Flare Rates in Low-Mass Stars

Low-mass stars constitute a large majority of the total population of stars in our galaxy, yet relatively little is known about their properties. This is largely a consequence of the difficulty of observing them due to their intrinsic dimness. As they are so common, low-mass stars are a large potential source of noise in numerous variability studies including extra-solar planet and novae surveys. Flare rates for these stars are also important in constraining the characteristics of their magnetic dynamos. In this study, we look at the open cluster IC 2391, observing three fields in U and I Johnson-Cousins filters. The data come from the CTIO 0.9m telescope. Twenty-three late-type stars are monitored, half of which have previously published I magnitudes. We present preliminary results

of the activity rates of these stars.