Automated Extended Aperture Photometry of K2 Variable Stars

Proper photometric data are challenging to obtain in the K2 mission of the Kepler space telescope due to strong systematics caused by the two-wheel-mode operation. It is especially true for variable stars wherein physical phenomena occur on timescales similar to the instrumental signals. We original...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Publications of the Astronomical Society of the Pacific 2022-01, Vol.134 (1031), p.1-14
Main Authors: Bódi, Attila, Szabó, Pál, Plachy, Emese, Molnár, László, Szabó, Róbert
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Astronomical Software, Data Analysis, and Techniques
Online Access:Get full text
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Summary:Proper photometric data are challenging to obtain in the K2 mission of the Kepler space telescope due to strong systematics caused by the two-wheel-mode operation. It is especially true for variable stars wherein physical phenomena occur on timescales similar to the instrumental signals. We originally developed a method with the aim to extend the photometric aperture to be able to compensate the motion of the telescope which we named Extended Aperture Photometry (EAP). Here we present the outline of the automatized version of the EAP method, an opensource pipeline called autoEAP. We compare the light curve products to other photometric solutions for examples chosen from high-amplitude variable stars. In addition to the photometry, we developed a new detrending method, which is based on phase dispersion minimization and is able to eliminate long-term instrumental signals for periodic variable stars.
ISSN:0004-6280
1538-3873