Chemical composition and stellar populations of the Galactic bulge

Beatriz Barbuy A. Alves-Brito, M. Zoccali, V. Hill, A. Renzini, S. Ortolani, E. Bica. D. Minniti

IAG/USP

The Galactic bulge is the least studied stellar population in our Galaxy. Very little data is available in terms of its detailed abundance pattern which could give important information of the formation and chemical enrichment of the bulge. A low spectral resolution of a large number of stars is interesting, since it can give some information on the chemical composition, and it is important for selection of candidates to be observed at higher resolution. Also, the spectra covering a large wavelength range can be used as templates for the study of bulges of galaxies. We intend to observe stars for which we have photometric data from the ESO Wide Field survey. The multi-object spectrographs Goodman on SOAR and GMOS on Gemini are suitable instruments for this purpose. After selection of targets, the STELES spectrograph on SOAR (to be available in the future), and the Phoenix infrared spectrograph on SOAR or on Gemini will be used to derive detailed chemical composition of the objects.