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ABSTRACT

Stothers and Simon 1970

Stothers, R., and N.R. Simon, 1970: Influence of opacity on the pulsational stability of massive stars with uniform chemical composition. Astrophys. J., 160, 1019-1029.

The maximum mass of homogeneous stars which are stable against nuclear-energized pulsations has been redetermined by using a full opacity formula and an accurate treatment of the equilibrium structure of the outer layers where nonscattering sources of opacity are important damping agents. Sixteen composition mixtures were used, covering the range 0 ≤ Y ≤ (1 - Z) and 0 ≤ Z ≤ 0.05. The nuclearenergy sources were taken to be the CN cycle and the triple-α process. Due to the primary influence of bound-free absorption by metals (and, to a lesser extent, of free-free absorption by hydrogen and helium), the critically stable nondimensional mass of hydrogen-burning stars, (M/M2, can range from 27 to 94, depending on the chemical composition. For likely chemical compositions of extreme Population I, the actual critical mass is probably 80-120 M. For homogeneous helium-burning stars, the critical mass ranges from 13 to 19 M, depending on the metal abundance.

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