Current state of the modelling of photospheric activity

TL;DR

This paper reviews current methods for modeling photospheric activity using high-precision optical light curves from space telescopes, highlighting their applications in studying stellar rotation, activity cycles, and star-planet interactions.

Contribution

It provides a comprehensive overview of recent modeling techniques and their applications to understanding stellar surface activity and star-planet systems.

Findings

Models can identify active longitudes and measure differential rotation.

Light curve analysis reveals short-term activity cycles.

Transit light modulations inform on star-planet alignment and active regions.

Abstract

I briefly review the current state of the modelling of photospheric activity based on the high-precision optical light curves obtained with MOST, CoRoT, and Kepler. These models can be used to search for active longitudes where activity is preferentially concentrated, estimate the amplitude of stellar differential rotation, and look for short-term activity cycles as, e.g., in the case of CoRoT-2. In the case of a late-type star accompanied by a transiting hot Jupiter, the small light modulations observed during transits when a dark spot is occulted by the disc of the planet are also briefly considered. They can be used to derive information on individual active regions as well as on stellar rotation and the spin-orbit alignment of the system.