THE EVOLUTION OF OXYGEN AND MAGNESIUM IN THE BULGE AND DISK OF THE MILKY WAY

We show that the Galactic bulge and disk share a similar, strong, decline in [O/Mg] ratio with [Mg/H]. The similarity of the [O/Mg] trend in these markedly different populations suggests that the strong decline is due to a metallicity-dependent modulation of the stellar yields from massive stars by mass loss from winds, related to the Wolf-Rayet phenomenon, as proposed by McWilliam & Rich in 2004. We have modified existing models for the chemical evolution of the Galactic bulge and the solar neighborhood with the inclusion of metallicity-dependent oxygen yields from theoretical predictions for massive stars that include mass loss by stellar winds. Our results significantly improve the agreement between predicted and observed [O/Mg] ratios in the bulge and disk above solar metallicity; however, a small zero-point normalization problem remains to be resolved. The zero-point shift indicates that either the semi-empirical yields of François et al. obtained in 2004 need adjustment, or that the bulge initial mass function (IMF) is not quite as flat as found by Ballero et al. in 2007. Our result removes a previous inconsistency between the interpretation of [O/Fe] and [Mg/Fe] ratios in the bulge, and confirms the conclusion that the bulge formed more rapidly than the disk, based on the overabundances of elements produced by massive stars. We also provide an explanation for the long-standing difference between [α/Fe] and [O/Fe] trends among disk stars more metal rich than the Sun.