3D hydrodynamical simulations of evolved stars and observations of stellar surfaces

TL;DR

This paper discusses advanced 3D hydrodynamical simulations of evolved stars' surfaces using the CO5BOLD code, linking these models with high-resolution observations to interpret stellar surface images accurately.

Contribution

It introduces detailed 3D simulations of evolved stars' surfaces with realistic physics, enhancing the interpretation of observational data.

Findings

Simulations effectively reproduce observed stellar surface features.

Post-processing radiative transfer accurately predicts observables.

Synergy between simulations and observations improves understanding of stellar convection.

Abstract

Evolved stars are among the largest and brightest stars and they are ideal targets for the new generation of sensitive, high resolution instrumentation that pro- vides spectrophotometric, interferometric, astrometric, and imaging observables. The interpretation of the complex stellar surface images requires numerical simulations of stellar convection that take into account multi-dimensional time-dependent radiation hydrodynamics with realistic input physics. We show how the evolved star simulations are obtained using the radiative hydrodynamics code CO5BOLD and how the accurate observables are computed with the post-processing radiative transfer code Optim3D. The synergy between observations and theoretical work is supported by a proper and quantitative analysis using these simulations, and by strong constraints from the obser- vational side.