Related papers: Fundamental Stellar Astrophysics Revealed at Very …
Continuous high-precision photometry of stars, provided by space missions such as CoRoT, Kepler, and K2, represents a unique way to study stellar rotation and magnetism. The coupling of these studies of the surface dynamics with…
Optical interferometry has been successful at achieving milliarcsecond resolution on bright stars. Imaging performance can improve greatly by increasing the number of baselines, which has motivated proposals to build large (~ 100 m) optical…
Over the last half-century quantitative stellar spectroscopy has made great progress. However, most stellar abundance analyses today still employ rather simplified models, which can introduce severe systematic errors swamping the…
Owing to the remarkable photometric precision of space observatories like Kepler, stellar and planetary systems beyond our own are now being characterized en masse for the first time. These characterizations are pivotal for endeavors such…
We provide a status report on the determination of stellar ages from asteroseismology for stars of various masses and evolutionary stages. The ability to deduce the ages of stars with a relative precision of typically 10 to 20% is a unique…
This pedagogical document about stellar photometry - aimed at those for whom astronomical arcana seem arcane - endeavours to explain the concepts of magnitudes, color indices, absolute magnitudes, distance moduli, extinctions, attenuations,…
Over the past ten years, the concept of adaptive optics has evolved from early experimental stages to a standard observing tool now available at almost all major optical and near-infrared telescope facilities. Adaptive optics will also be…
High-fidelity spectroscopy presents challenges for both observations and in designing instruments. High-resolution and high-accuracy spectra are required for verifying hydrodynamic stellar atmospheres and for resolving intergalactic…
Since its emergence two decades ago, astrophotonics has found broad application in scientific instruments at many institutions worldwide. The case for astrophotonics becomes more compelling as telescopes push for AO-assisted,…
The question "How did we get here and what will the future bring?" captures the human imagination and the attention of the National Academy of Science's Astronomy and Astrophysics Survey Commitee (AASC). Fulfillment of this "fundamental…
The answers to fundamental science questions in astrophysics, ranging from the history of the expansion of the universe to the sizes of nearby stars, hinge on our ability to make precise measurements of diverse astronomical objects. As our…
Astronomical polarimetry is a powerful technique that can provide physical information sometimes difficult or impossible to obtain by any other type of observation. Almost every class of binary star can benefit from polarimetric…
Photometric light curves suffer from fundamental degeneracies that limit surface information recovery. We demonstrate that astrometry enables access to complementary information through photocentre variations induced by rotating surface…
The study of protostellar collapse or infall has proven unusually difficult and controversial. Some historical context will be provided, against which recent advances can be measured. We now have a substantial number of objects with…
Asteroseismology is among the most powerful observational tools to determine fundamental properties of stars. Space-based photometry has recently enabled the systematic detection of oscillations in exoplanet host stars, allowing a…
Current burning issues in stellar physics, for both hot and cool stars, concern their magnetism. In hot stars, stable magnetic fields of fossil origin impact their stellar structure and circumstellar environment, with a likely major role in…
Star formation is a multi-scale, multi-physics problem ranging from the size scale of molecular clouds ($\sim$10s pc) down to the size scales of dense prestellar cores ($\sim$0.1 pc) that are the birth sites of stars. Several physical…
High spatial resolution is the key for the understanding various astrophysical phenomena. But even with the future E-ELT, single dish instruments are limited to a spatial resolution of about 4 mas in the visible. For the closest objects…
With the advent of optical interferometers that will be coming online in the next decade, radial velocity searches for extra-solar planets will be complemented by high angular resolution astrometric measurements. In this paper, we explore…
A brief summary of some highlights in the study of high energy astrophysical sources over the past decade is presented. It is argued that the great progress that has been made derives largely from the application of new technology to…