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Spots on Betelgeuse, what are they?

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  26 August 2011

Andrea K. Dupree
Andrea K. Dupree*
Affiliation:
Smithsonian Astrophysical Observatory/Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics 60 Garden Street, Cambridge, MA 02138USA email: [email protected]
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Abstract

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The supergiant star Alpha Orionis (Betelgeuse) is the only star other than the Sun to be spatially resolved either through direct imaging or through reconstruction of interferometric observations. Centimeter-radio wavelength, infrared and ultraviolet images reveal a few bright hot spots in the photosphere and chromosphere that possess characteristics different from sunspots. Large photospheric spots on Betelgeuse appear to result from convective motions, consistent with radiative hydrodynamic modeling; the chromospheric hot spots may be produced by shock waves in the chromosphere excited by the convective motions or pulsation in the photosphere. Bright chromospheric spots that cluster around the pole of Betelgeuse could be a natural result of shock breakout in a rotating star.

Keywords

stars: supergiantsstars: imaging
Type
Contributed Papers
Information
Proceedings of the International Astronomical Union , Volume 6 , Symposium S273: The Physics of Sun and Star Spots , August 2010 , pp. 188 - 194
Copyright
Copyright © International Astronomical Union 2011

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