K-band calibration of the red clump luminosity

The average near-infrared (K-band) luminosity of 238 Hipparcos red clump giants is derived and then used to measure the distance to the Galactic center. These Hipparcos red clump giants have been previously employed as I-band standard candles. The advantage of the K-band is a decreased sensitivity to reddening and perhaps a reduced systematic dependence on metallicity. In order to investigate the latter, and also to refer our calibration to a known metallicity zero point, we restrict our sample of red clump calibrators to those with abundances derived from high-resolution spectroscopic data. The mean metallicity of the sample is [Fe/H] = -0.18 dex (sigma = 0.17 dex). The data are consistent with no correlation between M-K and [Fe/H] and only weakly constrain the slope of this relation. The luminosity function of the sample peaks at M-K = -1.61 +/- 0.03 mag. Next, we assemble published optical and near-infrared photometry for similar to 20 red clump giants in a Baade's window held with a mean metallicity of [Fe/H] = -0.17 +/- 0.09 dex, which is nearly identical to that of the Nipparcos red clump. Assuming that the average (V-I)(0) and (V-K)(0) colors of these two red clumps are the same, the extinctions in the Baade's window held are found to be A(V) = 1.56, A(I) = 0.87, and A(K) = 0.15, in agreement with previous estimates. We derive the distance to the Galactic center: (m - M)(0)=14.58 +/- 0.11 mag, or R = 8.24 +/- 0.42 kpc. The uncertainty in this distance measurement is dominated by the small number of Baade's window red clump giants examined here.