PRESSURE SHIFT AND GRAVITATIONAL REDSHIFT OF BALMER LINES IN WHITE DWARFS: REDISCUSSION

The Stark-induced shift and asymmetry, the so-called pressure shift (PS) of Hα and Hβ Balmer lines in spectra of DA white dwarfs (WDs), have been examined in detail as masking effects in measurements of the gravitational redshift in WDs. The results are compared with our earlier ones from a quarter of a century ago. In these earlier papers, the standard, symmetrical Stark line profiles, as a dominant constituent of the Balmer line profiles but shifted as a whole by the PS effect, were applied to all spectrally active layers of the WD atmosphere. At present, in each of the WD layers, the Stark line profiles (especially of Hβ) are inherently asymmetrical and shifted due to the effects of strong inhomogeneity of the perturbing fields in plasma. To calculate the Stark line profiles in successive layers of the WD atmosphere we used the modified Full Computer Simulation Method, able to take adequately into account the complexity of local elementary quantum processes in plasma. In the case of the Hα line, the present value of Stark-induced shift of the synthetic Hα line profile is about half the previous one and it is negligible in comparison with the gravitational redshift. In the case of the Hβ line, the present value of Stark-induced shift of the synthetic Hβ line profile is about twice the previous one. The source of this extra shift is the asymmetry of Hβ peaks.