Evolution of thermally pulsing asymptotic giant branch stars - III. Dust production at supersolar metallicities

We extend the formalism presented in our recent calculations of dust ejecta from the Thermally Pulsing Asymptotic Giant Branch (TP-AGB) phase to the case of super-solar metallicity stars. The TP-AGB evolutionary models are computed with the COLIBRI code.We adopt our preferred scheme for dust growth. For M-giants, we neglect chemisputtering by H2 molecules and for C-stars we assume a homogeneous growth scheme which is primarily controlled by the carbon over oxygen excess. At super-solar metallicities, dust forms more efficiently and silicates tend to condense significantly closer to the photosphere (r � 1.5R*) and thus at higher temperatures and densities-than at solar and sub-solar metallicities (r � 2-3R*). In such conditions, the hypothesis of thermal decoupling between gas and dust becomes questionable, while dust heating due to collisions plays an important role. The heating mechanism delays dust condensation to slightly outer regions in the circumstellar envelope.We find that the same mechanism is not significant at solar and sub-solar metallicities. The main dust products at super-solar metallicities are silicates. We calculate the total dust ejecta and dust-to-gas ejecta, for various values of the stellar initial masses and initial metallicities Z = 0.04, 0.06. Merging these new calculations with those for lower metallicities it turns out that, contrary to what is often assumed, the total dust-to-gas ejecta of intermediate-mass stars exhibit only a weak dependence on the initial metal content. � 2013 The Authors Published by Oxford University Press on behalf of the Royal Astronomical Society