ALBERT

Description: The abundance of O in planetary nebulae (PNe) has been historically used as a metallicity indicator of the interstellar medium (ISM), where they originated; e.g. it has been widely used to study metallicity gradients in our Galaxy and beyond. However, clear observational evidence for O self-enrichment in low-metallicity Galactic PNe with C-rich dust has been recently reported. Here, we report asymptotic giant branch (AGB) nucleosynthesis predictions for the abundances of the CNO elements and helium in the metallicity range Z /4 〈 Z 〈 2 Z . Our AGB models, with diffusive overshooting from all the convective borders, predict that O is overproduced in low- Z low-mass (~1–3 M ) AGB stars and nicely reproduce the recent O overabundances observed in C-rich dust PNe. This confirms that O is not always a good proxy of the original ISM metallicity and other chemical elements such as Cl or Ar should be used instead. The production of oxygen by low-mass stars should be thus considered in galactic-evolution models.

Description: We present nucleosynthesis predictions (HeCNOCl) from asymptotic giant branch (AGB) models, with diffusive overshooting from all the convective borders, in the metallicity range Z /4 〈  Z  〈 2 Z . They are compared to recent precise nebular abundances in a sample of Galactic planetary nebulae (PNe) that is divided among double-dust chemistry (DC) and oxygen-dust chemistry (OC) according to the infrared dust features. Unlike the similar subsample of Galactic carbon-dust chemistry PNe recently analysed by us, here the individual abundance errors, the higher metallicity spread, and the uncertain dust types/subtypes in some PNe do not allow a clear determination of the AGB progenitor masses (and formation epochs) for both PNe samples; the comparison is thus more focused on a object-by-object basis. The lowest metallicity OC PNe evolve from low-mass (~1 M ) O-rich AGBs, while the higher metallicity ones (all with uncertain dust classifications) display a chemical pattern similar to the DC PNe. In agreement with recent literature, the DC PNe mostly descend from high-mass ( M ≥ 3.5 M ) solar/supersolar metallicity AGBs that experience hot bottom burning (HBB), but other formation channels in low-mass AGBs like extra mixing, stellar rotation, binary interaction, or He pre-enrichment cannot be disregarded until more accurate C/O ratios would be obtained. Two objects among the DC PNe show the imprint of advanced CNO processing and deep second dredge-up, suggesting progenitors masses close to the limit to evolve as core collapse supernovae (above 6 M ). Their actual C/O ratio, if confirmed, indicate contamination from the third dredge-up, rejecting the hypothesis that the chemical composition of such high-metallicity massive AGBs is modified exclusively by HBB.