Physical Sciences and Mathematics | Open Access Articles

Most Observations Of Our Nearest Neighbor: Flares On Proxima Centauri, James R. A. Davenport, David M. Kipping, Dimitar Sasselov, Jaymie M. Matthews, Chris Cameron

Physics & Astronomy

We present a study of white-light flares from the active M5.5 dwarf Proxima Centauri using the Canadian microsatellite Microvariability and Oscillations of STars. Using 37.6 days of monitoring data from 2014 to 2015, we have detected 66 individual flare events, the largest number of white-light flares observed to date on Proxima Cen. Flare energies in our sample range from 10²⁹ to 10^31.5erg. The flare rate is lower than that of other classic flare stars of a similar spectral type, such as UV Ceti, which may indicate Proxima Cen had a higher flare rate in its youth. …

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The Kepler Catalog Of Stellar Flares, James R. A. Davenport

Physics & Astronomy

A homogeneous search for stellar flares has been performed using every available Kepler light curve. An iterative light curve de-trending approach was used to filter out both astrophysical and systematic variability to detect flares. The flare recovery completeness has also been computed throughout each light curve using artificial flare injection tests, and the tools for this work have been made publicly available. The final sample contains 851,168 candidate flare events recovered above the 68% completeness threshold, which were detected from 4041 stars, or 1.9% of the stars in the Kepler database. The average flare energy detected is ~10³⁵ erg. …

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Kepler Flares Ii: The Temporal Morphology Of White-Light Flares On Gj 1243, James R. A. Davenport, Suzanne L. Hawley, Leslie Hebb, John P. Wisniewski, Adam F. Kowalski, Emily C. Johnson, Michael Malatesta, Jesus Paraza, Marcus Keil, Steven M. Silverberg, Tiffany C. Jansen, Matthew S. Scheffler, Jodi R. Berdis, Daniel M. Larsen, Eric J. Hilton

Physics & Astronomy

We present the largest sample of flares ever compiled for a single M dwarf, the active M4 star GJ 1243. Over 6100 individual flare events, with energies ranging from 10²⁹ to 10³³ erg, are found in 11 months of 1 minute cadence data from Kepler. This sample is unique for its completeness and dynamic range. We have developed automated tools for finding flares in short-cadence Kepler light curves, and performed extensive validation and classification of the sample by eye. From this pristine sample of flares we generate a median flare template. This template shows that two exponential …

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Multi-Wavelength Characterization Of Stellar Flares On Low-Mass Stars Using Sdss And 2mass Time Domain Surveys, James R. A. Davenport, Andrew C. Becker, Adam F. Kowalski, Suzanne L. Hawley, Sarah J. Schmidt, Eric J. Hilton, Branimir Sesar, Roc Cutri

Physics & Astronomy

We present the first rates of flares from M dwarf stars in both red optical and near-infrared (NIR) filters. We have studied ~50,000 M dwarfs from the Sloan Digital Sky Survey (SDSS) Stripe 82 area and 1321 M dwarfs from the Two Micron All Sky Survey (2MASS) Calibration Scan Point Source Working Database that overlap SDSS imaging fields. We assign photometric spectral types from M0 to M6 using (r – i) and (i – z) colors for every star in our sample. Stripe 82 stars each have 50-100 epochs of data, while 2MASS Calibration stars have …

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Full-Text Articles in Physical Sciences and Mathematics

Most Observations Of Our Nearest Neighbor: Flares On Proxima Centauri, James R. A. Davenport, David M. Kipping, Dimitar Sasselov, Jaymie M. Matthews, Chris Cameron

Physics & Astronomy

The Kepler Catalog Of Stellar Flares, James R. A. Davenport

Physics & Astronomy

Physics & Astronomy

Multi-Wavelength Characterization Of Stellar Flares On Low-Mass Stars Using Sdss And 2mass Time Domain Surveys, James R. A. Davenport, Andrew C. Becker, Adam F. Kowalski, Suzanne L. Hawley, Sarah J. Schmidt, Eric J. Hilton, Branimir Sesar, Roc Cutri

Physics & Astronomy