patrick gaulme edited Introduction.tex  almost 9 years ago

Commit id: e1896538f2b0a768ba07d9ae4650fa616bb6ccd6

deletions | additions      

       

% big picture context  Mass and radius are often-elusive stellar properties that are critical to understanding a star's past, present, and future. Eclipsing binaries are the only astrophysical laboratories that allow for a direct measurement of these and other fundamental physical parameters. Recently, however, observing solar-like oscillations in stars with convective envelopes has opened a window to stellar interiors and provided a new way to measure global stellar properties. Asteroseismic scaling relations use the Sun as a benchmark and an empirical connection between these oscillations, effective temperature, mass, and radius \citep{kje95,hub10,mos13}. YOU SHOULD SAY THAT THERE ARE TWO SCALING RELATIONS ONE FOR THE MASS THE OTHER FOR THE RADIUS (CF KJELDSEN).   While these relations are useful, they remain relatively untested. One notable exception is the red giant in the eclipsing binary KIC 8410637, which shows good agreement between Keplerian and asteroseismic mass and radius according to \citet{fra13}. However, a more recent analysis from Huber 2014 (http://adsabs.harvard.edu/cgi-bin/bib_query?arXiv:1404.7501) indicates that the density is underestimated by ∼7\% (1.8$\sigma$, $\sim$7\,\% (1.8~$\sigma$,  taking the uncertainty in the seismic and dynamical density into account), which results  in an overestimate of the radius by ∼9\% (2.7 σ) $\sim$9\,\% (2.7~$\sigma$)  and mass by ∼17\% (1.9σ). $\sim$17\,\% (1.9~$\sigma$.  In this work, we consider KIC 9246715, an eclipsing binary with two nearly-identical red giant stars, yet only one set of solar-like oscillations. % asteroseismology w/Kepler is an awesome tool  Stars with convective outer layers potentially exhibit solar-like oscillations. These oscillations depend on the physical structure and processes in their interiors. In particular, evolved red giants are increasingly easy to characterize through these pressure-mode oscillations \citep[for a review of this topic, see][]{cha13}. Compared to main-sequence stars, red giants oscillate with larger amplitudes and longer periods---several hours to days instead of minutes. Oscillations appear as spikes in the amplitude spectrum of a light curve that is sampled both frequently enough and for a sufficiently long duration. Given these two requirements, observations from the \emph{Kepler} space telescope taken every 29.4 minutes (long-cadence) over many 90-day quarters are ideal for asteroseismic studies of red giant stars.