KOI-1003: A new spotted, eclipsing RS CVn binary in the Kepler field

TL;DR

This paper reports the discovery and detailed analysis of KOI-1003, a new active RS CVn binary star observed with Kepler, highlighting its starspot activity, orbital synchronization, and stellar parameters.

Contribution

The study is the first to identify and characterize an RS CVn star using Kepler data, providing detailed stellar and orbital parameters.

Findings

KOI-1003 is an active RS CVn binary with synchronized orbit and rotation.

The primary is a subgiant of about 1.45 solar masses.

The system is approximately 4400 parsecs away and 3 billion years old.

Abstract

Using the high-precision photometry from the Kepler space telescope, thousands of stars with stellar and planetary companions have been observed. The characterization of stars with companions is not always straightforward and can be contaminated by systematic and stellar influences on the light curves. Here, through a detailed analysis of starspots and eclipses, we identify KOI-1003 as a new, active RS CVn star---the first identified with data from Kepler. The Kepler light curve of this close binary system exhibits the system's primary transit, secondary eclipse, and starspot evolution of two persistent active longitudes. The near equality of the system's orbital and rotation periods indicates the orbit and primary star's rotation are nearly synchronized ($P_\mathrm{orb} = 8.360613\pm0.000003$ days; $P_\mathrm{rot} \sim 8.23$ days). By assuming the secondary star is on the main sequence, we suggest the system consists of a $1.45^{+0.11}_{-0.19} \ M_\odot$ subgiant primary and a $0.59^{+0.03}_{-0.04} \ M_\odot$ main-sequence companion. Our work gives a distance of $4400 \pm 600$ pc and an age of $t = 3.0^{-0.5}_{+2.0}$ Gyr, parameters which are discrepant with previous studies that included the star as a member of the open cluster NGC 6791.