Insights from Asteroseismology of Massive Stars: The Need for Additional Angular Momentum Transport Mechanisms

TL;DR

This study uses asteroseismology to evaluate angular momentum transport in massive stars, finding that additional mechanisms beyond rotation are necessary to explain observed oscillation patterns.

Contribution

It demonstrates the importance of extra angular momentum transport mechanisms in massive stars through asteroseismic analysis of Kepler data.

Findings

Uniform rotation model fits observations well.

Additional angular momentum transport mechanisms are required.

Efficient transport occurs during early main sequence.

Abstract

In massive stars, rotation and oscillatory waves can have a tight interplay. In order to assess the importance of additional angular momentum transport mechanisms other than rotation, we compare the asteroseismic properties of a uniformly rotating model and a differentially rotating one. Accordingly, we employ the observed period spacing of 36 dipole g-modes in the Kepler $\sim3.2$ M$_\odot$ target KIC 7760680 to discriminate between these two models. We favor the uniformly rotating model, which fully satisfies all observational constraints. Therefore, efficient angular momentum transport by additional mechanisms such as internal gravity waves, heat-driven modes and magnetic field is needed during early main sequence evolution of massive stars.