On the Construction of a New 3D Atlas of Stellar Spectral Energy Distributions

Abstract

Modern spectrophotometric atlases are burdened with significant systematic errors. In particular, the problems of spectrum calibration in the ultraviolet region are not solved; different parts of the spectrum are not thoroughly fit to each other; spectra of (even bright) stars, obtained by different authors, display large discrepancies. Here we discuss a possibility to construct a new atlas of spectral energy distributions (SEDs) for a large set of stars by comparison of empirical stellar spectra in dozens of modern spectrophotometric atlases, as well as the comparison of synthetic and observed color indices in different multicolor photometric systems. In this way we suppose to exclude most of systematic errors and construct a new three-dimensional (spectral class, luminosity class, metallicity) atlas of empirical stellar spectra for several thousand stars. After exclusion of interstellar reddenings, a semi-empirical atlas of average SEDs can be constructed for about 150–200 spectral subtypes. This would allow us to make calibrations of spectrophotometric and photometric parameters in terms of spectral types and physical parameters (Teff, log g, [m/H]) and to verify the accuracy of model stellar atmospheres.

Keywords

• stars: fundamental parameters
• stars: spectral energy distributions