Photometric properties of stellar populations in Galactic globular clusters: the role of the Mg-Al anticorrelation

Abstract

We have computed low-mass stellar models and synthetic spectra for an initial chemical composition that includes the full C-N, O-Na, and Mg-Al abundance anticorrelations observed in second-generation stars belonging to a number of massive Galactic globular clusters. This investigation extends a previous study that addressed the effect of only the C-N and O-Na anticorrelations seen in all globulars observed to date. We find that the impact of Mg-Al abundance variations at fixed [Fe/H] and helium abundance is negligible on stellar models and isochrones (from the main sequence to the tip of the red giant branch) and bolometric corrections, when compared to the effect of C-N and O-Na variations. We identify a spectral feature at 490-520 nm, for low-mass main sequence stars, caused by MgH molecular bands. This feature has a vanishingly small effect on bolometric corrections for Johnson and Stromgren filters that cover that spectral range. However, specific narrow-band filters able to target this wavelength region can be powerful tools for investigating the Mg-poor unevolved stars and highlight possible splittings of the main sequence due to variations of Mg abundances.