ALBERT

Description: The candidate SX Phe star KIC 11754974 shows a remarkably high number of combination frequencies in the Fourier amplitude spectrum: 123 of the 166 frequencies in our multifrequency fit are linear combinations of independent modes. Predictable patterns in frequency spacings are seen in the Fourier transform of the light curve. We present an analysis of 180 d of short-cadence Kepler photometry and of new spectroscopic data for this evolved, late A-type star. We infer from the 1150-d, long-cadence light curve, and in two different ways, that our target is the primary of a 343-d, non-eclipsing binary system. According to both methods, the mass function is similar, f ( M ) = 0.0207 ± 0.0003 M . The observed pulsations are modelled extensively, using separate, state-of-the-art, time-dependent convection (TDC) and rotating models. The models match the observed temperature and low metallicity, finding a mass of 1.50–1.56 M . The models suggest that the whole star is metal poor, and that the low metallicity is not just a surface abundance peculiarity. This is the best frequency analysis of an SX Phe star, and the only Kepler  Sct star to be modelled with both TDC and rotating models.

Description: WASP-80b is a missing link in the study of exoatmospheres. It falls between the warm Neptunes and the hot Jupiters and is amenable for characterization, thanks to its host star's properties. We observed the planet through transit and during occultation with Warm Spitzer . Combining our mid-infrared transits with optical time series, we find that the planet presents a transmission spectrum indistinguishable from a horizontal line. In emission, WASP-80b is the intrinsically faintest planet whose dayside flux has been detected in both the 3.6 and 4.5 μm Spitzer channels. The depths of the occultations reveal that WASP-80b is as bright and as red as a T4 dwarf, but that its temperature is cooler. If planets go through the equivalent of an L–T transition, our results would imply that this happens at cooler temperatures than for brown dwarfs. Placing WASP-80b's dayside into a colour–magnitude diagram, it falls exactly at the junction between a blackbody model and the T-dwarf sequence; we cannot discern which of those two interpretations is the more likely. WASP-80b's flux density is as low as GJ 436b at 3.6 μm; the planet's dayside is also fainter, but bluer than HD 189733Ab's nightside (in the [3.6] and [4.5] Spitzer bands). Flux measurements on other planets with similar equilibrium temperatures are required to establish whether irradiated gas giants, such as brown dwarfs, transition between two spectral classes. An eventual detection of methane absorption in transmission would also help lift that degeneracy. We obtained a second series of high-resolution spectra during transit, using HARPS. We reanalyse the Rossiter–McLaughlin effect. The data now favour an aligned orbital solution and a stellar rotation nearly three times slower than stellar line broadening implies. A contribution to stellar line broadening, maybe macroturbulence, is likely to have been underestimated for cool stars, whose rotations have therefore been systematically overestimated.

Description: The Kepler space mission provided near-continuous and high-precision photometry of about 207 000 stars, which can be used for asteroseismology. However, for successful seismic modeling it is equally important to have accurate stellar physical parameters. Therefore, supplementary ground-based data are needed. We report the results of the analysis of high-resolution spectroscopic data of A- and F-type stars from the Kepler field, which were obtained with the HERMES spectrograph on the Mercator telescope. We determined spectral types, atmospheric parameters and chemical abundances for a sample of 117 stars. Hydrogen Balmer, Fe i , and Fe ii lines were used to derive effective temperatures, surface gravities, and microturbulent velocities. We determined chemical abundances and projected rotational velocities using a spectrum synthesis technique. The atmospheric parameters obtained were compared with those from the Kepler Input Catalogue (KIC), confirming that the KIC effective temperatures are underestimated for A stars. Effective temperatures calculated by spectral energy distribution fitting are in good agreement with those determined from the spectral line analysis. The analysed sample comprises stars with approximately solar chemical abundances, as well as chemically peculiar stars of the Am, Ap, and  Boo types. The distribution of the projected rotational velocity, v sin i , is typical for A and F stars and ranges from 8 to about 280 km s –1 , with a mean of 134 km s –1 .

Description: We report the identification of 61.45 d –1 (711.2 μHz) oscillations, with amplitudes of 62.6 μmag, in KIC 4768731 (HD 225914) using Kepler photometry. This relatively bright ( V  = 9.17) chemically peculiar star with spectral type A5 Vp SrCr(Eu) has previously been found to exhibit rotational modulation with a period of 5.21 d. Fourier analysis reveals a simple dipole pulsator with an amplitude that has remained stable over a 4-yr time span, but with a frequency that is variable. Analysis of high-resolution spectra yields stellar parameters of T eff  = 8100 ± 200 K, log g  = 4.0 ± 0.2, [Fe/H] = +0.31 ± 0.24 and v sin i  = 14.8 ± 1.6 km s –1 . Line profile variations caused by rotation are also evident. Lines of Sr, Cr, Eu, Mg and Si are strongest when the star is brightest, while Y and Ba vary in antiphase with the other elements. The abundances of rare earth elements are only modestly enhanced compared to other roAp stars of similar T eff and log g . Radial velocities in the literature suggest a significant change over the past 30 yr, but the radial velocities presented here show no significant change over a period of 4 yr.

Description: We investigate the light variations of 15 Am stars using four years of high-precision photometry from the Kepler spacecraft and an additional 14 Am stars from the K2 Campaign 0 field. We find that most of the Am stars in the Kepler field have light curves characteristic of rotational modulation due to star-spots. Of the 29 Am stars observed, 12 are Scuti variables and one is a Doradus star. One star is an eclipsing binary and another was found to be a binary from time delay measurements. Two Am stars show evidence for flares which are unlikely to be due to a cool companion. The fact that 10 out of 29 Am stars are rotational variables and that some may even flare strongly suggests that Am stars possess significant magnetic fields. This is contrary to the current understanding that the enhanced metallicity in these stars is due to diffusion in the absence of a magnetic field. The fact that so many stars are Scuti variables is also at odds with the prediction of diffusion theory. We suggest that a viable alternative is that the metal enhancement could arise from accretion.

Description: We identify stars in the  Sct instability strip that do not pulsate in p modes at the 50-μmag limit, using Kepler data. Spectral classification and abundance analyses from high-resolution spectroscopy allow us to identify chemically peculiar stars, in which the absence of pulsations is not surprising. The remaining stars are chemically normal, yet they are not  Sct stars. Their lack of observed p modes cannot be explained through any known mechanism. However, they are mostly distributed around the edges of the  Sct instability strip, which allows for the possibility that they actually lie outside the strip once the uncertainties are taken into account. We investigated the possibility that the non-pulsators inside the instability strip could be unresolved binary systems, having components that both lie outside the instability strip. If misinterpreted as single stars, we found that such binaries could generate temperature discrepancies of ~300 K – larger than the spectroscopic uncertainties, and fully consistent with the observations. After these considerations, there remains one chemically normal non-pulsator that lies in the middle of the instability strip. This star is a challenge to pulsation theory. However, its existence as the only known star of its kind indicates that such stars are rare. We conclude that the  Sct instability strip is pure, unless pulsation is shut down by diffusion or another mechanism, which could be interaction with a binary companion.

Description: The bright binary system YZ Cassiopeiae is a remarkable laboratory for studying the Am phenomenon. It consists of a metallic-lined A2 star and an F2 dwarf on a circular orbit, which undergo total and annular eclipses. We present an analysis of 15 published light curves and 42 new high-quality échelle spectra, resulting in measurements of the masses, radii, effective temperatures and photospheric chemical abundances of the two stars. The masses and radii are measured to 0.5 per cent precision: M A  = 2.263 ± 0.012 M , M B  = 1.325 ± 0.007 M , R A  = 2.525 ± 0.011 R and R B  = 1.331 ± 0.006 R . We determine the abundance of 20 elements for the primary star, of which all except scandium are supersolar by up to 1 dex. The temperature of this star (9520 ± 120 K) makes it one of the hottest Am stars. We also measure the abundances of 25 elements for its companion ( T eff  = 6880 ± 240 K), finding all to be solar or slightly above solar. The photospheric abundances of the secondary star should be representative of the bulk composition of both stars. Theoretical stellar evolutionary models are unable to match these properties: the masses, radii and temperatures imply a half-solar chemical composition ( Z  = 0.009 ± 0.003) and an age of 490–550 Myr. YZ Cas therefore presents a challenge to stellar evolutionary theory.

Description: We detect the second known Bootis star (HD 54272) which exhibits Doradus-type pulsations. The star was formerly misidentified as a RR Lyrae variable. The Bootis stars are a small group (only 2 per cent) of late B to early F-type, Population I stars which show moderate to extreme (up to a factor 100) surface underabundances of most Fe-peak elements and solar abundances of lighter elements (C, N, O, and S). The photometric data from the Wide Angle Search for Planets (WASP) and All Sky Automated Survey (ASAS) projects were analysed. They have an overlapping time base of 1566 d and 2545 d, respectively. Six statistically significant peaks were identified ( f 1  = 1.410 116 d –1 , f 2  = 1.283 986 d –1 , f 3  = 1.293 210 d –1 , f 4  = 1.536 662 d –1 , f 5  = 1.157 22 d –1 and f 6  = 0.226 57 d –1 ). The spacing between f 1 and f 2 , f 1 and f 4 , f 5 and f 2 is almost identical. Since the daily aliasing is very strong, the interpretation of frequency spectra is somewhat ambiguous. From spectroscopic data, we deduce a high rotational velocity (250 ± 25 km s –1 ) and a metal deficiency of about –0.8 to –1.1 dex compared to the Sun. A comparison with the similar star, HR 8799, results in analogous pulsational characteristics but widely different astrophysical parameters. Since both are Bootis-type stars, the main mechanism of this phenomenon, selective accretion, may severely influence Doradus-type pulsations.

Description: We report the discovery of the transiting exoplanets WASP-69b, WASP-70Ab and WASP-84b, each of which orbits a bright star ( V  ~ 10). WASP-69b is a bloated Saturn-mass planet (0.26  M Jup , 1.06  R Jup ) in a 3.868-d period around an active, ~1-Gyr, mid-K dwarf. ROSAT detected X-rays 60±27 arcsec from WASP-69. If the star is the source then the planet could be undergoing mass-loss at a rate of ~10 12  g s –1 . This is one to two orders of magnitude higher than the evaporation rate estimated for HD 209458b and HD 189733b, both of which have exhibited anomalously large Lyman α absorption during transit. WASP-70Ab is a sub-Jupiter-mass planet (0.59  M Jup , 1.16  R Jup ) in a 3.713-d orbit around the primary of a spatially resolved, 9–10-Gyr, G4+K3 binary, with a separation of 3.3 arcsec (≥800 au). WASP-84b is a sub-Jupiter-mass planet (0.69  M Jup , 0.94  R Jup ) in an 8.523-d orbit around an active, ~1-Gyr, early-K dwarf. Of the transiting planets discovered from the ground to date, WASP-84b has the third-longest period. For the active stars WASP-69 and WASP-84, we pre-whitened the radial velocities using a low-order harmonic series. We found that this reduced the residual scatter more than did the oft-used method of pre-whitening with a fit between residual radial velocity and bisector span. The system parameters were essentially unaffected by pre-whitening.

Description: Colour–magnitude diagrams form a traditional way of presenting luminous objects in the Universe and compare them to each other. Here, we estimate the photometric distance of 44 transiting exoplanetary systems. Parallaxes for seven systems confirm our methodology. Combining those measurements with fluxes obtained while planets were occulted by their host stars, we compose colour–magnitude diagrams in the near and mid-infrared. When possible, planets are plotted alongside very low mass stars and field brown dwarfs, who often share similar sizes and equilibrium temperatures. They offer a natural, empirical, comparison sample. We also include directly imaged exoplanets and the expected loci of pure blackbodies. Irradiated planets do not match blackbodies; their emission spectra are not featureless. For a given luminosity, hot Jupiters’ daysides show a larger variety in colour than brown dwarfs do and display an increasing diversity in colour with decreasing intrinsic luminosity. The presence of an extra absorbent within the 4.5 μm band would reconcile outlying hot Jupiters with ultra-cool dwarfs’ atmospheres. Measuring the emission of gas giants cooler than 1000 K would disentangle whether planets’ atmospheres behave more similarly to brown dwarfs’ atmospheres than to blackbodies, whether they are akin to the young directly imaged planets, or if irradiated gas giants form their own sequence.