No abstract

We present the discovery of HD 221416 b, the first transiting planet identified by the Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) for which asteroseismology of the host star is possible. HD 221416 b (HIP 116158, TOI-197) is a bright (V=8.2 mag), spectroscopically classified subgiant that oscillates with an average frequency of about 430 μHz and displays a clear signature of mixed modes. The oscillation amplitude confirms that the redder TESS bandpass compared to Kepler has a small effect on the oscillations, supporting the expected yield of thousands of solar-like oscillators with TESS 2 minute cadence observations. Asteroseismic modeling yields a robust determination of the host star radius (R å =2.943±0.064 R e), mass (M å =1.212±0.074 M e), and age (4.9±1.1 Gyr), and demonstrates that it has just started ascending the red-giant branch. Combining asteroseismology with transit modeling and radial-velocity observations, we show that the planet is a "hot Saturn" (R p =9.17±0.33 R ⊕) with an orbital period of ∼14.3 days, irradiance of F=343±24 F ⊕ , and moderate mass (M p =60.5±5.7 M ⊕) and density (ρ p =0.431±0.062 g cm −3). The properties of HD 221416 b show that the host-star metallicity-planet mass correlation found in sub-Saturns (4-8 R ⊕) does not extend to larger radii, indicating that planets in the transition between sub-Saturns and Jupiters follow a relatively narrow range of densities. With a density measured to ∼15%, HD 221416 b is one of the best characterized Saturn-size planets to date, augmenting the small number of known transiting planets around evolved stars and demonstrating the power of TESS to characterize exoplanets and their host stars using asteroseismology.

Context. The search for twins of the Sun and Earth relies on accurate characterization of stellar and the exoplanetary parameters age, mass, and radius. In the modern era of asteroseismology, parameters of solar-like stars are derived by fitting theoretical models to observational data, which include measurements of their oscillation frequencies, metallicity [Fe/H], and effective temperature T eff . Furthermore, combining this information with transit data yields the corresponding parameters for their associated exoplanets. Aims. While values of [Fe/H] and T eff are commonly stated to a precision of ∼ 0.1 dex and ∼ 100 K, the impact of systematic errors in their measurement has not been studied in practice within the context of the parameters derived from them. Here we seek to quantify this.Methods. We used the Stellar Parameters in an Instant (SPI) pipeline to estimate the parameters of nearly 100 stars observed by Kepler and Gaia, many of which are confirmed planet hosts. We adjusted the reported spectroscopic measurements of these stars by introducing faux systematic errors and, separately, artificially increasing the reported uncertainties of the measurements, and quantified the differences in the resulting parameters. Results. We find that a systematic error of 0.1 dex in [Fe/H] translates to differences of only 4%, 2%, and 1% on average in the resulting stellar ages, masses, and radii, which are well within their uncertainties (∼ 11%, 3.5%, 1.4%) as derived by SPI. We also find that increasing the uncertainty of [Fe/H] measurements by 0.1 dex increases the uncertainties of the ages, masses, and radii by only 0.01 Gyr, 0.02 M , and 0.01 R , which are again well below their reported uncertainties (∼ 0.5 Gyr, 0.04 M , 0.02 R ). The results for T eff at 100 K are similar. Conclusions. Stellar parameters from SPI are unchanged within uncertainties by errors of up to 0.14 dex or 175 K. They are even more robust to errors in T eff than the seismic scaling relations. Consequently, the parameters for their exoplanets are also robust.

Since the onset of the "space revolution" of high-precision high-cadence photometry, asteroseismology has been demonstrated as a powerful tool for informing Galactic archeology investigations. The launch of the NASA Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite (TESS) mission has enabled seismic-based inferences to go full skyproviding a clear advantage for large ensemble studies of the different Milky Way components. Here we demonstrate its potential for investigating the Galaxy by carrying out the first asteroseismic ensemble study of red giant stars observed by TESS. We use a sample of 25 stars for which we measure their global asteroseimic observables and estimate their fundamental stellar properties, such as radius, mass, and age. Significant improvements are seen in the uncertainties of our estimates when combining seismic observables from TESS with astrometric measurements from the Gaia mission compared to when the seismology and astrometry are applied separately. Specifically, when combined we show that stellar radii can be determined to a precision of a few percent, masses to 5%-10%, and ages to the 20% level. This is comparable to the precision typically obtained using end-of-mission Kepler data.

We present an in-depth analysis of the bright subgiant HR 7322 (KIC 10005473) using Kepler short-cadence photometry, optical interferometry from CHARA, high-resolution spectra from SONG, and stellar modelling using grids and the Bayesian grid-fitting algorithm . HR 7322 is only the second subgiant with high-quality Kepler asteroseismology for which we also have interferometric data. We find a limb-darkened angular diameter of 0.443 ± 0.007 mas, which, combined with a distance derived using the parallax from Gaia DR2 and a bolometric flux, yields a linear radius of 2.00 ± 0.03 R and an effective temperature of 6350 ± 90 K. HR 7322 exhibits solar-like oscillations, and using the asteroseismic scaling relations and revisions thereof, we find good agreement between asteroseismic and interferometric stellar radius. The level of precision reached by the careful modelling is to a great extent due to the presence of an avoided crossing in the dipole oscillation mode pattern of HR 7322. We find that the standard models predict a stellar radius systematically smaller than the observed interferometric one and that a sub-solar mixing length parameter is needed to achieve a good fit to individual oscillation frequencies, interferometric temperature, and spectroscopic metallicity.