Asteroseismology: Lessons From the Past and Prospects for the Future

Abstract

Ground-based, and now space-based, studies of a range of stellar families (all represented at this workshop) have, in large part, moved from study of pulsations for their own sake on to information of real value for stellar physics and its applications. This required a combination of improved observations, and open-minded stellar modelling, that continues today. Pulsating compact stars provide a good example of this progress. A flurry of activity from the mid 1980s to the mid 1990s, both observational and theoretical, began to realize this potential. A new generation of stellar models, coupled with reanalysis of seismological data and discovery of many new faint pulsators, have recently revitalized this field and may soon provide firm answers to some of the outstanding problems of post-AGB evolution. The discovery and analysis of pulsating sdB stars has followed an accelerated trajectory, enjoying mature theoretical model framework largely in place at the same time as the developing observational base.