arXiv subjects

James R. A. Davenport

Publications and source records attributed to James R. A. Davenport.

At least 73 records · Page 4Linked to original sources

arXiv2018

Rotating Stars from Kepler Observed with Gaia DR2

We have matched the astrometric data from Gaia Data Release 2 to the sample of stars with measured rotation periods from Kepler. Using 30,305 stars with good distance estimates, we select 16,248 as being likely main sequence single stars centered within a 0.5 mag region about a 1 Gyr isochrone, removing many sub-giants and unresolved binary stars from the sample. The rotation period bimodality, originally discovered by McQuillan et al. (2013), is clearly recovered for stars out to 525pc, but is not detectable at further distances. This bimodality correlates with Galactic height as well, dropping strongly for stars above Z>90 pc. We also find a significant width in the stellar main sequence of $ΔM_G$ ~0.25 mag, as well as a coherent gradient of increasing rotation periods orthogonal to the main sequence. We interpret this as a signature of stellar angular momentum loss over time, implying a corresponding diagonal age gradient across the main sequence. Stellar evolution models predict changes in color and luminosity that are consistent in amplitude, but not in direction, with those required to produce the gradient we have detected. This rotation gradient suggests that main sequence evolution produces offsets in color-magnitude space that are significantly more orthogonal to the zero-age main sequence than models currently predict, and may provide new tests for both stellar evolution and gyrochronology models.

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arXiv2018

Possible Bright Starspots on TRAPPIST-1

The M8V star TRAPPIST-1 hosts seven roughly Earth-sized planets and is a promising target for exoplanet characterization. Kepler/K2 Campaign 12 observations of TRAPPIST-1 in the optical show an apparent rotational modulation with a 3.3 day period, though that rotational signal is not readily detected in the Spitzer light curve at 4.5 $μ$m. If the rotational modulation is due to starspots, persistent dark spots can be excluded from the lack of photometric variability in the Spitzer light curve. We construct a photometric model for rotational modulation due to photospheric bright spots on TRAPPIST-1 which is consistent with both the Kepler and Spitzer light curves. The maximum-likelihood model with three spots has typical spot sizes of $R_\mathrm{spot}/R_\star \approx 0.004$ at temperature $T_\mathrm{spot} \gtrsim 5300 \pm 200$ K. We also find that large flares are observed more often when the brightest spot is facing the observer, suggesting a correlation between the position of the bright spots and flare events. In addition, these flares may occur preferentially when the spots are increasing in brightness, which suggests that the 3.3 d periodicity may not be a rotational signal, but rather a characteristic timescale of active regions.

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arXiv2018

Spotting Stellar Activity Cycles in Gaia Astrometry

Astrometry from Gaia will measure the positions of stellar photometric centroids to unprecedented precision. We show that the precision of Gaia astrometry is sufficient to detect starspot-induced centroid jitter for nearby stars in the Tycho-Gaia Astrometric Solution (TGAS) sample with magnetic activity similar to the young G-star KIC 7174505 or the active M4 dwarf GJ 1243, but is insufficient to measure centroid jitter for stars with Sun-like spot distributions. We simulate Gaia observations of stars with 10 year activity cycles to search for evidence of activity cycles, and find that Gaia astrometry alone likely can not detect activity cycles for stars in the TGAS sample, even if they have spot distributions like KIC 7174505. We review the activity of the nearby low-mass stars in the TGAS sample for which we anticipate significant detections of spot-induced jitter.

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arXiv2018

The First Post-Kepler Brightness Dips of KIC 8462852

We present a photometric detection of the first brightness dips of the unique variable star KIC 8462852 since the end of the Kepler space mission in 2013 May. Our regular photometric surveillance started in October 2015, and a sequence of dipping began in 2017 May continuing on through the end of 2017, when the star was no longer visible from Earth. We distinguish four main 1-2.5% dips, named "Elsie," "Celeste," "Skara Brae," and "Angkor", which persist on timescales from several days to weeks. Our main results so far are: (i) there are no apparent changes of the stellar spectrum or polarization during the dips; (ii) the multiband photometry of the dips shows differential reddening favoring non-grey extinction. Therefore, our data are inconsistent with dip models that invoke optically thick material, but rather they are in-line with predictions for an occulter consisting primarily of ordinary dust, where much of the material must be optically thin with a size scale <<1um, and may also be consistent with models invoking variations intrinsic to the stellar photosphere. Notably, our data do not place constraints on the color of the longer-term "secular" dimming, which may be caused by independent processes, or probe different regimes of a single process.

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arXiv2017

Flare Activity of Wide Binary Stars with Kepler

We present an analysis of flare activity in wide binary stars using a combination of value-added data sets from the NASA Kepler mission. The target list contains a set of previously discovered wide binary star systems identified by proper motions in the Kepler field. We cross-matched these systems with estimates of flare activity for $\sim$200,000 stars in the Kepler field, allowing us to compare relative flare luminosity between stars in coeval binaries. From a sample of 184 previously known wide binaries in the Kepler field, we find 58 with detectable flare activity in at least 1 component, 33 of which are similar in mass (q $>$ 0.8). Of these 33 equal-mass binaries, the majority display similar ($\pm 1$ dex) flare luminosity between both stars, as expected for stars of equal mass and age. However, we find two equal-mass pairs where the secondary (lower mass) star is more active than its counterpart, and two equal-mass pairs where the primary star is more active. The stellar rotation periods are also anomalously fast for stars with elevated flare activity. Pairs with discrepant rotation and activity qualitatively seem to have lower mass ratios. These outliers may be due to tidal spin-up, indicating these wide binaries could be hierarchical triple systems. We additionally present high resolution adaptive optics images for two wide binary systems to test this hypothesis. The demographics of stellar rotation and magnetic activity between stars in wide binaries may be useful indicators for discerning formation scenarios of these systems.

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arXiv2017

Tidal Synchronization and Differential Rotation of Kepler Eclipsing Binaries

Few observational constraints exist for the tidal synchronization rate of late-type stars, despite its fundamental role in binary evolution. We visually inspected the light curves of 2278 eclipsing binaries (EBs) from the Kepler Eclipsing Binary Catalog to identify those with starspot modulations, as well as other types of out-of-eclipse variability. We report rotation periods for 816 EBs with starspot modulations, and find that 79% of EBs with orbital periods less than ten days are synchronized. However, a population of short period EBs exists with rotation periods typically 13% slower than synchronous, which we attribute to the differential rotation of high latitude starspots. At 10 days, there is a transition from predominantly circular, synchronized EBs to predominantly eccentric, pseudosynchronized EBs. This transition period is in good agreement with the predicted and observed circularization period for Milky Way field binaries. At orbital periods greater than about 30 days, the amount of tidal synchronization decreases. We also report 12 previously unidentified candidate $δ$ Scuti and $γ$ Doradus pulsators, as well as a candidate RS CVn system with an evolved primary that exhibits starspot occultations. For short period contact binaries, we observe a period-color relation, and compare it to previous studies. As a whole, these results represent the largest homogeneous study of tidal synchronization of late-type stars.

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arXiv2017

Who asks questions at astronomy meetings?

Over the last decade, significant attention has been drawn to the gender ratio of speakers at conferences, and many meetings are evolving to better reflect the gender balance of the field as a whole. We find that women are significantly under-represented, however, among the astronomers asking questions after talks.

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arXiv2017

The Starspots of HAT-P-11: Evidence for a Solar-like Dynamo

We measure the starspot radii and latitude distribution on the K4 dwarf HAT-P-11 from Kepler short-cadence photometry. We take advantage of starspot occultations by its highly-misaligned planet to compare the spot size and latitude distributions to those of sunspots. We find that the spots of HAT-P-11 are distributed in latitude much like sunspots near solar activity maximum, with mean spot latitude of $16 \pm 1$ degrees. The majority of starspots of HAT-P-11 have physical sizes that closely resemble the sizes of sunspots at solar maximum. We estimate the mean spotted area coverage on HAT-P-11 is $3^{+6}_{-1}\%$, roughly two orders of magnitude greater than the typical solar spotted area.

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arXiv2017

The Role of Gender in Asking Questions at Cool Stars 18 and 19

We examine the gender balance of the 18th and 19th meetings of the Cambridge Workshop on Cool Stellar Systems and the Sun (CS18 and CS19). The percent of female attendees at both meetings (31% at CS18 and 37% at CS19) was higher than the percent of women in the American Astronomical Society (25%) and the International Astronomical Union (18%). The representation of women in Cool Stars as SOC members, invited speakers, and contributed speakers was similar to or exceeded the percent of women attending the meetings. We requested that conference attendees assist in a project to collect data on the gender of astronomers asking questions after talks. Using this data, we found that men were over-represented (and women were under-represented) in the question sessions after each talk. Men asked 79% of the questions at CS18 and 75% of the questions at CS19, but were 69% and 63% of the attendees respectively. Contrary to findings from previous conferences, we did not find that the gender balance of questions was strongly affected by the session chair gender, the speaker gender, or the length of the question period. We also found that female and male speakers were asked a comparable number of questions after each talk. The contrast of these results from previous incarnations of the gender questions survey indicate that more data would be useful in understanding the factors that contribute to the gender balance of question askers. We include a preliminary set of recommendations based on this and other work on related topics, but also advocate for additional research on the demographics of conference participants. Additional data on the intersection of gender with race, seniority, sexual orientation, ability and other marginalized identities is necessary to fully address the role of gender in asking questions at conferences.

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arXiv2016

No Conclusive Evidence for Transits of Proxima b in MOST photometry

The analysis of Proxima Centauri's radial velocities recently led Anglada-Escudé et al. (2016) to claim the presence of a low mass planet orbiting the Sun's nearest star once every 11.2 days. Although the a-priori probability that Proxima b transits its parent star is just 1.5%, the potential impact of such a discovery would be considerable. Independent of recent radial velocity efforts, we observed Proxima Centauri for 12.5 days in 2014 and 31 days in 2015 with the MOST space telescope. We report here that we cannot make a compelling case that Proxima b transits in our precise photometric time series. Imposing an informative prior on the period and phase, we do detect a candidate signal with the expected depth. However, perturbing the phase prior across 100 evenly spaced intervals reveals one strong false-positive and one weaker instance. We estimate a false-positive rate of at least a few percent and a much higher false-negative rate of 20-40%, likely caused by the very high flare rate of Proxima Centauri. Comparing our candidate signal to HATSouth ground-based photometry reveals that the signal is somewhat, but not conclusively, disfavored (1-2 sigmas) leading us to argue that the signal is most likely spurious. We expect that infrared photometric follow-up could more conclusively test the existence of this candidate signal, owing to the suppression of flare activity and the impressive infrared brightness of the parent star.

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arXiv2016

Rotating Stars from Kepler Observed with Gaia DR1

Astrometric data from the recent Gaia Data Release 1 has been matched against the sample of stars from Kepler with known rotation periods. A total of 1,299 bright rotating stars were recovered from the subset of Gaia sources with good astrometric solutions, most with temperatures hotter than 5000 K. From these sources, 894 were selected as lying near the main sequence using their absolute G-band magnitudes. These main sequence stars show a bimodality in their rotation period distribution, centered roughly around a 600 Myr rotation-isochrone. This feature matches the bimodal period distribution found in cooler stars with Kepler, but was previously undetected for solar-type stars due to sample contamination by subgiants. A tenuous connection between the rotation period and total proper motion is found, suggesting the period bimodality is due to the age distribution of stars within ~300pc of the Sun, rather than a phase of rapid angular momentum loss. This work emphasizes the unique power for understanding stellar populations by combining temporal monitoring from Kepler with astrometric data from Gaia.

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arXiv2016

Maximizing Science in the Era of LSST: A Community-Based Study of Needed US Capabilities

The Large Synoptic Survey Telescope (LSST) will be a discovery machine for the astronomy and physics communities, revealing astrophysical phenomena from the Solar System to the outer reaches of the observable Universe. While many discoveries will be made using LSST data alone, taking full scientific advantage of LSST will require ground-based optical-infrared (OIR) supporting capabilities, e.g., observing time on telescopes, instrumentation, computing resources, and other infrastructure. This community-based study identifies, from a science-driven perspective, capabilities that are needed to maximize LSST science. Expanding on the initial steps taken in the 2015 OIR System Report, the study takes a detailed, quantitative look at the capabilities needed to accomplish six representative LSST-enabled science programs that connect closely with scientific priorities from the 2010 decadal surveys. The study prioritizes the resources needed to accomplish the science programs and highlights ways that existing, planned, and future resources could be positioned to accomplish the science goals.

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arXiv2016

MOST Observations of our Nearest Neighbor: Flares on Proxima Centauri

We present a study of white light flares from the active M5.5 dwarf Proxima Centauri using the Canadian microsatellite MOST. Using 37.6 days of monitoring data from 2014 and 2015, we have detected 66 individual flare events, the largest number of white light flares observed to date on Proxima Cen. Flare energies in our sample range from $10^{29}$-$10^{31.5}$ erg. The flare rate is lower than that of other classic flare stars of similar spectral type, such as UV Ceti, which may indicate Proxima Cen had a higher flare rate in its youth. Proxima Cen does have an unusually high flare rate given its slow rotation period, however. Extending the observed power-law occurrence distribution down to $10^{28}$ erg, we show that flares with flux amplitudes of 0.5% occur 63 times per day, while superflares with energies of $10^{33}$ erg occur ~8 times per year. Small flares may therefore pose a great difficulty in searches for transits from the recently announced 1.27 M_earth Proxima b, while frequent large flares could have significant impact on the planetary atmosphere.

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arXiv2016

Maximizing Science in the Era of LSST, Stars Study Group Report: Rotation and Magnetic Activity in the Galactic Field Population and in Open Star Clusters

This is the stars chapter of the Kavli workshop report, which resulted from the community-based study of needed US OIR capabilities in the LSST era. The full report, which will include this chapter, is anticipated to be available in Fall 2016. See NOAO website (http://www.noao.edu/meetings/lsst-oir-study/) for more details.

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arXiv2016

Kepler Flares IV: A Comprehensive Analysis of the Activity of the dM4e Star GJ 1243

We present a comprehensive study of the active dM4e star GJ 1243. We use previous observations and ground-based echelle spectroscopy to determine that GJ 1243 is a member of the Argus association of field stars, suggesting it is $\sim 30-50$ Myr old. We analyze eleven months of 1-minute cadence data from Kepler, presenting Kepler flare frequency distributions, as well as determining correlations between flare energy, amplitude, duration, and decay time. We find that the exponent $α$ of the power-law flare energy distribution varies in time, primarily due to completeness of sample and the low frequency of high-energy flares. We also find a deviation from a single power law at high energy. We use ground-based spectroscopic observations simultaneous with the Kepler data to provide simultaneous photometric and spectroscopic analysis of three low-energy flares, the lowest-energy dMe flares with detailed spectral analysis to date on any star. The spectroscopic data from these flares extend constraints for radiative hydrodynamic (RHD) flare models to a lower energy regime than has previously been studied. We use this simultaneous spectroscopy and Kepler photometry to develop approximate conversions from the \textit{Kepler} bandpass to the traditional $U$ and $B$ bands. This conversion will be a critical factor in comparing any Kepler flare analyses to the canon of previous ground-based flare studies.

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arXiv2016

The Kepler Catalog of Stellar Flares

A homogeneous search for stellar flares has been performed using every available Kepler light curve. An iterative light curve de-trending approach was used to filter out both astrophysical and systematic variability to detect flares. The flare recovery completeness has also been computed throughout each light curve using artificial flare injection tests, and the tools for this work have been made publicly available. The final sample contains 851,168 candidate flare events recovered above the 68% completeness threshold, which were detected from 4041 stars, or 1.9% of the stars in the Kepler database. The average flare energy detected is ~$10^{35}$ erg. The net fraction of flare stars increases with $g-i$ color, or decreasing stellar mass. For stars in this sample with previously measured rotation periods, the total relative flare luminosity is compared to the Rossby number. A tentative detection of flare activity saturation for low-mass stars with rapid rotation below a Rossby number of ~0.03 is found. A power law decay in flare activity with Rossby number is found with a slope of -1, shallower than typical measurements for X-ray activity decay with Rossby number.

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arXiv2016

Examining the relationships between colour, $T_{\rm eff}$, and [M/H] for APOGEE K and M dwarfs

We present the effective temperatures ($T_{\rm eff}$), metallicities, and colours in SDSS, 2MASS, and WISE filters, of a sample of 3834 late-K and early-M dwarfs selected from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey APOGEE spectroscopic survey ASPCAP catalog. We confirm that ASPCAP $T_{\rm eff}$ values between 3550 K$<T_{\rm eff}<$4200 K are accurate to $\sim$100 K compared to interferometric $T_{\rm eff}$ values. In that same $T_{\rm eff}$ range, ASPCAP metallicities are accurate to 0.18 dex between $-1.0<$[M/H]$<0.2$. For these cool dwarfs, nearly every colour is sensitive to both $T_{\rm eff}$ and metallicity. Notably, we find that $g-r$ is not a good indicator of metallicity for near-solar metallicity early-M dwarfs. We confirm that $J-K_S$ colour is strongly dependent on metallicity, and find that $W1-W2$ colour is a promising metallicity indicator. Comparison of the late-K and early-M dwarf colours, metallicities, and $T_{\rm eff}$ to those from three different model grids shows reasonable agreement in $r-z$ and $J-K_S$ colours, but poor agreement in $u-g$, $g-r$, and $W1-W2$. Comparison of the metallicities of the KM dwarf sample to those from previous colour-metallicity relations reveals a lack of consensus in photometric metallicity indicators for late-K and early-M dwarfs. We also present empirical relations for $T_{\rm eff}$ as a function of $r-z$ colour combined with either [M/H] or $W1-W2$ colour, and for [M/H] as a function of $r-z$ and $W1-W2$ colour. These relations yield $T_{\rm eff}$ to $\sim$100 K and [M/H] to $\sim$0.18 dex precision with colours alone, for $T_{\rm eff}$ in the range of 3550-4200 K and [M/H] in the range of $-$0.5-0.2.

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arXiv2016

The MUSCLES Treasury Survey I: Motivation and Overview

Ground- and space-based planet searches employing radial velocity techniques and transit photometry have detected thousands of planet-hosting stars in the Milky Way. The chemistry of these atmospheres is controlled by the shape and absolute flux of the stellar spectral energy distribution, however, flux distributions of relatively inactive low-mass stars are poorly known at present. To better understand exoplanets orbiting low-mass stars, we have executed a panchromatic (X-ray to mid-IR) study of the spectral energy distributions of 11 nearby planet hosting stars, the {\it Measurements of the Ultraviolet Spectral Characteristics of Low-mass Exoplanetary Systems} (MUSCLES) Treasury Survey. The MUSCLES program consists of contemporaneous observations at X-ray, UV, and optical wavelengths. We show that energetic radiation (X-ray and ultraviolet) is present from magnetically active stellar atmospheres at all times for stars as late as M5. Emission line luminosities of \ion{C}{4} and \ion{Mg}{2} are strongly correlated with band-integrated luminosities. We find that while the slope of the spectral energy distribution, FUV/NUV, increases by approximately two orders of magnitude form early K to late M dwarfs ($\approx$~0.01~to~1), the absolute FUV and XUV flux levels at their corresponding habitable zone distances are constant to within factors of a few, spanning the range 10~--~70 erg cm$^{-2}$ s$^{-1}$ in the habitable zone. Despite the lack of strong stellar activity indicators in their optical spectra, several of the M dwarfs in our sample show spectacular flare emission in their UV light curves. Finally, we interpret enhanced $L(line)$/$L_{Bol}$ ratios for \ion{C}{4} and \ion{N}{5} as tentative observational evidence for the interaction of planets with large planetary mass-to-orbital distance ratios ($M_{plan}$/$a_{plan}$) with the transition regions of their host stars.

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