7,408 research outputs found
Photospheric activity, rotation, and star-planet interaction of the planet-hosting star CoRoT-6
The CoRoT satellite has recently discovered a hot Jupiter that transits
across the disc of a F9V star called CoRoT-6 with a period of 8.886 days. We
model the photospheric activity of the star and use the maps of the active
regions to study stellar differential rotation and the star-planet interaction.
We apply a maximum entropy spot model to fit the optical modulation as observed
by CoRoT during a uninterrupted interval of about 140 days. Photospheric active
regions are assumed to consist of spots and faculae in a fixed proportion with
solar-like contrasts. Individual active regions have lifetimes up to 30-40
days. Most of them form and decay within five active longitudes whose different
migration rates are attributed to the stellar differential rotation for which a
lower limit of \Delta \Omega / \Omega = 0.12 \pm 0.02 is obtained. Several
active regions show a maximum of activity at a longitude lagging the
subplanetary point by about 200 degrees with the probability of a chance
occurrence being smaller than 1 percent. Our spot modelling indicates that the
photospheric activity of CoRoT-6 could be partially modulated by some kind of
star-planet magnetic interaction, while an interaction related to tides is
highly unlikely because of the weakness of the tidal force.Comment: 9 pages, 7 figures, accepted to Astronomy & Astrophysic
Measuring stellar differential rotation with high-precision space-borne photometry
We introduce a method of measuring a lower limit to the amplitude of surface
differential rotation from high-precision, evenly sampled photometric time
series. It is applied to main-sequence late-type stars whose optical flux
modulation is dominated by starspots. An autocorrelation of the time series was
used to select stars that allow an accurate determination of starspot rotation
periods. A simple two-spot model was applied together with a Bayesian
information criterion to preliminarily select intervals of the time series
showing evidence of differential rotation with starspots of almost constant
area. Finally, the significance of the differential rotation detection and a
measurement of its amplitude and uncertainty were obtained by an a posteriori
Bayesian analysis based on a Monte Carlo Markov Chain approach. We applied our
method to the Sun and eight other stars for which previous spot modelling had
been performed to compare our results with previous ones. We find that
autocorrelation is a simple method for selecting stars with a coherent
rotational signal that is a prerequisite for successfully measuring
differential rotation through spot modelling. For a proper Monte Carlo Markov
Chain analysis, it is necessary to take the strong correlations among different
parameters that exist in spot modelling into account. For the planet-hosting
star Kepler-30, we derive a lower limit to the relative amplitude of the
differential rotation of \Delta P / P = 0.0523 \pm 0.0016. We confirm that the
Sun as a star in the optical passband is not suitable for measuring
differential rotation owing to the rapid evolution of its photospheric active
regions. In general, our method performs well in comparison to more
sophisticated and time-consuming approaches.Comment: Accepted to Astronomy and Astrophysics, 15 pages, 13 figures, 4
tables and an Appendi
Daily variability of Ceres' Albedo detected by means of radial velocities changes of the reflected sunlight
Bright features have been recently discovered by Dawn on Ceres, which extend
previous photometric and Space Telescope observations. These features should
produce distortions of the line profiles of the reflected solar spectrum and
therefore an apparent radial velocity variation modulated by the rotation of
the dwarf planet. Here we report on two sequences of observations of Ceres
performed in the nights of 31 July, 26-27 August 2015 by means of the
high-precision HARPS spectrograph at the 3.6-m La Silla ESO telescope. The
observations revealed a quite complex behaviour which likely combines a radial
velocity modulation due to the rotation with an amplitude of approx +/- 6 m/s
and an unexpected diurnal effect. The latter changes imply changes in the
albedo of Occator's bright features due to the blaze produced by the exposure
to solar radiation. The short-term variability of Ceres' albedo is on
timescales ranging from hours to months and can both be confirmed and followed
by means of dedicated radial velocity observations.Comment: 5 pag, 1fig, two tables, MNRAS Letters 201
Microscopic calculations of double and triple Giant Resonance excitation in heavy ion collisions
We perform microscopic calculations of the inelastic cross sections for the
double and triple excitation of giant resonances induced by heavy ion probes
within a semicalssical coupled channels formalism. The channels are defined as
eigenstates of a bosonic quartic Hamiltonian constructed in terms of collective
RPA phonons. Therefore, they are superpositions of several multiphonon states,
also with different numbers of phonons and the spectrum is anharmonic. The
inclusion of (n+1) phonon configurations affects the states whose main
component is a n-phonon one and leads to an appreacible lowering of their
energies. We check the effects of such further anharmonicities on the previous
published results for the cross section for the double excitation of Giant
Resonances. We find that the only effect is a shift of the peaks towards lower
energies, the double GR cross section being not modified by the explicity
inclusion of the three-phonon channels in the dynamical calculations. The
latters give an important contribution to the cross section in the triple GR
energy region which however is still smaller than the experimental available
data. The inclusion of four phonon configurations in the structure calculations
does not modify the results.Comment: Revtex4, to be published in PR
Microscopic description of Coulomb and nuclear excitation of multiphonon states in Ca + Ca collisions
We calculate the inelastic scattering cross sections to populate one- and
two-phonon states in heavy ion collisions with both Coulomb and nuclear
excitations. Starting from a microscopic approach based on RPA, we go beyond it
in order to treat anharmonicities and non-linear terms in the exciting field.
These anharmonicities and non-linearities are shown to have important effects
on the cross sections both in the low energy part of the spectrum and in the
energy region of the Double Giant Quadrupole Resonance. By properly introducing
an optical potential the inelastic cross section is calculated semiclassically
by integrating the excitation probability over all impact parameters. A
satisfactory agreement with the experimental results is obtained.Comment: 20 pages, 2 figures, revtex, to be published in Phys. Rev.
Nearly exact discrepancy principle for low-count poisson image restoration
The effectiveness of variational methods for restoring images corrupted by Poisson noise strongly depends on the suitable selection of the regularization parameter balancing the effect of the regulation term(s) and the generalized Kullback–Liebler divergence data term. One of the approaches still commonly used today for choosing the parameter is the discrepancy principle proposed by Zanella et al. in a seminal work. It relies on imposing a value of the data term approximately equal to its expected value and works well for mid-and high-count Poisson noise corruptions. However, the series truncation approximation used in the theoretical derivation of the expected value leads to poor performance for low-count Poisson noise. In this paper, we highlight the theoretical limits of the approach and then propose a nearly exact version of it based on Monte Carlo simulation and weighted least-square fitting. Several numerical experiments are presented, proving beyond doubt that in the low-count Poisson regime, the proposed modified, nearly exact discrepancy principle performs far better than the original, approximated one by Zanella et al., whereas it works similarly or slightly better in the mid-and high-count regimes
Radiation and magnetic field effects on new semiconductor power devices for HL-LHC experiments
The radiation hardness of commercial Silicon Carbide and Gallium Nitride
power MOSFETs is presented in this paper, for Total Ionizing Dose effects and
Single Event Effects, under gamma, neutrons, protons and heavy ions. Similar
tests are discussed for commercial DC-DC converters, also tested in operation
under magnetic field
Irreversible magnetization under rotating fields and lock-in effect on ErBa_2Cu_3O_7 single crystal with columnar defects
We have measured the irreversible magnetization M_i of an ErBa_2Cu_3O_7
single crystal with columnar defects (CD), using a technique based on sample
rotation under a fixed magnetic field H. This method is valid for samples whose
magnetization vector remains perpendicular to the sample surface over a wide
angle range - which is the case for platelets and thin films - and presents
several advantages over measurements of M_L(H) loops at fixed angles. The
resulting M_i(\Theta) curves for several temperatures show a peak in the CD
direction at high fields. At lower fields, a very well defined plateau
indicative of the vortex lock-in to the CD develops. The H dependence of the
lock-in angle \phi_L follows the H^{-1} theoretical prediction, while the
temperature dependence is in agreement with entropic smearing effects
corresponding to short range vortex-defects interactions.Comment: 7 pages, 6 figures, to be published in Phys. Rev.
- …