[Astronomy seminar] Astronomy seminar on Friday 10th of November

[Astronomy seminar announcements]

Title: Stellar activity and its effects on exoplanets and their detection
Speaker: Heidi Korhonen (University of Copenhagen)

Friday 10th of November from 10:30 to 11:30 at FC61.

Abstract:
Our Sun is known to harbour magnetic fields which cause myriad of 
phenomena, e.g., starspots, flares, and coronal mass ejections. The 
existence of starspots in other stars than the Sun has been known for 
more than five decades. The development of observing and analysis 
techniques that has occurred during the past two decades has enabled us 
to study the detailed starspot and magnetic field configurations on 
stars of different types and ages. Starspots also change the shape of 
the observed spectral line profiles in a way that can mimic radial 
velocity variations from exoplanet, especially hampering the detection 
of small exoplanets. Additionally, coronal mass ejections, explosive 
events that occur basically daily on the Sun, are one of the main 
ingredients in the changing space environment of the Earth. The lack of 
knowledge on the properties of stellar coronal mass ejections hinders 
our understanding of the space environments of planets orbiting other 
stars. In this talk I will discuss stellar activity, especially 
starspots and coronal mass ejections, and how it affects the orbiting 
planets and their detection.