The metallicity of β Cephei stars on the basis of the satellite ultraviolet spectra Original Research Article

We derive the mean stellar parameters like angular diameter, effective temperature, and metallicity from ultraviolet spectra for all β Cephei stars observed during the IUE satellite mission, including those belonging to the three open clusters. For this purpose we fit the theoretical flux distributions of Kuruczʹs models to observed low—resolution spectra of the stars. We focus on the metallicity parameter [m/H], which has a special meaning for β Cep stars. We obtain the value of [m/H] in the range of [−0.3, +0.3] for the field β Cep stars, and [−0.1, +0.1], [−0.5, −0.1] and [+0.1, +0.2] for β Cephei in NGC 3293, NGC 4755 and NGC 6231, respectively. We study what parameters are conditioned by metallicity and we perceive the higher metallicity for multiperiodic variables than for monoperiodic ones.