Magnetic field measurements of $\epsilon$ Eridani from Zeeman broadening

TL;DR

This study measures the magnetic field of epsilon Eridani using Zeeman broadening and PCA line-profile analysis, revealing inhomogeneous magnetic distribution, short-term variability, and a possible three-year cycle.

Contribution

It introduces a new application of PCA line-profile reconstruction to quantify surface magnetic fields and detect their variations in epsilon Eridani.

Findings

Mean magnetic field strength of 186 G with 47 G uncertainty

Detected short-term magnetic field variations of tens of Gauss

Evidence for a three-year magnetic cycle

Abstract

We present new magnetic field measurements of the K2 main-sequence star $\epsilon$ Eridani based on principal components analysis (PCA) line-profile reconstructions. The aim of this paper is to quantify the surface-averaged magnetic field and search for possible variations. A total of 338 optical echelle spectra from our robotic telescope facility STELLA with a spectral resolution of 55,000 were available for analysis. This time-series was used to search for the small line-profile variations due to a surface magnetic field with the help of a PCA. Evidence for a spatial and temporal inhomogeneous magnetic field distribution is presented. The mean, surface averaged, magnetic field strength was found to be $\langle B \rangle = 186 \pm 47\,\mathrm{G}$ in good agreement with previous Zeeman-broadening measurements. Clear short-term variations of the surface averaged magnetic field of up to few tens Gauss were detected together with evidence for a three-year cycle in the surface-averaged magnetic field of $\epsilon$ Eridani.