A Revised Gyro-Age for M 67 from Kepler/K2-Campaign-5 Light Curves

TL;DR

This study refines the gyro-age of the M 67 star cluster by analyzing Kepler/K2 light curves, expanding the search area and applying improved period detection methods to determine stellar rotation periods.

Contribution

It provides a more comprehensive analysis of stellar rotation periods in M 67, leading to an updated and more accurate gyro-age estimate for the cluster.

Findings

Mean rotation period of 29.6 days for Sun-like stars

Derived gyro-age of 5.4 Gyr for M 67

Expanded search area improves period detection

Abstract

We revisit the photometric variability of stars in the M 67 field using Kepler/K2-Campaign-5 light curves. In our previous work, we limited the search area around M\,67 to that of a recent ground-based study. In the present work, we expand the search area and apply a more rigorous period-finding algorithm to determine the rotation periods of 98 main sequence cluster members from the same data. In addition, we derive periods of 40 stars from the K2SC detrended light curves. We determine the mean period of single sun-like main sequence cluster members to be $29.6 \pm 0.6$ d. Assuming the periods correspond to stellar rotation, the corresponding mean gyro-age is $5.4 \pm 0.2$ Gyr.