Search

We present our numerical simulation approach for the End-to-End (E2E) model applied to various astronomical spectrographs, such as SOXS (ESO-NTT), CUBES (ESO-VLT), and ANDES (ESO-ELT), covering multiple wavelength regions. The E2E model aim at simulating the expected astronomical observations starting from the radiation of the scientific sources (or calibration sources) up to the raw-frame data produced by the detectors. The comprehensive description includes E2E architecture, computational models, and tools for rendering the simulated frames. Collaboration with Data Reduction Software (DRS) teams is discussed, along with efforts to meet instrument requirements. The contribution to the cross-correlation algorithm for the Active Flexure Compensation (AFC) system of CUBES is detailed., Comment: 19 pages, 17 figures, SPIE Astronomical Telescopes + Instrumentation, Yokohama 2024. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:2209.07185, arXiv:2012.12684

The first generation of ELT instruments includes an optical-infrared high-resolution spectrograph, indicated as ELT-HIRES and recently christened ANDES (ArmazoNes high Dispersion Echelle Spectrograph). ANDES consists of three fibre-fed spectrographs ([U]BV, RIZ, YJH) providing a spectral resolution of $\sim$100,000 with a minimum simultaneous wavelength coverage of 0.4-1.8 $\mu$m with the goal of extending it to 0.35-2.4 $\mu$m with the addition of a U arm to the BV spectrograph and a separate K band spectrograph. It operates both in seeing- and diffraction-limited conditions and the fibre feeding allows several, interchangeable observing modes including a single conjugated adaptive optics module and a small diffraction-limited integral field unit in the NIR. Modularity and fibre-feeding allow ANDES to be placed partly on the ELT Nasmyth platform and partly in the Coud\'e room. ANDES has a wide range of groundbreaking science cases spanning nearly all areas of research in astrophysics and even fundamental physics. Among the top science cases, there are the detection of biosignatures from exoplanet atmospheres, finding the fingerprints of the first generation of stars, tests on the stability of Nature's fundamental couplings, and the direct detection of the cosmic acceleration. The ANDES project is carried forward by a large international consortium, composed of 35 Institutes from 13 countries, forming a team of almost 300 scientists and engineers which include the majority of the scientific and technical expertise in the field that can be found in ESO member states., Comment: SPIE astronomical telescope and instrumentation 2024, in press

We measure the magnetic field produced by a linear octupole formed by four magnets placed in such a way that both their magnetic moments and their quadrupole moments cancel each other. The magnetic field is measured with the magnetic sensor of a smartphone together with a suitable app, using the Android operating system. The main objective is to determine the dependence of the x-component of the magnetic field with distance and compare with the theoretical result that tells us that this dependence is a quintic decrease., Comment: 4 pages, 4 figs

In the symposium contributions we discuss research in physics education and the consequences of its results for physics teaching. The symposium presents four different aspects of physics teaching and learning, but all of them have research-based problem analysis in common. The problems analysed cover different aspects of the physics teaching-learning process. Innovative aspects such as the effect on learning of the integration of engineering projects in the science teaching process, the influence on the learning process of conceptions about science and attitudes, and aspects related to teaching contents and students' learning difficulties. Its conclusions are not merely intuitive proposals based on teaching experience, but on a careful planning of data collection, analysis of results and empirical basis, Comment: Symposium Organized by GTG Physics Education Research at University-PERU

Fuelled by space photometry, asteroseismology is vastly benefitting the study of cool main-sequence stars, which exhibit convection-driven solar-like oscillations. Even so, the tiny oscillation amplitudes in K dwarfs continue to pose a challenge to space-based asteroseismology. A viable alternative is offered by the lower stellar noise over the oscillation timescales in Doppler observations. In this letter we present the definite detection of solar-like oscillations in the bright K5 dwarf $\epsilon$ Indi based on time-intensive observations collected with the ESPRESSO spectrograph at the VLT, thus making it the coolest seismic dwarf ever observed. We measured the frequencies of a total of 19 modes of degree $\ell=0$--2 along with $\nu_{\rm max}=5305\pm176\:{\rm \mu Hz}$ and $\Delta\nu=201.25\pm0.16\:{\rm \mu Hz}$. The peak amplitude of radial modes is $2.6\pm0.5\:{\rm cm\,s^{-1}}$, or a mere ${\sim} 14\%$ of the solar value. Measured mode amplitudes are ${\sim} 2$ times lower than predicted from a nominal $L/M$ scaling relation and favour a scaling closer to $(L/M)^{1.5}$ below ${\sim} 5500\:{\rm K}$, carrying important implications for our understanding of the coupling efficiency between pulsations and near-surface convection in K dwarfs. This detection conclusively shows that precise asteroseismology of cool dwarfs is possible down to at least the mid-K regime using next-generation spectrographs on large-aperture telescopes, effectively opening up a new domain in observational asteroseismology., Comment: Accepted for publication in Astronomy & Astrophysics Letters

The transition between convective and radiative stellar regions is still not fully understood. The sharp variations in sound speed located in these transition regions give rise to a signature in specific seismic indicators, opening the possibility to constrain the physics of convection to radiation transition. Among those seismic indicators, the ratios of the small to large frequency separation for $l=0$ and $1$ modes ($r_{010}$) were shown to be particularly efficient to probe these transition regions. Interestingly, in the Kepler Legacy F-type stars, the oscillatory signatures left in the $r_{010}$ ratios by the sharp sound-speed variation have unexpected large amplitudes that still need to be explained. We show that the signature of the bottom of the convective envelope is amplified in the ratios $r_{010}$ by the frequency dependence of the amplitude compared to the signal seen in the frequencies themselves or the second differences. We find that among the different options of physical input investigated here, large amplitude signatures can only be obtained when convective penetration of the surface convective zone into the underlying radiative region is taken into account. In this case and even for amplitudes as large as those observed in F-type stars, the oscillating signature in the ratios can only be detected when the convective envelope is deep enough. This deep extension of the convective envelope causes doubt that the origin of the large amplitudes is due to penetrative convection as it is modelled here or implies that current stellar modelling (without penetrative convection) leads to an underestimation of the size of convective envelopes. In any case, studying the glitch signatures of a large number of oscillating F-type stars opens the possibility to constrain the physics of the stellar interior in these regions., Comment: 19 pages, 12 figures, accepted for publication in A&A

The Gaia-ESO Public Spectroscopic Survey is an ambitious project designed to obtain astrophysical parameters and elemental abundances for 100,000 stars, including large representative samples of the stellar populations in the Galaxy, and a well-defined sample of 60 (plus 20 archive) open clusters. We provide internally consistent results calibrated on benchmark stars and star clusters, extending across a very wide range of abundances and ages. This provides a legacy data set of intrinsic value, and equally a large wide-ranging dataset that is of value for homogenisation of other and future stellar surveys and Gaia's astrophysical parameters. This article provides an overview of the survey methodology, the scientific aims, and the implementation, including a description of the data processing for the GIRAFFE spectra. A companion paper (arXiv:2206.02901) introduces the survey results. Gaia-ESO aspires to quantify both random and systematic contributions to measurement uncertainties. Thus all available spectroscopic analysis techniques are utilised, each spectrum being analysed by up to several different analysis pipelines, with considerable effort being made to homogenise and calibrate the resulting parameters. We describe here the sequence of activities up to delivery of processed data products to the ESO Science Archive Facility for open use. The Gaia-ESO Survey obtained 202,000 spectra of 115,000 stars using 340 allocated VLT nights between December 2011 and January 2018 from GIRAFFE and UVES. The full consistently reduced final data set of spectra was released through the ESO Science Archive Facility in late 2020, with the full astrophysical parameters sets following in 2022., Comment: 38 pages. A&A in press

In the last 15 years different ground-based spectroscopic surveys have been started (and completed) with the general aim of delivering stellar parameters and elemental abundances for large samples of Galactic stars, complementing Gaia astrometry. Among those surveys, the Gaia-ESO Public Spectroscopic Survey (GES), the only one performed on a 8m class telescope, was designed to target 100,000 stars using FLAMES on the ESO VLT (both Giraffe and UVES spectrographs), covering all the Milky Way populations, with a special focus on open star clusters. This article provides an overview of the survey implementation (observations, data quality, analysis and its success, data products, and releases), of the open cluster survey, of the science results and potential, and of the survey legacy. A companion article (Gilmore et al.) reviews the overall survey motivation, strategy, Giraffe pipeline data reduction, organisation, and workflow. The GES has determined homogeneous good-quality radial velocities and stellar parameters for a large fraction of its more than 110,000 unique target stars. Elemental abundances were derived for up to 31 elements for targets observed with UVES. Lithium abundances are delivered for about 1/3 of the sample. The analysis and homogenisation strategies have proven to be successful; several science topics have been addressed by the Gaia-ESO consortium and the community, with many highlight results achieved. The final catalogue has been released through the ESO archive at the end of May 2022, including the complete set of advanced data products. In addition to these results, the Gaia-ESO Survey will leave a very important legacy, for several aspects and for many years to come., Comment: Accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysics. 30 pages, 30 figures, 4 tables

Asteroseismology is a powerful tool to infer fundamental stellar properties. The use of these asteroseismic-inferred properties in a growing number of astrophysical contexts makes it vital to understand their accuracy. Consequently, we performed a hare-and-hounds exercise where the hares simulated data for 6 artificial main-sequence stars and the hounds inferred their properties based on different inference procedures. To mimic a pipeline such as that planned for the PLATO mission, all hounds used the same model grid. Some stars were simulated using the physics adopted in the grid, others a different one. The maximum relative differences found (in absolute value) between the inferred and true values of the mass, radius, and age were 4.32 per cent, 1.33 per cent, and 11.25 per cent, respectively. The largest systematic differences in radius and age were found for a star simulated assuming gravitational settling, not accounted for in the model grid, with biases of -0.88 per cent (radius) and 8.66 per cent (age). For the mass, the most significant bias (-3.16 per cent) was found for a star with a helium enrichment ratio outside the grid range. Moreover, a ~7 per cent dispersion in age was found when adopting different prescriptions for the surface corrections or shifting the classical observations by $\pm 1\sigma$. The choice of the relative weight given to the classical and seismic constraints also impacted significantly the accuracy and precision of the results. Interestingly, only a few frequencies were required to achieve accurate results on the mass and radius. For the age the same was true when at least one $l=2$ mode was considered., Comment: Accepted for publication in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society

Aims. The catalog of Stars With ExoplanETs (SWEET-Cat) was originally introduced in 2013. Since then many more exoplanets have been confirmed, increasing significantly the number of host stars listed there. A crucial step toward a comprehensive understanding of these new worlds is the precise and homogeneous characterization of their host stars. Better spectroscopic stellar parameters along with new results from Gaia eDR3 provide updated and precise parameters for the discovered planets. A new version of the catalog, whose homogeneity in the derivation of the parameters is key to unraveling star-planet connections, is available to the community. Methods. We made use of high-resolution spectra for planet-host stars, either observed by our team or collected through public archives. The spectroscopic stellar parameters were derived for the spectra following the same homogeneous process using ARES and MOOG (ARES+MOOG) as for the previous SWEET-Cat releases. We re-derived parameters for the stars in the catalog using better quality spectra and/or using the most recent versions of the codes. Moreover, the new SWEET-Cat table can now be more easily combined with the planet properties listed both at the Extrasolar Planets Encyclopedia and at the NASA exoplanet archive to perform statistical analyses of exoplanets. We also made use of the recent GAIA eDR3 parallaxes and respective photometry to derive consistent and accurate surface gravity values for the host stars. Results. We increased the number of stars with homogeneous parameters by more than 40\% (from 645 to 928). We reviewed and updated the metallicity distributions of stars hosting planets with different mass regimes comparing the low-mass planets (< 30M$_{\oplus}$) with the high-mass planets. The new data strengthen previous results showing the possible trend in the metallicity-period-mass diagram for low-mass planets., Comment: 14 pages, 10 figures, accepted for A&A

Digital agriculture has evolved significantly over the last few years due to the technological developments in automation and computational intelligence applied to the agricultural sector, including vineyards which are a relevant crop in the Mediterranean region. In this work, a study is presented of semantic segmentation for vine detection in real-world vineyards by exploring state-of-the-art deep segmentation networks and conventional unsupervised methods. Camera data have been collected on vineyards using an Unmanned Aerial System (UAS) equipped with a dual imaging sensor payload, namely a high-definition RGB camera and a five-band multispectral and thermal camera. Extensive experiments using deep-segmentation networks and unsupervised methods have been performed on multimodal datasets representing four distinct vineyards located in the central region of Portugal. The reported results indicate that SegNet, U-Net, and ModSegNet have equivalent overall performance in vine segmentation. The results also show that multimodality slightly improves the performance of vine segmentation, but the NIR spectrum alone generally is sufficient on most of the datasets. Furthermore, results suggest that high-definition RGB images produce equivalent or higher performance than any lower resolution multispectral band combination. Lastly, Deep Learning (DL) networks have higher overall performance than classical methods. The code and dataset are publicly available at https://github.com/Cybonic/DL_vineyard_segmentation_study.git, Comment: Accepted in Computer and Electronics in Agriculture journal

ESPRESSO is the new high-resolution spectrograph of ESO's Very-Large Telescope (VLT). It was designed for ultra-high radial-velocity precision and extreme spectral fidelity with the aim of performing exoplanet research and fundamental astrophysical experiments with unprecedented precision and accuracy. It is able to observe with any of the four Unit Telescopes (UT) of the VLT at a spectral resolving power of 140,000 or 190,000 over the 378.2 to 788.7 nm wavelength range, or with all UTs together, turning the VLT into a 16-m diameter equivalent telescope in terms of collecting area, while still providing a resolving power of 70,000. We provide a general description of the ESPRESSO instrument, report on the actual on-sky performance, and present our Guaranteed-Time Observation (GTO) program with its first results. ESPRESSO was installed on the Paranal Observatory in fall 2017. Commissioning (on-sky testing) was conducted between December 2017 and September 2018. The instrument saw its official start of operations on October 1st, 2018, but improvements to the instrument and re-commissioning runs were conducted until July 2019. The measured overall optical throughput of ESPRESSO at 550 nm and a seeing of 0.65 arcsec exceeds the 10% mark under nominal astro-climatic conditions. We demonstrate a radial-velocity precision of better than 25 cm/s during one night and 50 cm/s over several months. These values being limited by photon noise and stellar jitter show that the performanceis compatible with an instrumental precision of 10 cm/s. No difference has been measured across the UTs neither in throughput nor RV precision. The combination of the large collecting telescope area with the efficiency and the exquisite spectral fidelity of ESPRESSO opens a new parameter space in RV measurements, the study of planetary atmospheres, fundamental constants, stellar characterisation and many other fields., Comment: 26 pages, 28 figures

The bright star $\pi$ Men was chosen as the first target for a radial velocity follow-up to test the performance of ESPRESSO, the new high-resolution spectrograph at the ESO's Very-Large Telescope (VLT). The star hosts a multi-planet system (a transiting 4 M$_\oplus$ planet at $\sim$0.07 au, and a sub-stellar companion on a $\sim$2100-day eccentric orbit) which is particularly appealing for a precise multi-technique characterization. With the new ESPRESSO observations, that cover a time span of 200 days, we aim to improve the precision and accuracy of the planet parameters and search for additional low-mass companions. We also take advantage of new photometric transits of $\pi$ Men c observed by TESS over a time span that overlaps with that of the ESPRESSO follow-up campaign. We analyse the enlarged spectroscopic and photometric datasets and compare the results to those in the literature. We further characterize the system by means of absolute astrometry with Hipparcos and Gaia. We used the spectra of ESPRESSO for an independent determination of the stellar fundamental parameters. We present a precise characterization of the planetary system around $\pi$ Men. The ESPRESSO radial velocities alone (with typical uncertainty of 10 cm/s) allow for a precise retrieval of the Doppler signal induced by $\pi$ Men c. The residuals show an RMS of 1.2 m/s, and we can exclude companions with a minimum mass less than $\sim$2 M$_\oplus$ within the orbit of $\pi$ Men c). We improve the ephemeris of $\pi$ Men c using 18 additional TESS transits, and in combination with the astrometric measurements, we determine the inclination of the orbital plane of $\pi$ Men b with high precision ($i_{b}=45.8^{+1.4}_{-1.1}$ deg). This leads to the precise measurement of its absolute mass $m_{b}=14.1^{+0.5}_{-0.4}$ M$_{Jup}$, and shows that the planetary orbital planes are highly misaligned., Comment: Accepted for publication on A&A

We characterized the transiting planetary system orbiting the G2V star K2-38 using the new-generation echelle spectrograph ESPRESSO. We carried out a photometric analysis of the available K2 photometric light curve of this star to measure the radius of its two known planets. Using 43 ESPRESSO high-precision radial velocity measurements taken over the course of 8 months along with the 14 previously published HIRES RV measurements, we modeled the orbits of the two planets through a MCMC analysis, significantly improving their mass measurements. Using ESPRESSO spectra, we derived the stellar parameters, $T_{\rm eff}$=5731$\pm$66, $\log g$=4.38$\pm$0.11~dex, and $[Fe/H]$=0.26$\pm$0.05~dex, and thus the mass and radius of K2-38, $M_{\star}$=1.03 $^{+0.04}_{-0.02}$~M$_{\oplus}$ and $R_{\star}$=1.06 $^{+0.09}_{-0.06}$~R$_{\oplus}$. We determine new values for the planetary properties of both planets. We characterize K2-38b as a super-Earth with $R_{\rm P}$=1.54$\pm$0.14~R$_{\rm \oplus}$ and $M_{\rm p}$=7.3$^{+1.1}_{-1.0}$~M$_{\oplus}$, and K2-38c as a sub-Neptune with $R_{\rm P}$=2.29$\pm$0.26~R$_{\rm \oplus}$ and $M_{\rm p}$=8.3$^{+1.3}_{-1.3}$~M$_{\oplus}$. We derived a mean density of $\rho_{\rm p}$=11.0$^{+4.1}_{-2.8}$~g cm$^{-3}$ for K2-38b and $\rho_{\rm p}$=3.8$^{+1.8}_{-1.1}$~g~cm$^{-3}$ for K2-38c, confirming K2-38b as one of the densest planets known to date. The best description for the composition of K2-38b comes from an iron-rich Mercury-like model, while K2-38c is better described by a rocky model with a H2 envelope. The maximum collision stripping boundary shows how giant impacts could be the cause for the high density of K2-38b. The irradiation received by each planet places them on opposite sides of the radius valley. We find evidence of a long-period signal in the radial velocity time-series whose origin could be linked to a 0.25-3~M$_{\rm J}$ planet or stellar activity., Comment: 16 pages, 14 figures

We aim to confirm the presence of Proxima b using independent measurements obtained with the new ESPRESSO spectrograph, and refine the planetary parameters taking advantage of its improved precision. We analysed 63 spectroscopic ESPRESSO observations of Proxima taken during 2019. We obtained radial velocity measurements with a typical radial velocity photon noise of 26 cm/s. We ran a joint MCMC analysis on the time series of the radial velocity and full-width half maximum of the cross-correlation function to model the planetary and stellar signals present in the data, applying Gaussian process regression to deal with stellar activity. We confirm the presence of Proxima b independently in the ESPRESSO data. The ESPRESSO data on its own shows Proxima b at a period of 11.218 $\pm$ 0.029 days, with a minimum mass of 1.29 $\pm$ 0.13 Me. In the combined dataset we measure a period of 11.18427 $\pm$ 0.00070 days with a minimum mass of 1.173 $\pm$ 0.086 Me. We find no evidence of stellar activity as a potential cause for the 11.2 days signal. We find some evidence for the presence of a second short-period signal, at 5.15 days with a semi-amplitude of merely 40 cm/s. If caused by a planetary companion, it would correspond to a minimum mass of 0.29 $\pm$ 0.08 Me. We find that the FWHM of the CCF can be used as a proxy for the brightness changes and that its gradient with time can be used to successfully detrend the radial velocity data from part of the influence of stellar activity. The activity-induced radial velocity signal in the ESPRESSO data shows a trend in amplitude towards redder wavelengths. Velocities measured using the red end of the spectrograph are less affected by activity, suggesting that the stellar activity is spot-dominated. The data collected excludes the presence of extra companions with masses above 0.6 Me at periods shorter than 50 days., Comment: 25 pages, 26 figures

Aims. We report on ESPRESSO high-resolution transmission spectroscopic observations of two primary transits of the highly-irradiated, ultra-hot Jupiter-size planet WASP-76b. We investigate the presence of several key atomic and molecular features of interest that may reveal the atmospheric properties of the planet. Methods. We extracted two transmission spectra of WASP-76b with R approx 140,000 using a procedure that allowed us to process the full ESPRESSO wavelength range (3800-7880 A) simultaneously. We observed that at a high signal-to-noise ratio, the continuum of ESPRESSO spectra shows wiggles that are likely caused by an interference pattern outside the spectrograph. To search for the planetary features, we visually analysed the extracted transmission spectra and cross-correlated the observations against theoretical spectra of different atomic and molecular species. Results. The following atomic features are detected: Li I, Na I, Mg I, Ca II, Mn I, K I, and Fe I. All are detected with a confidence level between 9.2 sigma (Na I) and 2.8 sigma (Mg I). We did not detect the following species: Ti I, Cr I, Ni I, TiO, VO, and ZrO. We impose the following 1 sigma upper limits on their detectability: 60, 77, 122, 6, 8, and 8 ppm, respectively. Conclusions. We report the detection of Li I on WASP-76b for the first time. In addition, we found the presence of Na I and Fe I as previously reported in the literature. We show that the procedure employed in this work can detect features down to the level of ~ 0.1 % in the transmission spectrum and ~ 10 ppm by means of a cross-correlation method. We discuss the presence of neutral and singly ionised features in the atmosphere of WASP-76b., Comment: 20 pages, 19 figures, accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysics

We obtain a travelling-wave solution of a generalised nonlinear Schr\"odinger equation with an additional term of the form $\Gamma(\psi(x,t)) = \lambda \psi(x,t)^q$, where $\lambda$ and $q$ are real constants. Moreover, we show that the density of energy of the system for the travelling-wave solution presents a Lorentzian solitary wave behaviour., Comment: 9 pages. To appear in Physics Letters A

We present the first asteroseismic results for $\delta$ Scuti and $\gamma$ Doradus stars observed in Sectors 1 and 2 of the TESS mission. We utilise the 2-min cadence TESS data for a sample of 117 stars to classify their behaviour regarding variability and place them in the Hertzsprung-Russell diagram using Gaia DR2 data. Included within our sample are the eponymous members of two pulsator classes, $\gamma$ Doradus and SX Phoenicis. Our sample of pulsating intermediate-mass stars observed by TESS also allows us to confront theoretical models of pulsation driving in the classical instability strip for the first time and show that mixing processes in the outer envelope play an important role. We derive an empirical estimate of 74% for the relative amplitude suppression factor as a result of the redder TESS passband compared to the Kepler mission using a pulsating eclipsing binary system. Furthermore, our sample contains many high-frequency pulsators, allowing us to probe the frequency variability of hot young $\delta$ Scuti stars, which were lacking in the Kepler mission data set, and identify promising targets for future asteroseismic modelling. The TESS data also allow us to refine the stellar parameters of SX Phoenicis, which is believed to be a blue straggler., Comment: 33 pages (incl. appendix), accepted for publications in MNRAS

We present the first results from the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) on the rotational and pulsational variability of magnetic chemically peculiar A-type stars. We analyse TESS 2-min cadence data from sectors 1 and 2 on a sample of 83 stars. Five new rapidly oscillating Ap (roAp) stars are announced. One of these pulsates with periods around 4.7 min, making it the shortest period roAp star known to date. Four out of the five new roAp stars are multiperiodic. Three of these, and the singly-periodic one show the presence of rotational mode splitting. Individual frequencies are provided in all cases. In addition, seven previously known roAp stars are analysed. Additional modes of oscillation are found in some stars, while in others we are able to distinguish the true pulsations from possible aliases present in the ground-based data. We find that the pulsation amplitude in the TESS filter is typically a factor 6 smaller than that in the $B$ filter which is usually used for ground-based observations. For four roAp stars we set constraints on the inclination angle and magnetic obliquity, through the application of the oblique pulsator model. We also confirm the absence of roAp-type pulsations down to amplitude limits of 6 and 13 micromag, respectively, in two of the best characterised non-oscillating Ap (noAp) stars. We announce 27 new rotational variables along with their rotation periods, and provide different rotation periods for seven other stars. Finally, we discuss how these results challenge state-of-the-art pulsation models for roAp stars., Comment: 29 pages, accepted for publication in the MNRAS

The VVV survey has allowed for an unprecedented number of multi-epoch observations of the southern Galactic plane. In a recent paper,13 massive young stellar objects(MYSOs) have already been identified within the highly variable(\Delta Ks > 1 mag) YSO sample of another published work.This study aims to understand the general nature of variability in MYSOs.We present the first systematic study of variability in a large sample of candidate MYSOs.We examined the data for variability of the putative driving sources of all known Spitzer EGOs and bright 24 \mu m sources coinciding with the peak of 870 \mu m detected ATLASGAL clumps, a total of 718 targets. Of these, 190 point sources (139 EGOs and 51 non-EGOs) displayed variability (IQR > 0.05, \Delta Ks > 0.15 mag). Light-curves(LCs) have been sub-classified into eruptive, dipper, fader, short-term-variable and long-period variable-YSO categories.Lomb-Scargle periodogram analysis of periodic LCs was carried out. 1 - 870 \mu m spectral energy distributions of the variable sources were fitted with YSO models to obtain representative properties. 41% of the variable sources are represented by > 4Msun objects, and only 6% by > 8Msun objects.The highest-mass objects are mostly non-EGOs,deeply embedded.By placing them on the HR diagram we show that most lower mass,EGO type objects are concentrated on the putative birth-line position, while the luminous non-EGO type objects group around the ZAMS track.Some of the most luminous far infrared sources in the massive clumps and infrared quiet driving sources of EGOs have been missed out by this study owing to an uniform sample selection method.A high rate of detectable variability in EGO targets (139 out of 153 searched) implies that near-infrared variability in MYSOs is closely linked to the accretion phenomenon and outflow activity., Comment: 60 pages, 47 figures. Accepted for publication in Astronomy and Astrophysics

Understanding the physical process responsible for the transport of energy in the core of $\alpha$ Centauri A is of the utmost importance if this star is to be used in the calibration of stellar model physics. Adoption of different parallax measurements available in the literature results in differences in the interferometric radius constraints used in stellar modelling. Further, this is at the origin of the different dynamical mass measurements reported for this star. With the goal of reproducing the revised dynamical mass derived by Pourbaix & Boffin, we modelled the star using two stellar grids varying in the adopted nuclear reaction rates. Asteroseismic and spectroscopic observables were complemented with different interferometric radius constraints during the optimisation procedure. Our findings show that best-fit models reproducing the revised dynamical mass favour the existence of a convective core ($\gtrsim$ 70% of best-fit models), a result that is robust against changes to the model physics. If this mass is accurate, then $\alpha$ Centauri A may be used to calibrate stellar model parameters in the presence of a convective core., Comment: 6 pages, 2 figures, 4 tables. Accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Letters

Asteroseismic forward modelling techniques are being used to determine fundamental properties (e.g. mass, radius, and age) of solar-type stars. The need to take into account all possible sources of error is of paramount importance towards a robust determination of stellar properties. We present a study of 34 solar-type stars for which high signal-to-noise asteroseismic data is available from multi-year Kepler photometry. We explore the internal systematics on the stellar properties, that is, associated with the uncertainty in the input physics used to construct the stellar models. In particular, we explore the systematics arising from: (i) the inclusion of the diffusion of helium and heavy elements; and (ii) the uncertainty in solar metallicity mixture. We also assess the systematics arising from (iii) different surface correction methods used in optimisation/fitting procedures. The systematics arising from comparing results of models with and without diffusion are found to be 0.5%, 0.8%, 2.1%, and 16% in mean density, radius, mass, and age, respectively. The internal systematics in age are significantly larger than the statistical uncertainties. We find the internal systematics resulting from the uncertainty in solar metallicity mixture to be 0.7% in mean density, 0.5% in radius, 1.4% in mass, and 6.7% in age. The surface correction method by Sonoi et al. and Ball & Gizon's two-term correction produce the lowest internal systematics among the different correction methods, namely, ~1%, ~1%, ~2%, and ~8% in mean density, radius, mass, and age, respectively. Stellar masses obtained using the surface correction methods by Kjeldsen et al. and Ball & Gizon's one-term correction are systematically higher than those obtained using frequency ratios., Comment: 13 pages, 10 figures, 4 tables. Accepted for publication in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society Journal

The increased amount of high precision seismic data for solar-like stars calls for the existence of tools that can extract information from such data. In the case of the study of acoustic glitches there are no publicly available tools and most existing ones require a deep knowledge of their implementation. In this work a tool is presented that aims to both simplify the interaction with the user and also be capable of working automatically to determine properties of acoustic glitches from seismic data of solar-like stars. This tool is shown to work with both the Sun and other solar analogs but also shows that are still severe limitations to the methods used, when considering smaller datasets., Comment: 4 pages; 5 figures; Submitted to the Proceedings of the joint TASC2/KASC9 workshop - SPACEINN & HELAS8 conference 2016

The detection and analysis of oscillations in binary star systems is critical in understanding stellar structure and evolution. This is partly because such systems have the same initial chemical composition and age. Solar-like oscillations have been detected by Kepler in both components of the asteroseismic binary HD 176465. We present an independent modelling of each star in this binary system. Stellar models generated using MESA (Modules for Experiments in Stellar Astrophysics) were fitted to both the observed individual frequencies and complementary spectroscopic parameters. The individual theoretical oscillation frequencies for the corresponding stellar models were obtained using GYRE as the pulsation code. A Bayesian approach was applied to find the probability distribution functions of the stellar parameters using AIMS (Asteroseismic Inference on a Massive Scale) as the optimisation code. The ages of HD 176465 A and HD 176465 B were found to be 2.81 $\pm$ 0.48 Gyr and 2.52 $\pm$ 0.80 Gyr, respectively. These results are in agreement when compared to previous studies carried out using other asteroseismic modelling techniques and gyrochronology.

We created a large database of physical parameters and variability indicators by fully reducing and analysing the large number of spectra taken to complement the asteroseismic observations of the CoRoT satellite. 7103 spectra of 261 stars obtained with the ESO echelle spectrograph HARPS have been stored in the VO-compliant database Spectroscopic Indicators in a SeisMic Archive (SISMA), along with the CoRoT photometric data of the 72 CoRoT asteroseismic targets. The remaining stars belong to the same variable classes of the CoRoT targets and were observed to better characterize the properties of such classes. Several useful variability indicators (mean line profiles; indices of differential rotation, activity and emission lines) together with vsini and radial velocity measurements have been extracted from the spectra. The atmospheric parameters Teff, logg and [Fe/H] have been computed following a homogeneous procedure. As a result, we fully characterize a sample of new and known variable stars by computing several spectroscopic indicators, also providing some cases of simultaneous photometry and spectroscopy., Comment: 11 pages, 8 figures Accepted for publication in the Astronomical Journal

The first generation of E-ELT instruments will include an optical-infrared High Resolution Spectrograph, conventionally indicated as EELT-HIRES, which will be capable of providing unique breakthroughs in the fields of exoplanets, star and planet formation, physics and evolution of stars and galaxies, cosmology and fundamental physics. A 2-year long phase A study for EELT-HIRES has just started and will be performed by a consortium composed of institutes and organisations from Brazil, Chile, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Poland, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland and United Kingdom. In this paper we describe the science goals and the preliminary technical concept for EELT-HIRES which will be developed during the phase A, as well as its planned development and consortium organisation during the study., Comment: 12 pages, in Ground-based and Airborne Instrumentation for Astronomy VI, 2016, Proc. SPIE 9908, 23

The ever-growing number of large spectroscopic survey programs has increased the importance of fast and reliable methods with which to determine precise stellar parameters. Some of these methods are highly dependent on correct spectroscopic calibrations. The goal of this work is to obtain a new spectroscopic calibration for a fast estimate of Teff and [Fe/H] for a wide range of stellar spectral types. We used spectra from a joint sample of 708 stars, compiled from 451 FGK dwarfs and 257 GK-giant stars. We used homogeneously determined spectroscopic stellar parameters to derive temperature calibrations using a set of selected EW line-ratios, and [Fe/H] calibrations using a set of selected FeI lines. We have derived 322 EW line-ratios and 100 FeI lines that can be used to compute Teff and [Fe/H], respectively. We show that these calibrations are effective for FGK dwarfs and GK-giant stars in the following ranges: 4500 K < Teff < 6500 K , 2.5 < logg < 4.9 dex, and -0.8 < [Fe/H] < 0.5 dex. The new calibration has a standard deviation of 74 K for Teff and 0.07 dex for [Fe/H]. We use four independent samples of stars to test and verify the new calibration, a sample of 56 giant stars, a sample composed of Gaia FGK benchmark stars, a sample of 36 GK-giant stars of the DR1 of the Gaia-ESO survey, and a sample of 582 FGK-dwarf stars. We also provide a new computer code, GeTCal, for automatically producing new calibration files based on any new sample of stars., Comment: Accepted by A&A for publication, 8 pages, 9 figures

We analyze a general family of position-dependent mass quantum Hamiltonians which are not self-adjoint and include, as particular cases, some Hamiltonians obtained in phenomenological approaches to condensed matter physics. We build a general family of self-adjoint Hamiltonians which are quantum mechanically equivalent to the non self-adjoint proposed ones. Inspired in the probability density of the problem, we construct an ansatz for the solutions of the family of self-adjoint Hamiltonians. We use this ansatz to map the solutions of the time independent Schrodinger equations generated by the non self-adjoint Hamiltonians into the Hilbert space of the solutions of the respective dual self-adjoint Hamiltonians. This mapping depends on both the position-dependent mass and on a function of position satisfying a condition that assures the existence of a consistent continuity equation. We identify the non self-adjoint Hamiltonians here studied to a very general family of Hamiltonians proposed in a seminal article of Harrison [1] to describe varying band structures in different types of metals. Therefore, we have self-adjoint Hamiltonians that correspond to the non self-adjoint ones found in Harrison's article. We analyze three typical cases by choosing a physical position-dependent mass and a deformed harmonic oscillator potential . We completely solve the Schrodinger equations for the three cases; we also find and compare their respective energy levels., Comment: 21 pages, 1 figure, accepted for publication in Journal of Physics A

During the last decades, the global prevalence of dengue progressed dramatically. It is a disease that is now endemic in more than one hundred countries of Africa, America, Asia, and the Western Pacific. In this paper, we present a mathematical model for the dengue disease transmission described by a system of ordinary differential equations and propose a multiobjective approach to find the most effective ways of controlling the disease. We use evolutionary multiobjective optimization (EMO) algorithms to solve the resulting optimization problem, providing the performance comparison of different algorithms. The obtained results show that the multiobjective approach is an effective tool to solve the problem, giving higher quality and wider range of solutions compared to the traditional technique. The obtained trade-offs provide a valuable information about the dynamics of infection transmissions and can be used as an input in the process of planning the intervention measures by the health authorities. Additionally, a suggested hybrid EMO algorithm produces highly superior performance compared to five other state-of-the-art EMO algorithms, being indispensable to efficiently optimize the proposed model., Comment: This is a preprint of a paper whose final and definite form will be published in Journal of Mathematical Analysis, ISSN: 2217-3412, Volume 7, Issue 1 (2016). Submitted May 20, 2015. Revised and Accepted Dec 02, 2015

This paper deals with fractional differential equations, with dependence on a Caputo fractional derivative of real order. The goal is to show, based on concrete examples and experimental data from several experiments, that fractional differential equations may model more efficiently certain problems than ordinary differential equations. A numerical optimization approach based on least squares approximation is used to determine the order of the fractional operator that better describes real data, as well as other related parameters., Comment: This is a preprint. The final form will appear in Mathematical Methods in the Applied Sciences

Mathematical Program with Complementarity Constraints (MPCC) plays a very important role in many fields such as engineering design, economic equilibrium, multilevel game, and mathematical programming theory itself. In theory its constraints fail to satisfy a standard constraint qualification such as the linear independence constraint qualification (LICQ) or the Mangasarian-Fromovitz constraint qualification (MFCQ) at any feasible point. As a result, the developed nonlinear programming theory may not be applied to MPCC class directly. Nowadays, a natural and popular approach is try to find some suitable approximations of an MPCC so that it can be solved by solving a sequence of nonlinear programs. This work aims to solve the MPCC using nonlinear programming techniques, namely the SQP and the regularization scheme. Some algorithms with two iterative processes, the inner and the external, were developed. A set of AMPL problems from MacMPEC database \cite{MacMPEC} were tested. The algorithms performance comparative analysis was carried out., Comment: This is a preprint of a paper whose final and definite form is in Journal of Computational and Applied Mathematics

The first outbreak of dengue occurred in Madeira Island on 2012, featuring one virus serotype. Aedes aegypti was the vector of the disease and it is unlikely that it will be eliminated from the island. Therefore, a new outbreak of dengue fever can occur and, if it happens, risk to the population increases if two serotypes coexist. In this paper, mathematical modeling and numerical simulations are carried out to forecast what may happen in Madeira Island in such scenario., Comment: This is a preprint of a paper whose final and definite form is in 'Operations Research For Health Care', ISSN 2211-6923. Paper submitted 21/Nov/2014; revised 17/May/2015 and 07/Jul/2015; accepted for publication 14/Jul/2015

During the last decades, the global prevalence of dengue progressed dramatically. It is a disease which is now endemic in more than one hundred countries of Africa, America, Asia and the Western Pacific. This study addresses a mathematical model for the dengue disease transmission and finding the most effective ways of controlling the disease. The model is described by a system of ordinary differential equations representing human and vector dynamics. Multiobjective optimization is applied to find the optimal control strategies, considering the simultaneous minimization of infected humans and costs due to insecticide application. The obtained results show that multiobjective optimization is an effective tool for finding the optimal control. The set of trade-off solutions encompasses a whole range of optimal scenarios, providing valuable information about the dynamics of infection transmissions. The results are discussed for different values of model parameters., Comment: This is a preprint of a paper whose final and definite form is published in Statistics, Optimization & Information Computing (SOIC), ISSN 2310-5070 (online), ISSN 2311-004X (print). Paper submitted 28/April/2015; accepted, after a revision, 25/June/2015

The discovery of almost 2000 exoplanets has revealed an unexpectedly diverse planet population. Observations to date have shown that our Solar System is certainly not representative of the general population of planets in our Milky Way. The key science questions that urgently need addressing are therefore: What are exoplanets made of? Why are planets as they are? What causes the exceptional diversity observed as compared to the Solar System? EChO (Exoplanet Characterisation Observatory) has been designed as a dedicated survey mission for transit and eclipse spectroscopy capable of observing a large and diverse planet sample within its four-year mission lifetime. EChO can target the atmospheres of super-Earths, Neptune-like, and Jupiter-like planets, in the very hot to temperate zones (planet temperatures of 300K-3000K) of F to M-type host stars. Over the next ten years, several new ground- and space-based transit surveys will come on-line (e.g. NGTS, CHEOPS, TESS, PLATO), which will specifically focus on finding bright, nearby systems. The current rapid rate of discovery would allow the target list to be further optimised in the years prior to EChO's launch and enable the atmospheric characterisation of hundreds of planets. Placing the satellite at L2 provides a cold and stable thermal environment, as well as a large field of regard to allow efficient time-critical observation of targets randomly distributed over the sky. A 1m class telescope is sufficiently large to achieve the necessary spectro-photometric precision. The spectral coverage (0.5-11 micron, goal 16 micron) and SNR to be achieved by EChO, thanks to its high stability and dedicated design, would enable a very accurate measurement of the atmospheric composition and structure of hundreds of exoplanets., Comment: 50 pages, 30 figures. Experimental Astronomy

Dengue is a vector-borne disease and 40% of world population is at risk. Dengue transcends international borders and can be found in tropical and subtropical regions around the world, predominantly in urban and semi-urban areas. A model for dengue disease transmission, composed by mutually-exclusive compartments representing the human and vector dynamics, is presented in this study. The data is from Madeira, a Portuguese island, where an unprecedented outbreak was detected on October 2012. The aim of this work is to simulate the repercussions of the control measures in the fight of the disease., Comment: This is a preprint of a paper whose final and definite form will be published in the volume 'Mathematics of Planet Earth' that initiates the book series 'CIM Series in Mathematical Sciences' (CIM-MS) published by Springer. Submitted Oct/2013; Revised 16/July/2014 and 20/Sept/2014; Accepted 28/Sept/2014

Dengue is a vector-borne disease transmitted from an infected human to an Aedes mosquito, during a blood-meal. Dengue is still a major public health problem. A model for the disease transmission is presented, composed by human and mosquitoes compartments. The aim is to simulate the effects of seasonality, on the vectorial capacity and, consequently, on the disease development. Using entomological information about the mosquito behavior under different temperatures and rainfall, simulations are carried out and the repercussions analyzed. The basic reproduction number of the model is given, as well as a sensitivity analysis of model's parameters. Finally, an optimal control problem is proposed and solved, illustrating the difficulty of making a trade-off between reduction of infected individuals and costs with insecticide., Comment: Several typos detected by the authors while reading the proofs were corrected. This is a preprint of a paper whose final and definite form is published in 'Mathematical Methods in the Applied Sciences', ISSN 0170-4214 (see http://dx.doi.org/10.1002/mma.3319). Paper submitted 22/July/2014; revised 11/Sept/2014; accepted for publication 12/Sept/2014

Recently the number of main-sequence and subgiant stars exhibiting solar-like oscillations that are resolved into individual mode frequencies has increased dramatically. While only a few such data sets were available for detailed modeling just a decade ago, the Kepler mission has produced suitable observations for hundreds of new targets. This rapid expansion in observational capacity has been accompanied by a shift in analysis and modeling strategies to yield uniform sets of derived stellar properties more quickly and easily. We use previously published asteroseismic and spectroscopic data sets to provide a uniform analysis of 42 solar-type Kepler targets from the Asteroseismic Modeling Portal (AMP). We find that fitting the individual frequencies typically doubles the precision of the asteroseismic radius, mass and age compared to grid-based modeling of the global oscillation properties, and improves the precision of the radius and mass by about a factor of three over empirical scaling relations. We demonstrate the utility of the derived properties with several applications., Comment: 12 emulateapj pages, 9 figures, 1 online-only extended figure, 1 table, ApJS accepted (typo corrected in Eq.8)

Optimal Control (OC) is the process of determining control and state trajectories for a dynamic system, over a period of time, in order to optimize a given performance index. With the increasing of variables and complexity, OC problems can no longer be solved analytically and, consequently, numerical methods are required. For this purpose, direct and indirect methods are used. Direct methods consist in the discretization of the OC problem, reducing it to a nonlinear constrained optimization problem. Indirect methods are based on the Pontryagin Maximum Principle, which in turn reduces to a boundary value problem. In order to have a more reliable solution, one can solve the same problem through different approaches. Here, as an illustrative example, an epidemiological application related to the rubella disease is solved using several software packages, such as the routine ode45 of Matlab, OC-ODE, DOTcvp toolbox, IPOPT and Snopt, showing the state of the art of numerical software for OC., Comment: This is a preprint of a paper whose final and definite form will appear in the book 'Systems Theory: Perspectives, Applications and Developments', Nova Science Publishers, Editor: Francisco Miranda. Submitted 21/Sept/2013; Revised 01/Dec/2013; Accepted 22/Jan/2014

The acronym ESPRESSO stems for Echelle SPectrograph for Rocky Exoplanets and Stable Spectroscopic Observations; this instrument will be the next VLT high resolution spectrograph. The spectrograph will be installed at the Combined-Coud\'e Laboratory of the VLT and linked to the four 8.2 m Unit Telescopes (UT) through four optical Coud\'e trains. ESPRESSO will combine efficiency and extreme spectroscopic precision. ESPRESSO is foreseen to achieve a gain of two magnitudes with respect to its predecessor HARPS, and to improve the instrumental radial-velocity precision to reach the 10 cm/s level. It can be operated either with a single UT or with up to four UTs, enabling an additional gain in the latter mode. The incoherent combination of four telescopes and the extreme precision requirements called for many innovative design solutions while ensuring the technical heritage of the successful HARPS experience. ESPRESSO will allow to explore new frontiers in most domains of astrophysics that require precision and sensitivity. The main scientific drivers are the search and characterization of rocky exoplanets in the habitable zone of quiet, nearby G to M-dwarfs and the analysis of the variability of fundamental physical constants. The project passed the final design review in May 2013 and entered the manufacturing phase. ESPRESSO will be installed at the Paranal Observatory in 2016 and its operation is planned to start by the end of the same year., Comment: 12 pages, figures included, accepted for publication in Astron. Nachr

For the very best and brightest asteroseismic solar-type targets observed by Kepler, the frequency precision is sufficient to determine the acoustic depths of the surface convective layer and the helium ionization zone. Such sharp features inside the acoustic cavity of the star, which we call acoustic glitches, create small oscillatory deviations from the uniform spacing of frequencies in a sequence of oscillation modes with the same spherical harmonic degree. We use these oscillatory signals to determine the acoustic locations of such features in 19 solar-type stars observed by the Kepler mission. Four independent groups of researchers utilized the oscillation frequencies themselves, the second differences of the frequencies and the ratio of the small and large separation to locate the base of the convection zone and the second helium ionization zone. Despite the significantly different methods of analysis, good agreement was found between the results of these four groups, barring a few cases. These results also agree reasonably well with the locations of these layers in representative models of the stars. These results firmly establish the presence of the oscillatory signals in the asteroseismic data and the viability of several techniques to determine the location of acoustic glitches inside stars., Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJ

As the development of a dengue vaccine is ongoing, we simulate an hypothetical vaccine as an extra protection to the population. In a first phase, the vaccination process is studied as a new compartment in the model, and different ways of distributing the vaccines investigated: pediatric and random mass vaccines, with distinct levels of efficacy and durability. In a second step, the vaccination is seen as a control variable in the epidemiological process. In both cases, epidemic and endemic scenarios are included in order to analyze distinct outbreak realities., Comment: To appear in Mathematical Biosciences. Submitted 8-Nov-2012; revised 21-May-2013; accepted 16-Oct-2013

We use asteroseismic data obtained by the NASA Kepler Mission to estimate the fundamental properties of more than 500 main-sequence and sub-giant stars. Data obtained during the first 10 months of Kepler science operations were used for this work, when these solar-type targets were observed for one month each in a survey mode. Stellar properties have been estimated using two global asteroseismic parameters and complementary photometric and spectroscopic data. Homogeneous sets of effective temperatures were available for the entire ensemble from complementary photometry; spectroscopic estimates of T_eff and [Fe/H] were available from a homogeneous analysis of ground-based data on a subset of 87 stars. [Abbreviated version... see paper for full abstract.], Comment: Accepted for publication in ApJS; 90 pages, 22 figures, 6 tables. Units on rho in tables now listed correctly as rho(Sun)

PLATO 2.0 has recently been selected for ESA's M3 launch opportunity (2022/24). Providing accurate key planet parameters (radius, mass, density and age) in statistical numbers, it addresses fundamental questions such as: How do planetary systems form and evolve? Are there other systems with planets like ours, including potentially habitable planets? The PLATO 2.0 instrument consists of 34 small aperture telescopes (32 with 25 sec readout cadence and 2 with 2.5 sec candence) providing a wide field-of-view (2232 deg2) and a large photometric magnitude range (4-16 mag). It focusses on bright (4-11 mag) stars in wide fields to detect and characterize planets down to Earth-size by photometric transits, whose masses can then be determined by ground-based radial-velocity follow-up measurements. Asteroseismology will be performed for these bright stars to obtain highly accurate stellar parameters, including masses and ages. The combination of bright targets and asteroseismology results in high accuracy for the bulk planet parameters: 2%, 4-10% and 10% for planet radii, masses and ages, respectively. The planned baseline observing strategy includes two long pointings (2-3 years) to detect and bulk characterize planets reaching into the habitable zone (HZ) of solar-like stars and an additional step-and-stare phase to cover in total about 50% of the sky. PLATO 2.0 will observe up to 1,000,000 stars and detect and characterize hundreds of small planets, and thousands of planets in the Neptune to gas giant regime out to the HZ. It will therefore provide the first large-scale catalogue of bulk characterized planets with accurate radii, masses, mean densities and ages. This catalogue will include terrestrial planets at intermediate orbital distances, where surface temperatures are moderate. Coverage of this parameter range with statistical numbers of bulk characterized planets is unique to PLATO 2.0., Comment: 63 pages, 17 figures, submitted to Experimental Astronomy (ExA)

We comment on the potential for continuing asteroseismology of solar-type and red-giant stars in a 2-wheel Kepler Mission. Our main conclusion is that by targeting stars in the ecliptic it should be possible to perform high-quality asteroseismology, as long as favorable scenarios for 2-wheel pointing performance are met. Targeting the ecliptic would potentially facilitate unique science that was not possible in the nominal Mission, notably from the study of clusters that are significantly brighter than those in the Kepler field. Our conclusions are based on predictions of 2-wheel observations made by a space photometry simulator, with information provided by the Kepler Project used as input to describe the degraded pointing scenarios. We find that elevated levels of frequency-dependent noise, consistent with the above scenarios, would have a significant negative impact on our ability to continue asteroseismic studies of solar-like oscillators in the Kepler field. However, the situation may be much more optimistic for observations in the ecliptic, provided that pointing resets of the spacecraft during regular desaturations of the two functioning reaction wheels are accurate at the < 1 arcsec level. This would make it possible to apply a post-hoc analysis that would recover most of the lost photometric precision. Without this post-hoc correction---and the accurate re-pointing it requires---the performance would probably be as poor as in the Kepler-field case. Critical to our conclusions for both fields is the assumed level of pointing noise (in the short-term jitter and the longer-term drift). We suggest that further tests will be needed to clarify our results once more detail and data on the expected pointing performance becomes available, and we offer our assistance in this work., Comment: NASA Kepler Mission White Paper; 10 pages, 2 figures