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Solar analogues are important stars to study for understanding the properties of the Sun. Combined with seismic and spectroscopic analysis, evolutionary modelling becomes a powerful method to characterize stellar intrinsic parameters, such as mass, radius, metallicity and age. However, these characteristics, relevant for other aspects of astrophysics or exoplanetary system physics, for example, are difficult to obtain with high precision and/or accuracy. The goal of this study is to characterize the two solar analogues, HD 42618 and HD 43587, observed by CoRoT. In particular, we aim to infer their precise mass, radius and age, using evolutionary modelling constrained by spectroscopic, photometric and seismic analysis. These stars show evidence of being older than the Sun but with a relatively large lithium abundance. We present the seismic analysis of HD 42618, and the modelling of the two solar analogues, HD 42618 and HD 43587 using the cestam stellar evolution code. Models were computed to reproduce the spectroscopic (effective temperature and metallicity) and seismic (mode frequency) data, and the luminosity of the stars, based on Gaia parallaxes. We infer very similar values of mass and radius for both stars compared with the literature, within the uncertainties, and we reproduce correctly the seismic constraints. The modelling shows that HD 42618 is slightly less massive and older than the Sun, and that HD 43587 is more massive and older than the Sun, in agreement with previous results. The use of chemical clocks improves the reliability of our age estimates. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Helioseismology and asteroseismology of red giant stars have shown that distribution of angular momentum in stellar interiors, and the evolution of this distribution with time remains an open issue in stellar physics. Owing to the unprecedented quality and long baseline of Kepler photometry, we are able to seismically infer internal rotation rates in γ Doradus stars, which provide the main-sequence counterpart to the red-giants puzzle. Here, we confront these internal rotation rates to stellar evolution models which account for rotationally induced transport of angular momentum, in order to test angular momentum transport mechanisms. On the one hand, we used a stellar model-independent method developed by our team in order to obtain accurate, seismically inferred, buoyancy radii and near-core rotation for 37 γ Doradus stars observed by Kepler. We show that the stellar buoyancy radius can be used as a reliable evolution indicator for field stars on the main sequence. On the other hand, we computed rotating evolutionary models of intermediate-mass stars including internal transport of angular momentum in radiative zones, following the formalism developed in the series of papers started by Zahn (1992, A&A, 265, 115), with the CESTAM code. This code calculates the rotational history of stars from the birth line to the tip of the RGB. The initial angular momentum content has to be set initially, which is done here by fitting rotation periods in young stellar clusters. We show a clear disagreement between the near-core rotation rates measured in the sample and the rotation rates obtained from the evolutionary models including rotationally induced transport of angular momentum following Zahn's prescriptions. These results show a disagreement similar to that of the Sun and red giant stars in the considered mass range. This suggests the existence of missing mechanisms responsible for the braking of the core before and along the main sequence. The efficiency of the missing mechanisms is investigated. The transport of angular momentum as formalized by Zahn and Maeder cannot explain the measurements of near-core rotation in main-sequence intermediate-mass stars we have at hand. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Context. The NASA Kepler space telescope has detected solar-like oscillations in several hundreds of single stars, thereby providing a way to determine precise stellar parameters using asteroseismology. Aims. In this work, we aim to derive the fundamental parameters of a close triple star system, HD 188753, for which asteroseismic and astrometric observations allow independent measurements of stellar masses. Methods. We used six months of Kepler photometry available for HD 188753 to detect the oscillation envelopes of the two brightest stars. For each star, we extracted the individual mode frequencies by fitting the power spectrum using a maximum likelihood estimation approach. We then derived initial guesses of the stellar masses and ages based on two seismic parameters and on a characteristic frequency ratio, and modelled the two components independently with the stellar evolution code CESTAM. In addition, we derived the masses of the three stars by applying a Bayesian analysis to the position and radial-velocity measurements of the system. Results. Based on stellar modelling, the mean common age of the system is 10.8 ± 0.2 Gyr and the masses of the two seismic components are MA = 0.99 ± 0.01 M⊙ and MBa = 0.86 ± 0.01 M⊙. From the mass ratio of the close pair, MBb/MBa = 0.767 ± 0.006, the mass of the faintest star is MBb = 0.66 ± 0.01 M⊙ and the total seismic mass of the system is then Msyst = 2.51 ± 0.02 M⊙. This value agrees perfectly with the total mass derived from our orbital analysis, Msyst = 2.51−0.18+0.20M⊙ $M_{\textrm{syst}} =2.51^{+0.20}_{-0.18}\,M_{\odot}$ M syst = 2.51 − 0.18 + 0.20   M ⊙ , and leads to the best current estimate of the parallax for the system, π = 21.9 ± 0.2 mas. In addition, the minimal relative inclination between the inner and outer orbits is 10.9° ± 1.5°, implying that the system does not have a coplanar configuration. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The detection of mixed modes in subgiants and red giants by the CoRoT and Kepler space-borne missions allows us to investigate the internal structure of evolved low-mass stars, from the end of the main sequence to the central helium-burning phase. In particular, the measurement of the mean core rotation rate as a function of the evolution places stringent constraints on the physical mechanisms responsible for the angular momentum redistribution in stars. It showed that the current stellar evolution codes including the modelling of rotation fail to reproduce the observations. An additional physical process that efficiently extracts angular momentum from the core is thus necessary. Our aim is to assess the ability of mixed modes to do this. To this end, we developed a formalism that provides a modelling of the wave fluxes in both the mean angular momentum and the mean energy equations in a companion paper. In this article, mode amplitudes are modelled based on recent asteroseismic observations, and a quantitative estimate of the angular momentum transfer is obtained. This is performed for a benchmark model of 1.3 M at three evolutionary stages, representative of the evolved pulsating stars observed by CoRoT and Kepler. We show that mixed modes extract angular momentum from the innermost regions of subgiants and red giants. However, this transport of angular momentum from the core is unlikely to counterbalance the effect of the core contraction in subgiants and early red giants. In contrast, for more evolved red giants, mixed modes are found efficient enough to balance and exceed the effect of the core contraction, in particular in the hydrogen-burning shell. Our results thus indicate that mixed modes are a promising candidate to explain the observed spin-down of the core of evolved red giants, but that an other mechanism is to be invoked for subgiants and early red giants. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Stellar evolutionary models simulate well binary stars when individual stellar mass and system metallicity are known. The mass can be derived directly from observations only in the case of multiple stellar systems, mainly binaries. Yet, the number of such stars for which accurate stellar masses are available is rather small. The main goal of this project is to provide realistic mass estimates for a homogeneous sample of about a thousand FGK single stars, using four different methods and techniques. We present the masses inferred according to each one of these methods as well as a final mass estimate consisting in the median of the four mass estimates. The procedures evaluated here include the use of stellar evolutionary models, mass–luminosity relation and surface gravity spectroscopic observations. By combining the results obtained with different methods, we determine the best mass value for each individual star, as well as the associated error budget. Our results confirm the expected consistency between the different mass estimation methods. None the less, for masses above 1.2 M⊙, the spectroscopic surface gravities seem to overestimate the mass. This result may be a consequence of the spectroscopic surface gravities used in this analysis. Nevertheless, this problem is minimized by the fact that we have several approaches available for deriving stellar masses. Moreover, we suggest an empirical procedure to overcome this issue. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Context. Determining the mass of stars is crucial both for improving stellar evolution theory and for characterising exoplanetary systems. Asteroseismology offers a promising way for estimating the stellar mean density. When combined with accurate radii determinations, such as are expected from Gaia, this yields accurate stellar masses. The main difficulty is finding the best way to extract the mean density of a star from a set of observed frequencies. Aims. We seek to establish a new method for estimating the stellar mean density, which combines the simplicity of a scaling law while providing the accuracy of an inversion technique. Methods. We provide a framework in which to construct and evaluate kernel-based linear inversions that directly yield the mean density of a star. We then describe three different inversion techniques (SOLA and two scaling laws) and apply them to the Sun, several test cases and three stars, α Cen B, HD 49933 and HD 49385, two of which are observed by CoRoT. Results. The SOLA (subtractive optimally localised averages) approach and the scaling law based on the surface correcting technique described by Kjeldsen et al. (2008, ApJ, 683, L175) yield comparable results that can reach an accuracy of 0.5% and are better than scaling the large frequency separation. The reason for this is that the averaging kernels from the two first methods are comparable in quality and are better than what is obtained with the large frequency separation. It is also shown that scaling the large frequency separation is more sensitive to near-surface effects, but is much less affected by an incorrect mode identification. As a result, one can identify pulsation modes by looking for an l and n assignment which provides the best agreement between the results from the large frequency separation and those from one of the two other methods. Non-linear effects are also discussed, as is the effects of mixed modes. In particular, we show that mixed modes bring little improvement to the mean density estimates because of their poorly adapted kernels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]