Optical and near-IR spectra of O-rich Mira variables: A comparison between models and observations

Pulsation models are crucial for the interpretation of spectrophotometric and interferometric observations of Mira variables. Comparing predicted and observed spectra is one way of establishing the validity of such models. In this paper, we focus on the models published between 1996 and 1998 by Bessell, Hofmann, Scholz and Wood. A few new model spectra are added, to improve available phase coverage. We compare the synthetic spectra with observed low resolution spectra of optically selected oxygen-rich Miras, over a range of optical and near-IR wavelengths that encompasses most of the stellar energy output. We investigate the overall energy distributions, and specific spectral features in the near-IR wavelength range. The agreement between the observed and the model-predicted properties is found to be reasonably good. However, there are discrepancies seen especially in various molecular bands. We find that different combinations of stellar parameters and pulsation phases often result in very similar model spectra. Therefore the problem of deriving parameters of a Mira variable from its spectrum has no unique solution. More advanced models than presently available, providing even better fits to the data and covering a wider range of parameters, would be needed to achieve better discrimination.