The Golden Gift of Red Giants

In the early days of asteroseismology, red giant stars were often considered secondary targets with limited potential for providing precise constraints on stellar structure and evolution. However, with recent and ongoing space missions such as CoRoT, Kepler, and TESS, this perception has changed. Red giants have emerged as keystone targets of asteroseismology, enabling the determination of their masses, radii, ages, and evolutionary status with unprecedented precision. Moreover, asteroseismic data are now complemented by spectroscopic (APOGEE) and astrometric (Gaia) measurements, offering a unique opportunity to address long-standing questions about the evolution of stars and the Galaxy.

This book explains the reasons behind this transformation and explores the richness of information that red giants provide-a phenomenon we refer to as The Golden Gift of Red Giants. We begin by tracing the evolution of low-mass stars from their pre-main-sequence phase through to the cooling of white dwarfs, laying the foundation for understanding how red giants differ from other stars and highlighting the wealth of insights they can offer. The final section delves into this trove of information through detailed analyses of asteroseismic observations from space- based telescopes, demonstrating how these data revolutionise our understanding of stellar and galactic evolution.