Spot activity of LQ Hya from photometry between 1988 and 2011

TL;DR

This study analyzes 24 years of photometric data of LQ Hya to investigate starspot activity, differential rotation, and active longitudes, revealing short-term stability and potential long-term activity cycles.

Contribution

It applies the Continuous Period Search method to long-term data, providing new insights into the star's spot configurations and activity patterns.

Findings

Seasonal variability in light curve amplitude and mean level.

Estimated small differential rotation, close to rigid rotation.

Identification of stable active longitudes on timescales up to six months.

Abstract

We investigate the spot activity of the young chromospherically active main sequence star LQ Hya. Our aims are to identify possible active longitudes, estimate the differential rotation and study long and short term changes in the activity. Our analysis is based on 24 years of Johnson V-band photometry. We use the previously published Continuous Period Search (CPS) method to model the evolution of the light curve of LQ Hya. The CPS fits a Fourier series model to short overlapping subsets of data. This enables us to monitor the spot configuration of the star with a higher time resolution. We find seasonal variability in the mean level and amplitude of the light curve of LQ Hya. The variability of the light curve amplitude seems not to be cyclic, but the long-term variations in the mean magnitude could be explained by an approximately 13 year cycle. Because of the limited length of the observed time series, it is not yet possible to determine whether this structure really is periodic and represents an activity cycle. We estimate the differential rotation of the star to be small, and the star is potentially very close to a rigid rotator. We search for active longitudes and find that on time scales up to six months there are typically one or two relatively stable active areas on the star with limited phase migration. On time scales longer than one year, no stable active longitudes have been present except for the period between 2003 and 2009 and possibly also some time before 1995. We find any signs of flip-flops with a regular period. The mean time scale of change of the light curve during the observation period is determined to be of the same order of magnitude as the predicted convective turnover time for the star.