First Name:
Ryan
Last Name:
Lambert
Major Department:
Physics
Thesis Director:
Richard O. Gray
Date of Thesis:
Dec 2014
Beginning with the Mt. Wilson project, standards method for detecting and characterizing stellar magnetic activity has been the measurement of the chromospheric flux in the cores of the Ca II K & H lines. However, it is important to explore the use of other features in the stellar spectrum for the same purpose, especially those that will give insight into the manifestation of stellar activity in the photosphere. This thesis identifies and explores two such features – the Ca I resonance line at 4226 Å, and the hydrogen gamma (Hɣ) line in the Balmer series. This project used data made available by the Young Solar Analogs project to explore the relationship between indices based on these two spectral features and the Mt. Wilson chromospheric activity index based on the Ca II K & H. The results show promise for the use of these two photospheric indices. As expected, many stars show a negative correlation between Ca I and Hɣ, and a number of stars show interesting correlations between these indices and the Mt. Wilson index.