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Bedding TR, Murphy SJ, Hey DR, Huber D, Li T, Smalley B, Stello D, White TR, Ball WH, Chaplin WJ, Colman IL, Fuller J, Gaidos E, Harbeck DR, Hermes JJ, Holdsworth DL, Li G, Li Y, Mann AW, Reese DR, Sekaran S, Yu J, Antoci V, Bergmann C, Brown TM, Howard AW, Ireland MJ, Isaacson H, Jenkins JM, Kjeldsen H, McCully C, Rabus M, Rains AD, Ricker GR, Tinney CG, Vanderspek RK. Very regular high-frequency pulsation modes in young intermediate-mass stars. Nature 2020; 581:147-151. [PMID: 32405022 DOI: 10.1038/s41586-020-2226-8] [Citation(s) in RCA: 47] [Impact Index Per Article: 11.8] [Reference Citation Analysis] [Abstract] [Track Full Text] [Journal Information] [Subscribe] [Scholar Register] [Received: 07/17/2019] [Accepted: 02/27/2020] [Indexed: 11/09/2022]
Abstract
Asteroseismology probes the internal structures of stars by using their natural pulsation frequencies1. It relies on identifying sequences of pulsation modes that can be compared with theoretical models, which has been done successfully for many classes of pulsators, including low-mass solar-type stars2, red giants3, high-mass stars4 and white dwarfs5. However, a large group of pulsating stars of intermediate mass-the so-called δ Scuti stars-have rich pulsation spectra for which systematic mode identification has not hitherto been possible6,7. This arises because only a seemingly random subset of possible modes are excited and because rapid rotation tends to spoil regular patterns8-10. Here we report the detection of remarkably regular sequences of high-frequency pulsation modes in 60 intermediate-mass main-sequence stars, which enables definitive mode identification. The space motions of some of these stars indicate that they are members of known associations of young stars, as confirmed by modelling of their pulsation spectra.
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Affiliation(s)
- Timothy R Bedding
- Sydney Institute for Astronomy (SIfA), School of Physics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales, Australia. .,Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark.
| | - Simon J Murphy
- Sydney Institute for Astronomy (SIfA), School of Physics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales, Australia.,Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark
| | - Daniel R Hey
- Sydney Institute for Astronomy (SIfA), School of Physics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales, Australia.,Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark
| | - Daniel Huber
- Institute for Astronomy, University of Hawai'i, Honolulu, HI, USA
| | - Tanda Li
- Sydney Institute for Astronomy (SIfA), School of Physics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales, Australia.,Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark.,School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK
| | - Barry Smalley
- Astrophysics Group, Lennard-Jones Laboratories, Keele University, Keele, UK
| | - Dennis Stello
- Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark.,School of Physics, University of New South Wales, Kensington, New South Wales, Australia
| | - Timothy R White
- Sydney Institute for Astronomy (SIfA), School of Physics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales, Australia.,Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark.,Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Mount Stromlo Observatory, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
| | - Warrick H Ball
- Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark.,School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK
| | - William J Chaplin
- Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark.,School of Physics and Astronomy, University of Birmingham, Birmingham, UK
| | - Isabel L Colman
- Sydney Institute for Astronomy (SIfA), School of Physics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales, Australia.,Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark
| | - Jim Fuller
- TAPIR, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Eric Gaidos
- Department of Earth Sciences, University of Hawai'i, Honolulu, HI, USA
| | | | - J J Hermes
- Department of Astronomy, Boston University, Boston, MA, USA
| | | | - Gang Li
- Sydney Institute for Astronomy (SIfA), School of Physics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales, Australia.,Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark
| | - Yaguang Li
- Sydney Institute for Astronomy (SIfA), School of Physics, University of Sydney, Camperdown, New South Wales, Australia.,Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark.,Department of Astronomy, Beijing Normal University, Beijing, China
| | - Andrew W Mann
- Department of Physics and Astronomy, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, Chapel Hill, NC, USA
| | - Daniel R Reese
- LESIA, Observatoire de Paris, Université PSL, CNRS, Sorbonne Université, Université de Paris, Meudon, France
| | - Sanjay Sekaran
- Instituut voor Sterrenkunde (IvS), KU Leuven, Leuven, Belgium
| | - Jie Yu
- Max-Planck-Institut für Sonnensystemforschung, Göttingen, Germany
| | - Victoria Antoci
- Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark.,DTU Space, National Space Institute, Technical University of Denmark, Kongens Lyngby, Denmark
| | - Christoph Bergmann
- School of Physics, University of New South Wales, Kensington, New South Wales, Australia
| | | | - Andrew W Howard
- TAPIR, California Institute of Technology, Pasadena, CA, USA
| | - Michael J Ireland
- Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Mount Stromlo Observatory, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
| | - Howard Isaacson
- Department of Astronomy, University of California at Berkeley, Berkeley, CA, USA
| | | | - Hans Kjeldsen
- Stellar Astrophysics Centre, Department of Physics and Astronomy, Aarhus University, Aarhus, Denmark.,Institute of Theoretical Physics and Astronomy, Vilnius University, Vilnius, Lithuania
| | - Curtis McCully
- Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope, Goleta, CA, USA
| | - Markus Rabus
- Las Cumbres Observatory Global Telescope, Goleta, CA, USA.,Department of Physics, University of California, Santa Barbara, CA, USA
| | - Adam D Rains
- Research School of Astronomy and Astrophysics, Mount Stromlo Observatory, The Australian National University, Canberra, Australian Capital Territory, Australia
| | - George R Ricker
- Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA.,Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA
| | - Christopher G Tinney
- School of Physics, University of New South Wales, Kensington, New South Wales, Australia
| | - Roland K Vanderspek
- Department of Physics, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA.,Kavli Institute for Astrophysics and Space Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA
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