November 2013

The spectacular data delivered by the Kepler space mission have not only boosted the discovery of planets orbiting other stars, they have opened a window on the inner workings of the stars themselves.  For the study of the RR Lyrae stars, Kepler has led to a breakthrough.  To date, over 50 RR Lyrae stars are known in the Kepler field. I will present some of the most interesting results on RR Lyrae stars obtained through the Kepler mission so far.

Katrien Kolenberg was born in Belgium.  She studied Physics at the University of Leuven, followed by a PhD in astrophysics. Her research took her first to Vienna, Austria, where she worked at the Astronomical Institute for several years.   She currently works at the Harvard-Smithsonian Center for Astrophysics, in Cambridge MA, as a Marie Curie Fellow. The main focus of her research lies in stellar astrophysics, more specifically asteroseismology.