A&A 628, A101 (2019) https://doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361/201833258 Astronomy & © ESO 2019 Astrophysics The inner dust shell of Betelgeuse detected by polarimetric aperture-masking interferometry? X. Haubois1,2, B. Norris2, P. G. Tuthill2, C. Pinte3,4, P. Kervella4,5, J. H. Girard1, N. M. Kostogryz6, S. V. Berdyugina6, G. Perrin5, S. Lacour5, A. Chiavassa7, and S. T. Ridgway8 1 European Organisation for Astronomical Research in the Southern Hemisphere, Casilla 19001, Santiago 19, Chile e-mail: [email protected] 2 Sydney Institute for Astronomy, School of Physics, University of Sydney, NSW 2006, Australia 3 UJF-Grenoble 1/CNRS-INSU, Institut de Planétologie et d’Astrophysique de Grenoble, UMR 5274, 38041 Grenoble, France 4 Unidad Mixta Internacional Franco-Chilena de Astronomía, CNRS/INSU UMI 3386 and Departamento de Astronomía, Universidad de Chile, Casilla 36-D Santiago, Chile 5 LESIA, Observatoire de Paris, PSL Research University, CNRS, Sorbonne Universités, UPMC Université Paris 06, Université Paris Diderot, Sorbonne Paris Cité, 5 place Jules Janssen, 92195 Meudon, France 6 Kiepenheuer-Institut für Sonnenphysik (KIS), Schöneckstrasse 6, 79104 Freiburg, Germany 7 Laboratoire Lagrange, Université Côte d’Azur, Observatoire de la Côte d’Azur, CNRS, Boulevard de l’Observatoire, CS 34229, 06304 Nice Cedex 4, France 8 National Optical Astronomy Observatory, PO Box 26732, Tucson, AZ 85726-6732, USA Received 18 April 2018 / Accepted 30 June 2019 ABSTRACT Context. Theory surrounding the origin of the dust-laden winds from evolved stars remains mired in controversy. Characterizing the formation loci and the dust distribution within approximately the first stellar radius above the surface is crucial for understanding the physics that underlie the mass-loss phenomenon. Aims. By exploiting interferometric polarimetry, we derive the fundamental parameters that govern the dust structure at the wind base of a red supergiant. Methods. We present near-infrared aperture-masking observations of Betelgeuse in polarimetric mode obtained with the NACO/SAMPol instrument. We used both parametric models and radiative transfer simulations to predict polarimetric differential visibility data and compared them to SPHERE/ZIMPOL measurements. Results. Using a thin dust shell model, we report the discovery of a dust halo that is located at only 0.5 R? above the photosphere (i.e. an inner radius of the dust halo of 1.5 R?). By fitting the data under the assumption of Mie scattering, we estimate the grain size and density for various dust species. By extrapolating to the visible wavelengths using radiative transfer simulations, we compare our model with SPHERE/ZIMPOL data and find that models based on dust mixtures that are dominated by forsterite are most favored. Such a close dusty atmosphere has profound implications for the dust formation mechanisms around red supergiants. Key words. techniques: interferometric – stars: fundamental parameters – infrared: stars – stars: individual: Betelgeuse 1. Introduction convective cells (Hayes 1984). UBV polarimetric measurements from 600 to 2500 around the star (Le Borgne et al. 1986) led to the Betelgeuse (α Orionis) is a red supergiant (hereafter RSG) of detection of a silicon dust environment whose grain size is in the spectral type M2Iab and one of the brightest stars in the night range between 0.05 and 0.5 µm (Mauron & Le Borgne 1986). +48 sky at all wavelengths. With a distance of 222−34 pc (Harper et al. Interferometric reconstructed images in the visible unveiled 2017), its angular diameter of ∼43 mas in the near-infrared (e.g., an elliptical structure around Betelgeuse at ∼2–2.5 stellar radii Perrin et al. 2004; Haubois et al. 2009; Montargès et al. 2014) (Roddier & Roddier 1985). The favored explanation for this makes it an ideal target for studying the inner structures that are circumstellar emission was Mie scattering of stellar light by involved in the poorly constrained mass-loss phenomenon. For dust particles. This interpretation was found in agreement with an overview of Betelgeuse’s properties, we refer to the proceed- Draine(1981), who showed that assuming a 3600 K effective ings of a workshop that focused on Betelgeuse (Kervella et al. temperature for Betelgeuse, clean silicate grains would start to 2013). condense at 1.8 stellar radius. This confirmed previous work pre- Betelgeuse exhibits a complex signal that is spectrally and dicting that at such a short distance above the photosphere, this temporally variable in net polarized light. From the temporal dust shell would yield a significant degree of polarized light in analysis of four years of B-band polarization data, the reported the visible (Tsuji 1978). Based on interferometric and spectro- variability has been interpreted in terms of activity of large-scale scopic observations, Verhoelst et al.(2006) suggested that an amorphous alumina shell at 1.5 R? could account for the fact that ? Based on SAMPol data obtained at the ESO VLT Yepun telescope Betelgeuse appears 1.5 times larger in the mid-infrared (MIR) (090.D-0898(A)). than in the near-infrared (NIR). However, given the sublimation Article published by EDP Sciences A101, page 1 of 10 A&A 628, A101 (2019) temperature of 1900 K for alumina, the gas pressure required zero net polarization as a sum over a circularly symmetric to maintain such a shell is 104 times higher than model pre- environment. Operating at the extreme spatial resolution limit, dictions for the inner atmosphere of Betelgeuse. Perrin et al. SAMPol is capable of breaking the degeneracy, delivering infor- (2007) found that a layer of water vapor coexists with a thin mation on polarized structures at spatial scales that are normally shell composed of SiO and alumina in a maximum radius of hidden. about 62.5 mas, corresponding to 1.43 R? in the N band. Far- This work employed the 18-hole aperture mask (net trans- ther away at about arcsecond spatial scales, Kervella et al.(2011) mission of 3.9% with respect to the full aperture), with an reported MIR spectroimaging observations of the highly asym- integration time of 0.1 s obtained with a subframe window of metric Betelgeuse circumstellar environment, concluding that 512 × 514 pixels on the Aladdin3 detector. For each image data silicates or alumina dust were viable constituents. cube, interferograms for the two orthogonal polarizations split by The atmosphere of Betelgeuse is subject to ∼1 G magnetic the Wollaston prism are recorded simultaneously on the detec- fields inferred from the Zeeman effect (Aurière et al. 2010), tor array. The full starlight polarization state is explored by which are thought to originate from local low-scale convec- changing the rotation angle of upstream half-wave plates. This tive activity. Simplifying the interpretation of polarized-light experiment employed four half-wave plate positions separated signals, such modest fields are unlikely to result in signifi- by 22.5◦ in order to sample the Q and U Stokes parameters. Fol- cant levels of direct continuum polarization. Extreme adaptive- lowing a relatively standard data reduction procedure entailing optics polarimetric observations within the Spectro-Polarimetric sky subtraction, flat fielding, and cosmic-ray removal, the com- High-contrast Exoplanet Research (SPHERE) obtained with plex visibilities and bispectra were separately accumulated for the Zürich Imaging Polarimeter (ZIMPOL) were obtained by each baseline and baseline triplet, respectively, for each of the Kervella et al.(2016), resolving the surface and inner envi- two polarizations. Finally, in order to remove systematics that ronment of Betelgeuse. A somewhat complex picture emerged are due to the non-common paths after the Wollaston prism, hor- from this work, in which media of inhomogeneous densities izontally polarized visibilities (Vh) were divided by vertically and temperatures coexist in asymmetric structures. Dust is con- polarized visibilities (Vv), forming a single differential observ- firmed at 3 R?, but the authors note that polarization levels able. This ratio of the observables, hereafter called differential might be diluted by (unpolarized) gaseous emission, which (polarimetric) visibility, is highly robust to errors induced by see- allows for the possibility that significant dust may exist interior ing because the two polarizations were recorded simultaneously. to this. A list of spectral filters employed for the SAMPol observations Developments in polarimetric aperture masking interferom- is given in Table1. etry (SAMPol mode at NACO) allowed novel polarized-light studies of dust shells around AGB stars (Norris et al. 2012). Observational studies targeting several bright systems revealed 3. Detection of the dusty inner environment of dust shells capable of strong scattered-light interaction with the Betelgeuse stellar radiation field. These systems had typical diameters of Although strictly speaking, the self-calibrating differential R about 2 ? and grain sizes of about 300 nm. These data imme- polarimetric visibility obviates the need for the usual strict obser- diately provoked renewed interest in the role played by photon vance of known (usually point source) stars for the system scattering in the physics of radiatively driven winds, opening a transfer function, here the dust-free red giant Aldebaran was new window to explore links between the stellar properties and chosen as a non-polarized reference object. Photometric mea- final mass-loss rates on the AGB. surements performed in the optical and infrared domains (Ducati Based on the same observing technique, we aim to iden- 2002) were compared with a simple (non-dusty) synthetic tify the nature and the location of the polarizing structures at spectrum obtained from Castelli & Kurucz(2003) 1 and with the wind base for the red supergiant Betelgeuse. We here report the following parameters: effective temperature Teff = 3900 K, on optical interferometry polarimetric observations of Betel- log g = 1.5 and limb-darkened disk with a diameter of 20.60 mas geuse obtained with the NACO/SAMPol instrument. Section2 (Fig.1). The χ2 per data point (equivalent of a reduced χ2) of describes the observations and the data reduction.