The search for ZZ Ceti stars in the original Kepler mission

Abstract

We report the discovery of 42 white dwarfs in the original Kepler mission field, including nine new confirmed pulsating hydrogen-atmosphere white dwarfs (ZZ Ceti stars). Guided by the Kepler-INT Survey (KIS), we selected white dwarf candidates on the basis of their U-g, g-r, and r-H_alpha photometric colours. We followed up these candidates with high-signal-to-noise optical spectroscopy from the 4.2-m William Herschel Telescope. Using ground-based, time-series photometry, we put our sample of new spectroscopically characterized white dwarfs in the context of the empirical ZZ Ceti instability strip. Prior to our search, only two pulsating white dwarfs had been observed by Kepler. Ultimately, four of our new ZZ Cetis were observed from space. These rich datasets are helping initiate a rapid advancement in the asteroseismic investigation of pulsating white dwarfs, which continues with the extended Kepler mission, K2.

9 pages, 6 figures, accepted for publication in MNRAS

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• Outbursts in two new cool pulsating DA white dwarfs
• Probing the structure of Kepler ZZ Ceti stars with full evolutionary models-based asteroseismology
• Properties and Asteroseismological analysis of a new ZZ ceti discovered by TMTS
• New ZZ Ceti stars from the LAMOST survey
• DA White Dwarfs in the Kepler Field
• Seismological Studies of Pulsating DA White Dwarfs Observed with the Kepler Space Telescope and K2 Campaigns 1-8
• MOCKA -- A PLATO mock asteroseismic catalogue: Simulations for gravity-mode oscillators
• An observer's view on the future of asteroseismology
• A comparison of best fits obtained in white dwarf asteroseismology using the WDEC and the LPCODE
• Constraints from parallaxes and average period spacings in the asteroseismic study of 8 DAVs
• Seismic test of the mass-radius relationship of hydrogen-atmospheric white dwarf stars