Asteroseismology and evolutionary status of Procyon A

Free access article

Issue		A&A Volume 460, Number 3, December IV 2006


Page(s)		759 - 767
Section		Stellar structure and evolution
DOI		http://dx.doi.org/10.1051/0004-6361:20065251

A&A 460, 759-767 (2006)
DOI: 10.1051/0004-6361:20065251

Asteroseismology and evolutionary status of Procyon A

J. Provost¹, G. Berthomieu¹, M. Martic², and P. Morel¹

¹ Département Cassiopée, UMR CNRS 6202, Observatoire de la Côte d'Azur, BP 4229, 06304 Nice Cedex 4, France
e-mail: janine.provost@obs-nice.fr
² Service d'Aéronomie du CNRS, BP 3, 91371 Verrières-le-Buisson Cedex, France

(Received 22 March 2006 / Accepted 22 June 2006)

Abstract
Models of Procyon A satisfying the actual observational constraints, particularly the asteroseismic ones, are discussed. The oscillations of these models were computed and analysed. We looked for seismic signatures of the evolutionary status of Procyon A. We show that the behavior of the small frequency spacings, particularly $\delta\nu_{01}$ allows us to distinguish between main sequence and post-main sequence models, all satisfying the observational constraints on mass, effective temperature, radius, and surface metallicity of Procyon A. We also introduce a new seismic evolution criterion, $\varepsilon$ , based on the comparison of the low and high frequency parts of the power spectrum. The comparison of the seismic properties of the models with the available asteroseismic observations does not allow us to definitely decide on the stage of evolution of Procyon A. Much more accurate frequencies must be obtained especially in the low-frequency domain to distinguish between the models.

Key words: stars: oscillations -- stars: evolution -- stars: individual: Procyon A

What is OpenURL?

The OpenURL standard is a protocol for transmission of metadata describing the resource that you wish to access. An OpenURL link contains article metadata and directs it to the OpenURL server of your choice. The OpenURL server can provide access to the resource and also offer complementary services (specific search engine, export of references...). The OpenURL link can be generated by different means.

If your librarian has set up your subscription with an OpenURL resolver, OpenURL links appear automatically on the abstract pages.
You can define your own OpenURL resolver with your EDPS Account. In this case your choice will be given priority over that of your library.
You can use an add-on for your browser (Firefox or I.E.) to display OpenURL links on a page (see http://www.openly.com/openurlref/). You should disable this module if you wish to use the OpenURL server that you or your library have defined.