Questions tagged [starspot]

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7 votes
1 answer
164 views

Do brown dwarfs have starspots?

Do lithium-burning brown dwarfs (65+ Jupiter masses) have starspots too or do they occur only on hydrogen-burning stars?
John's user avatar
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2 votes
1 answer
147 views

How would one estimate the rotation period of a star from its spectrum?

The figure is shown; the measurements were taken on two consecutive observing nights. The Ordinate is the flux normalized to continuum and the abscissa is the wavelength scale. You can see the "...
Jay D's user avatar
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10 votes
1 answer
389 views

Can New Horizons be used to measure the distance to Betelgeuse (despite its fickle photocenter)?

The New Horizons spacecraft is almost 50 AU from Earth and near-simultaneous images taken by its telescope and one on Earth have demonstrated parallax without relying on the movement of Earth in it's ...
uhoh's user avatar
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6 votes
3 answers
417 views

Can we see evidence of sunspots on other stars? (starspots)

Searching for exoplanets by measuring the change of a stars brightness when an exoplanet transits the star's disk also has the potential to detect exo-sunspots (starspots). Have they ever been ...
Mike H's user avatar
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6 votes
1 answer
102 views

Activity of M dwarf stars

Why are M dwarf stars the most active (in terms of starspots and faculae) of all stars?
user4437416's user avatar
6 votes
1 answer
437 views

Why can't the surfaces of stars be observed?

If I'm correctly informed, only three stars: Sol, Betelgeuse and Altair have surfaces which have been resolved by telescopes. All other stars are only point sources of light, even in the greatest of ...
LocalFluff's user avatar
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