Discovery of a New Stellar Subpopulation Residing in the (Inner) Stellar Halo of the Milky Way

Abstract

We report the discovery of a unique collection of metal-poor giant stars that exhibit anomalously high levels of 28 Si, clearly above typical Galactic levels. Our sample spans a narrow range of metallicities, peaking at −1.07 ± 0.06, and exhibits abundance ratios of [Si, Al/Fe] that are as extreme as those observed in Galactic globular clusters (GCs), and Mg is slightly less overabundant. In almost all the sources we used, the elemental abundances were redetermined from high-resolution spectra, which were reanalyzed assuming LTE. Thus, we compiled the main element families, namely, the light elements (C, N), α -elements (O, Mg, Si), iron-peak element (Fe), s -process elements (Ce, Nd), and the light odd-Z element (Al). We also provide dynamical evidence that most of these stars lie on tight (inner) halo-like and retrograde orbits passing through the bulge. Such kinds of objects have been found in present-day halo GCs, providing the clearest chemical signature of past accretion events in the (inner) stellar halo of the galaxy, possibly formed as the result of dissolved halo GCs. Their chemical composition is, in general, similar to that of typical GC populations, although several differences exist.