Effective temperatures of low-mass stars

Yet, the properties of exoplanets cannot be precisely determined without accurate and precise measurements of the host star. Spectra obtained with the Immersion Grating Infrared Spectrometer simultaneously provide diagnostics for most stellar parameters, but the first step in any analysis is the determination of the effective temperature.

Here we report the calibration of high-resolution H-band spectra to accurately determine the effective temperature for stars between 4000 and 3000K (~K8-M5) using absorption line-depths of FeI, OH, and Al I. The field star sample used here contains 254 K and M stars with temperatures derived using BT-Settl synthetic spectra. We use 106 stars with precise temperatures in the literature to calibrate our method, with typical errors of about 140K, and systematic uncertainties less than ~120K.