Matteo Cantiello edited Discussion.tex  about 9 years ago

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\section{Discussion}  The striking agreement between the theoretical expectations for the $\ell=1$ modes visibility and the observations of \citet{Mosser_2011} conclusively shows that the energy sink for the suppressed dipole modes is located in the stellar core (see Fig.~\ref{fig:moneyplot}). The core acts as an efficient energy sink, as sink:  all the waves leaking through the evanescent region never couple back to the envelope modes. We have shown that the magnetic greenhouse effect can provide such maximally efficient trapping, thanks to the symmetry braking enforced by any plausible geometry of a (strong enough) magnetic field. While it is possible that other symmetry breaking mechanisms could play a similar role to the magnetic greenhouse effect, we believe this is an unlikely explanation for the bulk of the suppressed dipoles sample (Details in the supplementary material). This is because the core rotation rate required to modify the incoming waves such that they will be trapped in the core is two orders of magnitude higher than the values commonly observed in these stars \citep{Beck_2011,Mosser_2012}. Moreover the magnetic greenhouse effect makes a clear prediction: that for stars with frequency of maximum power similar to the critical magneto gravity frequency $\nu_{\rm c}$, dipole modes with $\nu >\nu_{\rm c}$ will be unaffected, while those with $\nu <\nu_{\rm c}$ should show suppression. The early subgiant star KIC 8561221 displays this exact behavior \citep{Garcia_2014}, demonstrating the reality of the magnetic greenhouse effect.  For the magnetic greenhouse effect to operate, stars need to have magnetic fields with a longitudinal component $B\gtrsim 10^5 {\rm G}$ around the location of the H-burning shell. This is consistent with both a fossil field with surface amplitude $\sim 1 {\rm kG}$ on the main sequence, or a convective core dynamo generated field (equipartition strength $B \sim 10^5-10^6 {\rm G}$). The fraction of stars showing suppressed dipole modes in the data of \citet{Mosser_2011} is about 22\%, tentatively showing that red giants with magnetized cores are not just the descendants of Ap stars. A detailed analysis of the fraction and mass distribution of a large population of stars with suppressed dipole modes will put strong constraints on the amplitude and evolution of internal magnetic fields in stars of different mass (Stello et al. In prep.).