction for a Teff dependence (see Carbon et al. for a discussion on this correction). From figure 2 it can be seen that when the raw data from Carbon et al. are adopted they are not inconsistent with a secondary N scenario for massive stars although any conclusion about this point still waits for better data. If, as suggested by Carbon et al., their data should be corrected for this temperature dependence, then \[N/Fe\] turns out to be roughly constant over the entire metallicity range. In that case, as for carbon, this implies that both Fe and N, although they have a different nucleosynthetic origin, are produced in the same proportions in the same stellar mass ranges. However, as stressed by Wheeler et al. (1989) we still are left with considerable uncertainty in the preferred \[N/Fe\] value even if it is constant with metallicity.

The isotope <sup>15</sup>N in the ISM has been recently studied by Dahmen et al. (1995), who derived a Galactic gradient of \[<sup>14</sup>N/<sup>15</sup>N\] of 19 $`\pm `$ 8.9 dex kpc<sup>-1</sup>, and concluded that <sup>15</sup>N should be considered a secondary element (normally “secondary” means produced proportionally to the initial stellar metal content, although the same behaviour can be expected if an element is produced without a metallicity dependence but restored on long timescales), and that <sup>14</sup>N has a significant primary component.

## 3 Observed Trends and Scatter

We have made an effort to obtain a more quantitative comparison between model predictions and observations of the elemental abundance ratios elements as a function of metallicity. Accordingly, we include in our data set essentially all published observations of the elements under consideration (C, N, O, Mg, Si, S, Ca and Fe), and renormalize all data to a common solar value (the Anders & Grevesse 1989, hereafter AG89, meteoritic values). This is especially important for the adopted solar iron abundance, which has changed (in the literature) by about 0.2 dex in the last 10 years. We recognize, however, that this normalization alone is not enough to obtain an homogeneous sample and that, for instance, we should also correct for the different adopted oscillator strengths (gf). In the case of a differential analysis the correction for the gfs should not be very important whereas for the absolute analysis this correction may not be not negligible. However, this effect is not as important for metal-poor stars as it is for more metal-rich ones (François private communication).

As the amount of data for the relative abundances of elements in samples of metal-poor stars increases, it is important to consider improvements in the methodology which we use to describe and analyse the trends which are revealed. Following the approach described by Ryan et al. (1996), we have made use of the summary statistics of Cleveland & Kleiner (1975). After applying corrections to the literature values of abundance ratios (as described above) we obtained a straight average for each elemental ratio. We then obtain three lines which summarize the trend of the data as a function of \[Fe/H\]. The three lines are: MM – the midmean – an average of all data between the quartiles of the distribution of relative abundances over a given range in \[Fe/H\]; LSMM – the lower semi-midmean – the midmean of all observations below the median; USMM – the midmean of all observations above the median. If the data are scattered about the midmean according to a normal distribution, the semi-midmeans are estimates of the true quartiles. We have checked this assumption, and it appears to hold, at least globally (over all values of \[Fe/H\]) for each of the abundance ratios considered herein. In Figures 1 and 2 we show plots of the resulting summary lines, obtained by taking either 10 or 15 data points in the estimation window, depending on the density of data. The final plots represent locally weighted regression (lowess; see Cleveland & Devlin 1988) smooths of the summary lines.

Figures 1 and 2 show our plots for O, Mg, Ca, Si, S, C and N respectively. Those elements were chosen not only because they are the most abundant and consequently less uncertain but also because for even-z elements the yields are less dependent on the metallicity (see WW95 and Samland 1997). Samland shows that the stellar models tend to underestimate the yields of odd-z elements, but that there is a good agreement for the even-z ones. The left panels of these figures show the original data sets quoted in Table 1 compared to the models; the right panels show a comparison between the trend lines obtained from the data and the model predictions (see a description of the different models in the next section).

At a first glance of figures 1 and 2 one sees that the so-called plateau for the \[$`\alpha `$/Fe\] ratios at low metallicities is not really constant. This is an important fact and it is very likely to be real. In fact, it is not surprising that the plateau is not constant, since theoretical models always predict a slight decrease of \[$`\alpha `$/Fe\] ratios during the halo phase and this is due to the fact that massive stars of different masses produce slightly different O/Fe ratios. In addition, as predicted by the canonical model for SNe Ia (Matteucci and Greggio, 1986) the first SNe appear already after 30 million years although they reach a maximum at around 1 Gyr from the beginning of the evolution. This epoch corresponds to a metallicity of \[Fe/H\] $``$-1.0 and to the more drastic change of slope in the \[$`\alpha `$/Fe\] ratios. Only simple models where the SN Ia are imposed to appear only after 1 Gyr produce a flat plateau. This large new collection of data is therefore important since it shows clearly this effect.

Recently, Israelian et al. (1998) presented new \[O/Fe\] data, not included in this study, showing that oxygen is overabundant relative to iron, with the \[O/Fe\] ratio increasing from +0.6 to +1.0 going from \[Fe/H\]=$``$1.5 to $``$3.0. This overabundance is larger than it is shown by the data used in this paper. Moreover they show that the plateau of the \[O/Fe\] ratio is not constant but it has a slope of $``$0.31 $`\pm `$ 0.11 in the range $``$3.0$`<`$\[Fe/H\]$`<`$1.0.

It is instructive to consider the spread of the abundance ratios about the underlying trend lines over several intervals of \[Fe/H\]. To do this, we first obtain the lowess line for each elemental ratio as a function of \[Fe/H\], then derive the residual in the ordinate of each data point about the trend. In Table 2 we summarize robust estimators of scale for these residuals over the metallicity intervals: $`0.5>[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]`$; $`1.5>[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]0.5`$; $`2.5<[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]1.5`$; $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]2.5`$. The scale estimator we employ, the biweight estimator $`S_{BI}`$ discussed by Beers et al. (1990), has been shown to have the desirable property that it is not overly influenced by outliers, and approaches the more-commonly-applied standard deviation estimator of scale for samples drawn from a normal parent distribution. For a number of elements we had to combine stars across several abundance intervals due to the paucity of extant data – entries in the table span the columns over which the abundances have been combined. For each entry in the table we also include an estimate of the 68% (one-sigma) bootstrap confidence interval about the biweight estimate of scale, indicated as $`IS_{68}`$, which is useful for assessing the significance of the change in spread from one abundance interval to the next. In the table we also indicate an estimate of the 95% range in the residuals, obtained as $`R_{95}=2\mathrm{x}\mathrm{\hspace{0.33em}1.96}S_{BI}`$, since 1.96 $`S_{BI}`$ is the one-sided two-sigma interval of a normal distribution.

Figure 3 summarizes the data shown in Table 2. This figure shows that the scatter in the abundance ratios increases with decreasing metal abundance, at least for Ca, Mg, and Si (the alpha elements for which substantial amounts of data are available). For O the scatter is essentially constant over the metallicity range but the statistics are poor, although the sample is a more homogeneous one. In the case of N the data show an increase in the scatter of the \[N/Fe\] ratio as metallicity decreases. However, as already discussed in §2.3 the data for low metallicities are very uncertain and are probably affected by the \[N/Fe\] vs Teff correlation found by Carbon et al. (1987). The trend lines in Figure 2 show an obvious decrease in \[N/Fe\] at low metallicity (when the raw data of Carbon et al. are adopted), but no data presently exist for stars with $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]3.0`$, so we cannot be certain not only that this trend exists but even if it continues to lower abundances. The scatter in the \[C/Fe\] ratios also increases as the metallicity decreases. For this element the trend lines in Figure 2 show a small bump around $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=0.5`$ and a slight increase in the \[C/Fe\] ratio for metallicities $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]<2`$ (already noted by Carbon et al. 1987).

## 4 The Chemical Evolution Model

The model of chemical evolution we adopt here is that of Chiappini et al. (1997), where a detailed description can be found. We recall the main assumptions of this model:

* The Galactic disk is approximated by several independent rings, 2 kpc wide, without exchange of matter between them. Continuous infall of gas ensures the temporal increase of the surface mass density $`\sigma _{Tot}`$ in each ring.
* The instantaneous recycling approximation is relaxed. This is of fundamental importance in treating those isotopes, such as <sup>14</sup>N and <sup>56</sup>Fe, which are mostly produced by long-lived stars.
* The prescription for the star formation rate (SFR) is:

$$SFR\sigma _{Tot}^{k_2}\sigma _g^{k_1}$$
$`(1)`$   
where $`\sigma _{Tot}`$ is the total surface mass density and $`\sigma _g`$ is the surface gas density and $`k_1=1.5`$ and $`k_2=0.5`$. A threshold in the surface gas density ($`7M_{}pc^2`$) is also assumed; when the gas density drops below this threshold the star formation stops. The existence of such a threshold has been suggested by star formation studies (Kennicutt 1989).
* For the initial mass function (IMF) we adopt the prescriptions from Scalo (1986) as described in Chiappini et al. (1997).
* This model assumes that the halo+thick disk and the thin disk are formed during two different infall episodes–the thin disk does not form out of gas shed from the halo and the thick disk, but simply out of external gas. Such an interpretation is supported by recent dynamical and kinematical studies of stars in the outer Galactic halo by Sommer-Larsen et al. (1997). Under these hypotheses, the infall rate is given by:

$$\frac{dG_i(r,t)}{dt}=\frac{A(r)(X_{inf})_ie^{t/\tau _T}}{\sigma _{Tot}(r,t_G)}+\frac{B(r)(X_{inf})_ie^{(tt_{max})/\tau _D(r)}}{\sigma _{Tot}(r,t_G)}$$
$`(2)`$   
where $`\tau _T`$ represents the time scale for the formation of the halo and the thick disk, and $`\tau _D(r)`$ represents the time scale for disk formation, which is assumed to increase with Galactocentric distance. The best-fit model of Chiappini et al. (1997) suggests that the timescale for the formation of the halo and thick disk is quite short ($`0.51.0`$ Gyr) whereas the timescale for the formation of the thin disk is quite long ($`8.0`$ Gyr for the solar vicinity). This timescale for the thin disk ensures a very good fit of the new data on the G-dwarf metallicity distribution (Wyse & Gilmore 1995; Rocha-Pinto & Maciel 1996). A(r) and B(r) are derived by the condition of reproducing the present total surface mass density distribution in the solar vicinity. $`(X_{inf})_i`$ is the abundance of the element $`i`$ in the infalling material and $`T_G`$ the age of the Galaxy.

The contributions to the chemical enrichment from supernovae of different type (Ia, Ib and II) as well as from stars dying as C-O white dwarfs and contributing processed elements through stellar winds and the planetary nebula phase are taken into account in great detail (see Chiappini et al. 1997).

The adopted nucleosynthesis prescriptions are from: (a) Renzini & Voli (1981) for intermediate stellar masses and (b) Thielemann et al. (1993) and Nomoto et al. (1997b) for SNe Ia. For the massive stars we considered two different sets of yields, one from WW95 and the other from TNH96.

Figures 4 and 5 show comparisons between both sets of yields for massive stars. In these figures we show also the abundance yields adopted by MF89. WW95 present the yield calculations for stars of up to 40 $`M_{}`$, whereas TNH96 obtained the yields for stars of up to 70 $`M_{}`$(where the yields for the 18, 40 and 70 $`M_{}`$stars are given in Nomoto et al. 1997a and Tsujimoto et al. 1995). Both sets were extrapolated up to $`M_{up}`$ = 100 $`M_{}`$, though this has little effect on the results for the chemical evolution of the Galaxy, as the adopted IMF predicts very few stars more massive than 40 $`M_{}`$. Matteucci (1996) shows a comparison of yields relative to stars of different metallicities for some of the most important heavy elements. She shows that there are non-negligible differences in the yields from $`Z=0`$ and $`\mathrm{Z}0`$ in the WW95 calculations (at least for C, O, Mg, Si and Fe) whereas the yields for different initial metallicities greater than zero are very similar ($`\mathrm{Z}`$ = 0.0001, 0.0002, 0.0020 and 0.0200). As discussed in the introduction, from the point of view of Galactic evolution this difference is not very important since very few stars of zero metallicity must have existed. WW95 present several tables for different metallicities, with the ejected mass as a function of initial stellar mass. We adopt the table which corresponds to the calculation made for $`\mathrm{Z}=\mathrm{Z}_{}`$.

The main differences seen in Figure 5, for the elements Si, Ca and S, are due to the adopted yields in MF89 and the present ones. The difference originates in the fact that both the sets of recent yields contain explosive nucleosynthesis calculations. The yields for massive stars adopted by MF89 were from Woosley & Weaver (1986), which did not include the explosion mechanism in their calculations. To overcome this problem MF89 assumed that the fraction of Si-Ca elements which fall back into the collapsing cores of the post-explosion remnants were roughly 40% of what is remaining of the Si-Ca elements after subtracting the iron. As discussed by these authors, this value was uncertain and was chosen to give the best agreement with the observations. The abundances of elements lighter than silicon are almost unmodified by the explosion (see WW95) and the nuclei which are ejected are the same ones present in the pre-supernova star. The yields for S, Si and Ca obtained by TNH96 are systematically larger than those obtained by WW95 for stars more massive than 30 $`M_{}`$, whereas they are smaller for masses below this value. The elements Si, S and Ca are products of explosive oxygen burning, and the difference of their yields may stem from (the difference in the explosion energy and/or) the difference in the presupernova density structure of the innermost oxygen layer due to the different treatment of convection.

The yields of the most abundant isotopes are not very different. The first example is <sup>16</sup>O, which is the most abundant heavy element made in massive stars. Oxygen is produced by helium-burning and neon-burning, and its synthesis is expected to be roughly independent of metallicity. The main source of uncertainty for the <sup>16</sup>O and <sup>12</sup>C yields is ascribed to the uncertainties in the <sup>12</sup>C($`\alpha ,\gamma `$)<sup>16</sup>O reaction, although the <sup>12</sup>C production is also sensitive to details of convection (see WW95 for a discussion).

The iron yield from WW95 is higher than the TNH96 value for stars with masses below $``$ 35 $`M_{}`$. The iron (and iron-group elements) yield depends strongly on the mass cut that divides the ejecta and the material fallen back onto the neutron star or black hole, thus being sensitive to the explosion mechanism. Hence the predicted yields are uncertain by (at least) a factor of two. In fact, Timmes et al. (1995) suggested that the iron yields from WW95 should be lowered by just this factor. This would lead to an agreement with the TNH96 values for these elements.

For the element Mg we can see a non-negligible difference between both sets of calculations, which would primarily stem from the different treatment of convection (i.e., stability criterion and semi-convective mixing). The WW95 values are much smaller than the TNH96 ones. Chiappini et al. (1997) adopted in their chemical evolution model the WW95 yields, and suggested that it might be appropriate to increase the Mg yields in order to obtain a solar value of Mg in agreement with the observed one.

In Figure 6 we present the masses ejected in the form of various elements, weighted by the IMF in the range of massive stars, as a function of the initial mass of the progenitor star for WW95 (upper panel) and TNH96 (lower panel) and calculations, respectively.

The new calculations also include the yields for <sup>14</sup>N. Figure 7 presents the same plot as Figure 6 for this element (solid line: WW95 and dot-dashed line: TNH96). <sup>14</sup>N in massive stars is thought to be mostly secondary although some primary contribution can occur.

In Table 3 we show the predicted and observed solar abundances of the elements under consideration adopting each of the two sets of predicted yields (model A with WW95 yields and Model B with the TNH96 yields) and the solar abundance values from Anders and Grevesse (1989). The differences between columns (2) and (3) reflect the differences in the adopted yields for massive stars (in Table 3, the exponents are shown in parentheses). We can see that the difference for <sup>14</sup>N in the final abundances is small, even with the very different predictions seen in Figure 7, as this element is mainly produced by stars with progenitors in the intermediate-mass range. The yields adopted for the intermediate-mass range are the same in both models (Renzini & Voli 1981). Note the good agreement for the solar iron abundance when the TNH96 values are adopted. In §6 we discuss the differences in the predicted abundance ratios as a function of metallicity for the two sets of yields considered in this paper.

## 5 The Abundance Ratio of \[O/Fe\] at High Redshift

In figures 8 and 9 we show the predicted \[O/Fe\] ratios as functions of redshift for different cosmologies. In particular, a cosmology is identified by the age of the Universe $`T_U`$, the redshift of the galaxy formation $`z_f`$, the density parameter $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0`$ and the cosmological constant, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$.

Figure 8 shows the predictions of the model which adopts the yields of WW95; Figure 9 shows the predictions using the yields of THN96. A striking characteristic in both figures is the sharp increase of \[O/Fe\] at very high redshift. The spike in \[O/Fe\], which is independent of the adopted yields, is the result of the rapid increase of metallicity at the initiation of the star formation process. For instance, for the cosmological model with $`T_U`$=15 Gyrs, $`z_f`$=5, $`\mathrm{\Omega }_0`$=1 and $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$=0 (solid line in figures 8 and 9), the initial metallicities are $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=5.8`$ and $`5.4`$ for TNH96 and WW95, respectively. As already mentioned, it is sufficient that some Type II SNe explode to raise the metal content of the interstellar medium from zero to metallicities of the order of \[Fe/H\] $`5`$, already in the first 0.5 Gyrs. For the solid line model, in figure 8, we have that $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=5.4`$ at a redshift of 3.52. The \[O/Fe\] plateau extends until a metallicity of about $`[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=3.0`$, which corresponds to a redshift value of 3.51 (in other words, a range in metallicity of $`\mathrm{\Delta }[\mathrm{Fe}/\mathrm{H}]=2.4`$ corresponds to a change in redshift of $`\mathrm{\Delta }`$z = 0.01). This explains the peaks when plotting the abundance ratios as functions of redshift instead of metallicity. A similar result applies when adopting the TNH96 yields.

The same behavior is expected for the \[O/Zn\] ratio which should be easier to compare with the abundances observed in high redshift DLA systems, as these elements are likely not to be affected by dust, and because the abundance of Zn has been measured for a large number of such systems (Pettini et al. 1997). The element Zn behaves exactly like iron and therefore is very probably formed in the same way, namely mostly during the explosion of a type Ia SN (see Matteucci et al. 1993).

This striking feature can be used to identify proto-spiral galaxies similar to our own Galaxy when observing high redshift objects. This is an important point in view of the fact that more and more data are becoming available for damped Lyman-$`\alpha `$ systems at high redshifts.

## 6 Results and Conclusions

In this paper we computed the chemical evolution of the solar neighbourhood by adopting two different sets of yields for massive stars with the aim of imposing constraints on the early phases of galaxy evolution. To do that we have assembled one of the largest sample of relative abundance ratios observed in a range of metallicity going from \[Fe/H\]=$``$4.0 up to solar. We have adopted a detailed method to compare model predictions and observations in a self-consistent way. This method allowed us to quantify the apparent spread in the data, to discover some new trends and to impose constraints on stellar nucleosynthesis.

Our main conclusions can be summarized as follows:

\- From the analysis of the data sample we found that the so-called “plateau” for the \[$`\alpha `$/Fe\] ratio at low metallicities is not perfectly flat but it presents a slight slope, especially for oxygen. This is an important fact that had been not noticed before since the number of data at low metallicities used to compare with chemical evolution models was always small (except in Samland 1997). This slight slope is in very good agreement with our model predictions for both sets of yields in the metallicity range ($``$3.0$`<`$ \[Fe/H\] $`<`$1.0) and it is due partly to the fact that massive stars of different mass produce slightly different O/Fe ratios and partly to the appearence of SNeIa which start occurring already after 30 million years in the adopted model of a white dwarf plus a red giant companion (Matteucci and Greggio 1986). These supernovae reach then a maximum at around 1Gyr which is the time at which the \[O/Fe\] ratio starts changing more drastically. This corresponds, in our model, to roughly a metallicity of \[Fe/H\] = $``$1.0. If we identify this time with the end of the halo phase, although the border line between halo and thick-disk is not so precise, we can infer that 1 Gyr is the average timescale for the formation of the halo.

\- By comparing the different sets of yields used in this paper we can not draw very firm conclusions since both of them can reproduce the solar abundances inside a factor of two. However, going more into detail we can say that the model predictions are in agreement with the observed values, except for two elements which are only marginally consistent with observations, namely, Mg when the WW95 yields are adopted, and <sup>12</sup>C when the TNH96 yields are adopted. Moreover, the values of Mg and <sup>12</sup>C are always underestimated either adopting TNH96 or WW95 yields. For Mg this has been already shown by Chiappini et al. (1997) and Thomas et al. (1997). In the case of <sup>12</sup>C the TNH96 yields are systematically lower than the WW95 ones, and this could be the origin of the “valley” seen in figure 2 for \[C/Fe\] between the metallicities \[Fe/H\] = $``$1 and $``$3. For oxygen both sets of yields are very similar, at least up to 30 $`M_{}`$. However, for masses above 30 $`M_{}`$ the yields obtained by TNH96 are larger. While the TNH96 yields for iron in massive stars increase almost linearly with mass up to 40 $`M_{}`$ being roughly constant after this value, the calculations by WW95 indicate an iron production which is concentrated in the range between 20 and 30 $`M_{}`$.

The predicted iron solar abundance obtained when adopting the TNH96 yields is closer to the observed value although the difference between the TNH96 and WW95 values are smaller than the uncertainties involved. It can be seen that the O/Fe ratio for very high mass stars varies with the stellar mass much more in WW95 predictions than in the TNH96 ones. This influences the slope of the \[O/Fe\] plateau at low metallicities and can be used as a constraint to the yields of massive stars. Unfortunately, at such low metallicities (\[Fe/H\] between $``$4 and $``$3) there are still not enough data to be able to choose between the two set of yields. For Si, S, and Ca the WW95 yields are higher than the TNH96 ones up to 35 $`M_{}`$. The opposite occurs for masses above 35 $`M_{}`$. In this case both models predict \[X/Fe\] ratios in good agreement with the observational data. This happens because the differences between predicted iron and $`\alpha `$-element yields are compensating each others.

-The observed increasing scatter in the abundance ratios of many elements with decreasing metallicity could be interpreted as if the interstellar medium was less homogeneous at early times. It seems unlikely that the increasing scatter is due solely to the increased uncertainty in the estimates of elemental abundances in the most metal-poor stars. Although the number of lines suitable for abundance analyses certainly decreases with lower abundances, the continuum against which they are measured also gets cleaner, and uncertainties due to contamination from blends lessens as well. We recall that McWilliam et al. (1995) suggested that the observed spread at very low metallicities could be due to metallicity dependent yields. From the sets of yields analysed here we can exclude this possibility, at least for the $`\alpha `$-elements and Fe, since they depend only slightly on the initial stellar metallicity and, again, the global metallicity increases quite fast in the early phases of Galactic evolution as indicated by the absence of zero-metallicity stars in the Galaxy.

-Finally, we predicted that in spite of the adopted yields, the \[O/Fe\] ratio at high redshifts should show a sharp rise and we suggested that the same behaviour is expected for the \[O/Zn\] ratio which should be not affected by dust. Future measurements of either \[$`\alpha `$/Zn\] or \[$`\alpha `$/Fe\] ratios in very metal poor stars will be very useful to infer the nature and age of high-redshift objects.

CC acknowledges that this work was partially supported by CNPq and FAPESP, Brazil. TCB acknowledges partial support of this work from NSF grant AST 95-29454 to Michigan State University. TCB expresses gratitude to the Instituto Astronômico e Geofísico of the University of São Paulo (IAG/USP) for hospitality during his visit, when the final version of this paper was completed and acknowledges that this visit was supported by FAPESP and pró-reitoria de pós-graduação of the University of São Paulo, Brazil. KN acknowledges that this research has been supported in part by the Grant-in-Aid for Scientific Research (05242102, 06233101) and COE research (07CE2002) of the Japanese Ministry of Education, Science, and Culture.      

Figure Captions

Fig. 1 – Abundance ratios as function of the metallicity for O, Mg, and Ca. The left panels show a comparison between the data (see Table 1) and the models (dashed-line: with WW95 yields; dot-dashed line: with TNH96 yields). The right panels show a comparison between the summary lines (as described in section 3 – the solid line represents the midmean and the dotted lines represent the lower and upper semi-midmean) and the model predictions. The parameter r represents the number of data points (10 or 15) in the estimation window and s refers to amount of smoothing (the fraction of data included at each location) in the summary lines.

Fig. 2 – The same as Figure 1, for Si, S, C, and N.

Fig. 3 – The biweight estimator of scale, $`S_{BI}`$, for the \[X/Fe\] ratios (X = C, Ca, Mg, N, O, S, and Si) at different \[Fe/H\] intervals (see Table 2).

Fig. 4 – Ejected masses in the form of <sup>12</sup>C, <sup>16</sup>O, and <sup>24</sup>Mg as function of the initial mass of the progenitor star given by different authors (solid line: WW95, dot-dashed line: TNH96, dotted line: Woosley and Weaver 1986, adopted by MF89).

Fig. 5 – The same as Figure 4, for Si, Fe, Ca, and S.

Fig. 6 – Masses ejected in the form of various elements, weighted by the IMF, for the more massive stars, plotted as functions of the initial mass of the progenitor (upper panel: WW95 yields, lower panel: TNH96 yields).

Fig. 7 – The same as Figure 6, for <sup>14</sup>N, based on the WW95 (solid line) and TNH96 (dot-dashed line) yields.

Fig. 8 – \[O/Fe\] plotted as function of the redshift, for different cosmologies, adopting the WW95 yields (where T<sub>U</sub> is the age of the Universe, $`z_f`$ initial redshift of galaxies formation, $`\mathrm{\Lambda }`$ is the cosmological constant).

Fig. 9 – The same as figure 8, but adopting the TNH96 yields.