Interferometric observations of weak radio flares from a red dwarf star

Abstract

MEASUREMENT of the radio emission associated with flares on M-type red dwarf stars has been difficult because of the sporadic and transient nature of the phenomena, and the danger of confusion with terrestrial sources of emission. The existence of detectable radio emission from the flares was first established by integration and correlation with the optical flares^1,2 but in several thousand hours of observations there are only a few cases where the existence of individual flares of long duration has been unambiguous^3–5. We have used a long baseline interferometer for such measurements, and report here observations which yielded clear records of weak radio flares from the star YZ CMi.