Deep MMT Transit Survey of the Open Cluster M37 III: Stellar Rotation at 550 Myr

TL;DR

This study measures rotation periods of 575 stars in the 550 Myr old open cluster M37, revealing correlations with mass and challenging existing models of stellar angular momentum evolution for low-mass stars.

Contribution

It provides the largest sample of rotation periods for a cluster older than 500 Myr and tests stellar angular momentum evolution models against these observations.

Findings

Heavier stars (>~0.8 Msun) rotate faster with a tight period-mass relation.

A group of 4 stars with P > 15 days challenges existing angular momentum theories.

Discrepancies between models and observations for 0.6-1.0 Msun stars were identified.

Abstract

In the course of conducting a deep (14.5 ~< r ~< 23), 20 night survey for transiting planets in the rich ~550 Myr old open cluster M37 we have measured the rotation periods of 575 stars which lie near the cluster main sequence, with masses 0.2 Msun ~< M ~< 1.3 Msun. This is the largest sample of rotation periods for a cluster older than 500 Myr. Using this rich sample we investigate a number of relations between rotation period, color and the amplitude of photometric variability. Stars with M >~ 0.8 Msun show a tight correlation between period and mass with heavier stars rotating more rapidly. There is a group of 4 stars with P > 15 days that fall well above this relation, which, if real, would present a significant challenge to theories of stellar angular momentum evolution. Below 0.8 Msun the stars continue to follow the period-mass correlation but with a broad tail of rapid rotators that expands to shorter periods with decreasing mass. We combine these results with observations of other open clusters to test the standard theory of lower-main sequence stellar angular momentum evolution. We find that the model reproduces the observations for solar mass stars, but discrepancies are apparent for stars with 0.6 ~< M ~< 1.0 Msun. We also find that for late-K through early-M dwarf stars in this cluster rapid rotators tend to be bluer than slow rotators in B-V but redder than slow rotators in V-I_{C}. This result supports the hypothesis that the significant discrepancy between the observed and predicted temperatures and radii of low-mass main sequence stars is due to stellar activity.