Abstract
The NASAKeplerand follow-on K2 mission (2009–2018) left a legacy of data and discoveries, finding thousands of exoplanets, and also obtaining high-precision long time-series data for hundreds of thousands of stars, including many types of pulsating variables. Here we highlight a few of the ongoing discoveries fromKeplerdata on δ Scuti pulsating variables, which are core hydrogen-burning stars of about twice the mass of the Sun. We discuss many unsolved problems surrounding the properties of the variability in these stars, and the progress enabled byKeplerdata in using pulsations to infer their interior structure, a field of research known as asteroseismology.
Highlights
The long time-series, high-cadence, high-precision photometric observations of the NASA Kepler (2009-2013) (Borucki et al, 2010; Gilliland et al, 2010; Koch et al, 2010) and follow-on K2 (2014-2018) (Howell et al, 2014) missions have revolutionized the study of stellar variability
We review some highlights of discoveries for δ Scuti variable stars from the Kepler mission
Balona (2018) highlights theoretical and computational work by Xiong et al (2016) with a new treatment of time-dependent convection that allows δ Sct stars to pulsate in low-frequency modes
Summary
The long time-series, high-cadence, high-precision photometric observations of the NASA Kepler (2009-2013) (Borucki et al, 2010; Gilliland et al, 2010; Koch et al, 2010) and follow-on K2 (2014-2018) (Howell et al, 2014) missions have revolutionized the study of stellar variability. The δ Sct variables are pre-main-sequence, main-sequence (core hydrogen-burning), or post-main-sequence (undergoing core contraction after core hydrogenburning, and beginning shell hydrogen-burning) stars with spectral types A through mid-F, and masses around two solar masses They pulsate in one or more radial and non-radial modes with periods of around 2 h. Kepler observations have revealed overlap and commonalities among these types, pointing the way to a more fundamental understanding of the origins of the diverse phenomena seen in these stars While these stars were expected at first to be the straightforward step beyond the solar-like oscillators for applications of asteroseismology, this goal has turned out to be more difficult to achieve than expected. The many complexities of these stars make this field of variable star research rich in potential discoveries
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