The Radioactive Elements in the Atmosphere of HD25354—Are They the Result of the Symmetric Decay of the Chemical Elements of the Island of Stability?

Abstract

In this research, we investigated the observed spectra of the hot peculiar star HD25354 with an effective temperature Teff = 12,800 K, identified the lines of radioactive chemical elements, including the elements with short decay time, and estimated the abundances of these elements. We tried to confirm or reject the existence of promethium lines and lines of other radioactive elements which were detected in previous investigations of this star and explain the physical mechanisms which are responsible for the synthesis of these elements in the stellar atmosphere. We used two high-dispersion spectra of HD25354 observed with the 2 m telescope of Terskol observatory with resolving power near R = 60,000, and a signal to noise ratio near 200. The spectrum of the star from the archive of the 1.93 m telescope of Haute-Provence observatory was also used. The observations were compared with synthetic spectra and the abundance of promethium was found using the best four lines of this element in the observed spectra: logN(Pm) = 5.84 ± 0.16 in the scale logN(H) = 12. It is comparable to the abundances of stable lanthanides in the atmosphere of this star. The abundance of thorium derived from two lines of double-ionized thorium is logN(Th) = 3.59 ± 0.15. The upper limits for technetium, radium, actinium, uranium, and americium abundances are found to be equal to 4.0, 3.0, 1.25, 3.5, and 4.0, respectively. Maybe the existence of promethium lines and lines of other unstable chemical elements in the spectra of HD25354, as well as the other stars of our Galaxy, Magellanic Clouds, and Fornax dwarf galaxy, can be explained by contamination of its atmosphere by the products of kilonova outburst and by symmetric decay of chemical elements with long decay times located at the island of stability (atomic numbers Z = 110–128) of transfermium elements. Maybe the decay of superheavy elements of the island of stability can be one of the reasons for the enhanced abundances of rare earth lanthanides in different types of stars.

Keywords

• stars—abundances
• stars—individual (HD25354)
• nuclear reactions
• nucleosynthesis stellar evolution
• cosmic rays
• accretion