Revealing the chemical structure of the Magellanic Clouds with APOGEE. II. Abundance gradients of the Large Magellanic Cloud
ABSTRACT We present the gradients of the Large Magellanic Cloud (LMC) for 25 elemental abundances and abundance ratios with their respective temporal evolution as well as age-[X/Fe] trends using 6130 LMC field red giant branch (RGB) stars observed by SDSS-IV / APOGEE-2S. APOGEE is a high resolution (R $\sim$ 22 500) H-band spectroscopic survey that gathered data on the LMC with broad radial and azimuthal coverage out to $\sim$10$^\circ$. The calculated overall metallicity ([Fe/H]) gradient of the LMC with no age binning is –0.0296 $\pm$ 0.0017 dex kpc−1. We also find that many of the gradients ($\nabla _R$[X/H]) show a U-shaped trend as functions of age. This trend is marked by a flattening of the gradient but then a general steepening at more recent times. The extremum point at which all these gradients (with the U-shaped trend) begin to steepen is $\gtrsim$2 Gyr ago. In addition, some of the age–[X/Fe] trends show an increase starting a few Gyr before the extremum point in the gradient evolutions. A subset of the age–[X/Fe] trends also show maxima concurrent with the gradients’ extremum points, further pinpointing a major event in the history of the LMC $\sim$2 Gyr ago. This time frame aligns with a known Magellanic Clouds interaction, likely driving the gradient and age–[X/Fe] trends seen. In the future, ongoing or recent mergers can be studied potentially using similar patterns like the ones found here.
Authors
- David L. Nidever (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1793-3689)
- Richard R. Lane (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1805-0316)
- Guy S. Stringfellow (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-1479-3059)
- D. Geisler (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3900-8208)
- Maria-Rosa L. Cioni (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6797-696X)
- Ricardo R. Muñoz (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0810-5558)
- Penélope Longa-Peña (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0001-9330-5003)
- Andrés Almeida (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0009-0000-0733-2479)
- Joshua Povick (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-6553-7082)
- Alexandre Roman–Lopes (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1379-4204)
- Steven R. Majewski (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-2025-3147)
- Yuxi Lu (ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0003-4769-3273)
Institutions
- Universidad de Antofagasta (CL)
- American Museum of Natural History (US)
- University of Concepción (CL)
- Montana State University (US)
- Leibniz Institute for Astrophysics Potsdam (DE)
- Millennium Science Initiative (CL)
- Universidad Bernardo O'Higgins (CL)
- Chinese Academy of Science South America Center for Astronomy (CL)
- Astronomy and Space (AU)
- University of Virginia (US)
- University of La Serena (CL)
- Columbia University (US)
- Universidad Diego Portales (CL)
Publication Details
- Journal
- Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society
- Published
- 2025-08-28
- DOI
- https://doi.org/10.1093/mnras/staf1428
- Citations
- 1
- Primary Topic
- Stellar, planetary, and galactic studies
- Type
- article
- Field-Weighted Citation Impact
- 1.15
Funders
- National Science Foundation
- Smithsonian Institution
- U.S. Department of Energy
- Alfred P. Sloan Foundation
- Montana Space Grant Consortium
- Carnegie Institution of Washington
- University of Utah
- Johns Hopkins University
- Carnegie Mellon University
- Agencia Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo
- Instituto de Astrofísica de Canarias
- Office of Science