Revised rate coefficients for h2 and h? destruction by realistic stellar spectra

Abstract

Understanding the processes that can destroy H2 and H- species is quintessential in governing the formation of the first stars, black holes and galaxies. In this study, we compute the reaction rate coefficients for H2 photodissociation by Lyman-Werner photons (11.2-13.6 eV) and H- photodetachment by 0.76 eV photons emanating from self-consistent stellar populations that we model using publicly available stellar synthesis codes. So far, studies that include chemical networks for the formation of molecular hydrogen take these processes into account by assuming that the source spectra can be approximated by a power-law dependence or a blackbody spectrum at 104 or 105 K. We show that using spectra generated from realistic stellar population models can alter the reaction rates for photodissociation, kdi, and photodetachment, kde, significantly. In particular, kde can be up to ∼2-4 orders of magnitude lower in the case of realistic stellar spectra suggesting that previous calculations have overestimated the impact that radiation has on lowering H2 abundances. In contrast to burst modes of star formation, we find that models with continuous star formation predict increasing kde and kdi, which makes it necessary to include the star formation history of sources to derive self-consistent reaction rates, and that it is not enough to just calculate J21 for the background. For models with constant star formation rate, the change in shape of the spectral energy distribution leads to a non-negligible late-time contribution to kde and kdi, and we present self-consistently derived cosmological reaction rates based on star formation rates consistent with observations of the high-redshift Universe.