Large Turbulent Elements in Supergiant Photospheres
Abstract
During the ‘cool phase’ of the super-supergiant HR 8752, which happened around 1973, when the star's spectral type was K2...K5 Ia+, the most probable vertical extent of the main turbulent elements in the star's photosphere was about 6 times the density scale height, which is about half the stellar radius. In early-type photospheres (class Ia) it is about 10 times the atmospheric density scale height (about 0.25 of the stellar radius), while in less extreme (luminosity class Ib) medium-type supergiants the most probable vertical extent of the elements is approx. 8 times the density scale height (≈0.05R). Large turbulent elements are apparently a common feature in supergiant photospheres; the more extreme the supergiant the larger the relative size of the eddies.
- Publication:
-
Astrophysics and Space Science
- Pub Date:
- May 1979
- DOI:
- 10.1007/BF00643919
- Bibcode:
- 1979Ap&SS..62..245D
- Keywords:
-
- Photosphere;
- Stellar Luminosity;
- Supergiant Stars;
- Turbulence;
- Astrophysics;
- Stellar Evolution;
- Stellar Spectra;
- Vortices;
- Astrophysics