Related papers: Stellar coronal magnetic fields and star-planet in…
It has been observed that hot Jupiters located within 0.08 AU of their host stars commonly display radii in excess of those expected based on models. A number of theoretical explanations for this phenomenon have been suggested, but the…
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…
Stellar dynamos are driven by complex couplings between rotation and turbulent convection, which drive global-scale flows and build and rebuild stellar magnetic fields. When stars like our sun are young, they rotate much more rapidly than…
The concentration of magnetic flux near the poles of rapidly rotating cool stars has been recently proposed as an alternative mechanism to dynamo saturation in order to explain the saturation of angular momentum loss. In this work we study…
There is currently no explanation of why the corona has the temperature and density it has. We present a model which explains how the dynamics of magnetic reconnection regulates the conditions in the corona. A bifurcation in magnetic…
Stellar activity can reveal itself in the form of radiation (eg, enhanced X-ray coronal emission, flares) and particles (eg, winds, coronal mass ejections). Together, these phenomena shape the space weather around (exo)planets. As stars…
The photospheric spot activity of some of the stars with transiting planets discovered by the CoRoT space experiment is reviewed. Their out-of-transit light modulations are fitted by a spot model previously tested with the total solar…
Recent observations of rapidly-rotating cool dwarfs have revealed H$\alpha$ line asymmetries indicative of clumps of cool, dense plasma in the stars' coronae. These clumps may be either long-lived (persisting for more than one stellar…
Observations indicate that magnetic fields in rapidly rotating stars are very strong, on both small and large scales. What is the nature of the resulting corona? Here we seek to shed some light on this question. We use the results of an…
The large-scale field of the Sun is well represented by its lowest energy (or potential) state. Recent observations, by comparison, reveal that many solar-type stars show large-scale surface magnetic fields that are highly non-potential -…
Signatures of "evaporative" winds from exo-planets on short (hot) orbits around their host star have been observed in a number of systems. In this paper we present global AMR simulations that track the launching of the winds, their…
Today, the generation of magnetic fields in solar-type stars and its relation to activity and rotation can coherently be explained, although it is certainly not understood in its entirety. Rotation facilitates the generation of magnetic…
The fast solar wind that fills the heliosphere originates from deep within regions of open magnetic field on the Sun called coronal holes. The energy source responsible for accelerating the plasma to high speeds is widely debated, however…
The high stellar densities in the cores of globular clusters cause significant stellar interactions. These stellar interactions can produce close binary mass-transferring systems involving compact objects and their progeny, such as X-ray…
The problem of cosmic-ray scattering in the turbulent electromagnetic fields of the interstellar medium and the solar wind is of great importance due to the variety of applications of the resulting diffusion coefficients. Examples are…
At least 10-15% of nearby sun-like stars have known Jupiter-mass planets. In contrast, very few planets are found in mature open and globular clusters such as the Hyades and 47 Tuc. We explore here the possibility that this dichotomy is due…
It is a long-standing question in exoplanet research if Hot Jupiters can influence the magnetic activity of their host stars. While cool stars usually spin down with age and become inactive, an input of angular momentum through tidal…
In the past decade, hundreds of exoplanets have been discovered in extremely short orbits below 10 days. Unlike in the Solar System, planets in these systems orbit their host stars close enough to disturb the stellar magnetic field lines.…
A new mechanism for the internal heating of ultra-short-period planets is proposed based on the gravitational perturbation by a non-axisymmetric quadrupole moment of their host stars. Such a quadrupole is due to the magnetic flux tubes in…
Neutron stars exhibit magnetic fields and densities far beyond those achievable in terrestrial laboratories, offering a natural probe of strongly interacting matter under extreme conditions. Using observationally anchored mass-radius…