Chemical constraints on the formation of the Galactic thick disk

Abstract

We highlight some results from our detailed abundance analysis study of 703 kinematically selected F and G dwarf stars in the solar neighbourhood. The analysis is based on spectra of high-resolution (R=45000 to 110000) and high signal-to-noise (S/N=150 to 300). The main findings include: (1) at a given metallicity, the thick disk abundance trends are more $α$-enhanced than those of the thin disk; (2) the metal-rich limit of the thick disk reaches at least solar metallicities; (3) the metal-poor limit of the thin disk is around [Fe/H]=-0.8; (4) the thick disk shows an age-metallicity gradient; (5) the thin disk does {\it not} show an age-metallicity gradient; (6) the most metal-rich thick disk stars at [Fe/H]=0 are significantly older than the most metal-poor thin disk stars at [Fe/H]=-0.7; (7) based on our elemental abundances we find that kinematical criteria produce thin and thick disk stellar samples that are biased in the sense that stars from the low-velocity tail of the thick disk are classified as thin disk stars, and stars from the high-velocity tail of the thin disk are classified as thick disk stars; (8) age criteria appears to produce thin and thick disk stellar samples with less contamination.

Invited talk at the "Assembling the puzzle of the Milky Way" conference, April 17-22, 2011, in Le Grand-Bornand, France. Will be published in EPJ Web of Conferences (Edited by Céline Reylé, Annie Robin and Mathias Schultheis)