Carbon Abundances in the Galactic Thin and Thick Disks

Abstract

Although carbon is, together with oxygen and nitrogen, one of the most important elements in the study of galactic chemical evolution its production sites are still poorly known and have been much debated (see e.g. Gustafsson et al. 1999; Chiappini et al. 2003). To trace the origin and evolution of carbon we have determined carbon abundances from the forbidden [C I] line at 8727 Å and made comparisons to oxygen abundances from the forbidden [OI] line at 6300 Å in a sample of 51 nearby F and G dwarf stars. These data and the fact that the forbidden [C I] and [O I] lines are very robust abundance indicators (they are essentially insensitive to deviations from LTE and uncertainties in the stellar parameters, see, e.g., Gustafsson et al. 1999; Asplund et al. 2005) enable us to very accurately measure the C/O ratio as well as individual C and O abundances. Our first results indicate that the time-scale for the main source that contribute to the carbon enrichment of the interstellar medium operate on the same time-scale as those that contribute to the iron enrichment (and can possibly be AGB stars…)