Yesterday in Stellar Physics class I gave a presentation on two papers which appeared in the journal Astronomy & Astrophysics. I spent a long time on the overview of the presentation, which lasted about a minute. It was met well, so here’s the script:
Here’s a quick schematic overview. The papers for today
Deal with p-mode oscillations found on alph’ Centauri A.
The papers split the topic up so well it’s almost eerie:
One’s rich in observation and the other one in theory.
We begin by giving props to Bouchy, June 2001,
For getting p-mode observations from a star that’s not the Sun.
They report on high-precision measurements they got
Of the radial velocity, of which they have a lot.
They then analyze the power spectrum, looking for the peaks
Of the frequencies of p-modes, with statistical techniques.
They determine next the values for each one of l and n,
And give tables of the p-mode frequencies for alpha Cen.
So we wind up with a hundred different values, then, of nu,
To be put to use in Thevenin et al., 2002.
They begin subtracting spacings of the frequencies, which are
Rather sensitive to all the inside structure of the star.
They use stellar model fitting with these data points and then,
They report on the parameters they get for alpha Cen.
And thus, helioseismology is quite a useful tool,
And we use it now with other stars, and that is really cool.
