starspot
Sign in to saveStarspots are stellar phenomena, so-named by analogy with sunspots. Spots as small as sunspots have not been detected on other stars, as they would cause undetectably small fluctuations in brightness. The commonly observed starspots are in general much larger than those on the Sun: up to about 30% of the stellar surface may be covered, corresponding to starspots 100 times larger than those on the Sun.
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Encyclopedic overview
9 sectionsContents
- Detection and measurements
- Temperature
- Lifetimes
- Activity cycles
- Maunder minimum
- Flip-flop cycles
- Notes
- References
- Further reading
Starspots are stellar phenomena, so-named by analogy with sunspots. Spots as small as sunspots have not been detected on other stars, as they would cause undetectably small fluctuations in brightness. The commonly observed starspots are in general much larger than those on the Sun: up to about 30% of the stellar surface may be covered, corresponding to starspots 100 times larger than those on the Sun.
==Detection and measurements ==
Excerpted from Wikipedia’s “starspot” article, available under the CC BY-SA 4.0 licence.