Stellar Rotation in K2

20 Sep 2017

Intro

this post is in-prep

Kepler measured lots of rotation periods. Differential rotation was… harder. Or maybe impossible in many cases.

In walks Gaia

wrote short paper last year on rotation Kepler, using Gaia to filter our subgiants, find period bimodality extends from M dwarfs all the way to G dwarfs.

time to extend this to K2, search stars of more ages/masses. have NASA-ADAP grant to study this with Ruth, need students!

Fun Avenues

this project isn’t just about the nuts & bolts of measuring rotation, though that is a neat project in of itself.

• calibrate gyrochronology
• define 3d structure/extent of the period bimodality
• star formation history, how localized/coherent it can be. Compare to SFH in M31 from HST!
• look for influence of spiral arm passage?
• look for substructure in the 5-D space of (X,Y,Z, Color, Period)
• rotation versus OTHER THINGS, like metallicity, planet(s), age…
• rotation off the main sequence (e.g. Subgiant evolution, binaries, blue stragglers?)